"Jesu that erst of mighte most Fader and sone and Holy Ghost."
Before I quit the subject of Sir Guy, I must observe, that if we may believe Dugdale in his _Baronage_ (vol. i. p. 243, col. 2), the fame of our English Champion had in the time of Henry IV. travelled as far as the East, and was no less popular among the Sarazens, than here in the West among the nations of Christendom. In that reign a Lord Beauchamp travelling to Jerusalem was kindly received by a noble person, the Soldan's Lieutenant, who hearing he was descended from the famous Guy of Warwick, "whose story they had in books of their own language," invited him to his palace; and royally feasting him, presented him three precious stones of great value, besides divers cloaths of silk and gold given to his servants.
6. The romance of _Syr Bevis_ is described in page 216 of this vol. Two manuscript copies of this poem are extant at Cambridge, viz., in the public library[519], and in that of Caius Coll. Class A. 9. (5.)--The first of these begins,
There is also a copy of this romance of _Sir Bevis of Hamptoun_, in the Edinburgh MS. Numb. XXII. consisting of twenty-five leaves, and beginning thus:
"Lordinges herkneth to mi tale, Is merier than the nightengale."
The printed copies begin different from both, viz.,
7. _Libeaux_ (_Libeaus_, or _Lybius_) _Disconius_ is preserved in the Editor's folio MS. (page 317) [pr. ed, vol. ii. p. 415], where the first stanza is,
"Jesus Christ christen kinge, And his mother that sweete thinge, Helpe them at their neede, That will listen to my tale, Of a Knight I will you tell, A doughtye man of deede."
An older copy is preserved in the Cotton Library (Calig. A. 2. fol. 40) but containing such innumerable variations, that it is apparently a different translation of some old French original, which will account for the title of _Le Beaux Disconus_, or the Fair Unknown. The first line is,
As for _Pleindamour_, or _Blandamoure_, no romance with this title has been discovered; but as the word _Blaundemere_ occurs in the romance of _Libius Disconius_, in the Editor's folio MS. p. 319 [pr. ed. vol. ii. p. 420], he thought the name of _Blandamoure_ (which was in all the editions of Chaucer he had then seen) might have some reference to this. But _Pleindamour_, the name restored by Mr. Tyrwhitt, is more remote.