In the 36th page of the preceding Chronicle it is stated that "In this yere (1295) the kyng [Edward the first] was defraunded of his lond in Gascoigne in this manner, sothly: the kyng hadde yoven the forseyd lond of Gascoyne to the kynges suster of Fraunce, for that she schulde be yoyned to hym in fre mariage: and be some of his counseill enfeffed here in the sayd lond of Gascoigne, whiche lond of Gascoigne sche yaf to Charles here brother, and to other; and the matrymoigne betwen here and kyng Edward sche sette at noughte, and wolde noughte stonden therto."--That circumstance is the subject of the following Fragment of a curious Poem preserved in the archives of the Corporation of the City of London, in the MS. entitled _Liber Custumarium_, fol. 84; from which it has been extracted by the obliging permission of Henry Woodthorpe, Esq. the Town Clerk. The leaf which contained the concluding stanzas has been lost; but judging from the number of those which remain, it originally consisted of about nine more verses. It is written in the hand of the period in which the events to which it alludes took place, and as the documents in the volume from which it is copied end in the succeeding reign, there is every reason to presume that it was entered in the Records of the City of London within a short period after it was composed. Every line of each verse contains the same letter in the middle of the line, and every line ends with the same letter: these two letters are placed in the middle and at the end of each verse, separated from the words to which they belong, but connected with them by lines in the manner in which the first verse of the Poem is here printed, and which has been considered sufficient to show the singular manner in which it was originally written.
HIC INCIPIT QUIDA' RISMUS F'TUS DE P'DIC'ONE VASCON' ET DE RIUSD' CONQUESTU P' R' E' FILIU' REG' H'.
Satis novit seculu______ ____De lingua Galloru_____ \_ _/ \_ Qualiter fit speculu___ \ / ___Patens traditoru_____ \ \===m===/ \===m Quia p' p'fidia________/ _/ \_ \___Pessimam ip'oru______/ _/ _/ \_ _/ Jam p'dit Vasconia____/ \__Princeps Anglicoru__/
Rex fidem adhibuit Dictus Gallicorum Egit quod non debuit Nam fraus miserorum Seriem composuit Quorumdam verborum Que Regi transposuit Cetus nunciorum