tolled, and the funeral service was said for a knight thus degraded as for one dead to knightly honour.  And if he fell in the appeal to the judgment of God, the same dishonour was done to his senseless corpse.  If alive, he was only rescued from death to be confined in the cloister.  Such at least were the strict roles of Chivalry, though the courtesy of the victor, or the clemency of the prince, might remit them in favourable cases.’

For illustration of forms observed at such contests, see Richard ii, i. 3.

line 524.  Each knight declared on oath that he ’had his quarrel just.’  The fall of an unworthy knight is referred to below, vi. 961.

Stanza xxix. line 545.  This illustrates Henry’s impulsive and imperious character, and is not, necessarily, a premonition of his final attitude towards Roman Catholicism.

line 555. dastard (Icel. doestr = exhausted, breathless; O. Dut. dasaert = a fool) is very appropriately used here, after the description above, St. xxii, to designate the poltroon that quails only before death.  Cp.  Pope’s Iliad, ii. 427:—­

     ‘And die the dastard first, who dreads to die.’

Stanza XXX. line 568.  Cp.  Julius Caesar, ii. 2. 35:—­

     ’It seems to me most strange that men should fear;
      Seeing that death, a necessary end,
      Will come when it will come.’

Stanza XXXI. line 573. the fiery Dane.  See note on line 10 above.  Passing northwards after destroying York and Tynemouth, the Danes in 875 burned the monastery on Lindisfarne.  The bishop and monks, with their relics and the body of St. Cuthbert, fled over the Kylve hills.  See Raine, &c.

line 576. the crosier bends.  Crosier (O.  Fr. croiser; Fr. croix = cross) is used both for the staff of an archbishop with a cross on the top, and for the staff of a bishop or an abbot, terminating in a carved or ornamented curve or crook.  The word is used here metaphorically for Papal power, as Bacon uses it, speaking of Anselm and Becket, ’who with their CROSIERS did almost try it with the king’s sword.’  Constance’s prophecy refers to Henry VIII’s victorious collision with the Pope.

Stanza xxxii. lines 585-91.  It is impossible not to connect this striking picture with that of Virgil’s Sibyl (Aeneid, vi. 45):—­

     ’Ventum erat ad limen, cum virgo, ’poscere fata
      Tempus,’ ait; ‘deus, ecce, deus.’  Cui talia fanti
      Ante fores subito non voltus, non color unus,
      Non comptae mansere comae; sed pectus anhelum,
      Et rabie fera corda tument; maiorque videri
      Nec mortale sonans, adflata est numine quando
      Iam propiore dei.’

line 588.  Stared, stood up stiffly.  Cp.  Julius Caesar, iv. 3. 280, and Tempest, i. 2. 213, ‘with hair UPSTARING.’

line 600.  See above, line 468, and note.

Stanza XXXIII. line 616. for terror’s sake = because of terror.  Cp. 
‘For fashion’s sake,’ As You Like It, iii. 2. 55.