A poor widow, somedeal y-stept in age, Was whilom dwelling in a poor cottáge, Beside a grovë, standing in a dale. This widow, of which I tellë you my tale, Since thilkë day that she was last a wife, In patiénce led a full simple life, For little was her chattel and her rent. By husbandry of such as God her sent, She found herself, and eke her daughters two. Three largë sowës had she, and no mo’; Three kine, and eke a sheep that hightë Mall. Full sooty was her bow’r, and eke her hall, In which she ate full many a slender meal. Of poignant saucë knew she never a deal. No dainty morsel passed through her throat; Her diet was accordant to her cote. Repletión her madë never sick; Attemper diet was all her physíc, And exercise, and heartë’s suffisance. The goutë let her nothing for to dance, Nor apoplexy shentë not her head. No winë drank she, neither white nor red: Her board was served most with white and black, Milk and brown bread, in which she found no lack, Seind bacon, and sometimes an egg or tway; For she was as it were a manner dey.
A yard she had, enclosed all about With stickës, and a dryë ditch without, In which she had a cock, hight Chanticleer; In all the land of crowing n’as his peer. His voice was merrier than the merry orgón, On massë days that in the churches gon. Well sickerer was his crowing in his lodge, Than is a clock, or an abbáy horloge. By nature he knew each ascensioún Of th’ equinoctial in thilkë town; For when degrees fiftenë were ascended, Then crew he, that it might not be amended. His comb was redder than the fine corál, Embattell’d as it were a castle wall. His bill was black, and as the jet it shone; Like azure were his leggës and his tone; His nailës whiter than the lily flow’r, And like the burnish’d gold was his coloúr, This gentle cock had in his governánce Sev’n hennës, for to do all his pleasánce, Which were his sisters and his paramours, And wondrous like to him as of coloúrs. Of which the fairest-hued in the throat Was