4. The use of _ado_ (for _at do_), in the sense of 'to do,' is also Northern; see the New E. Dict. It occurs in l. 5080, riming with _go_.
5. The dropping of the inflexional _e_, in the infin. mood or gerund, is also Northern. In fragment B, this is very common; as examples, take the rimes _lyf_, _dryf_, 1873; _feet_, _lete_ (= _leet_), 1981; _sit_, _flit_, 2371; _may_, _convay_, 2427; _may_, _assay_, 2453; _set_, _get_, 2615; _spring_, _thing_, 2627; _ly_, _by_, 2629; _ly_, _erly_, 2645; &c. The Chaucerian forms are _dryv-e_, _let-e_, _flit-te_, _convey-e_, _assay-e_, _get-e_, _spring-e_, _ly-e_. That the Northern forms are not due to the scribe, is obvious; for he usually avoids them where he can. Thus in l. 2309, he writes _sitting_ instead of _sittand_; but in l. 2263, he could not avoid the form _sittand_, because of the rime.
§ 8. TEST III.--THE RIMING OF -y WITH -y-ë.--With two intentional exceptions (both in the ballad metre of Sir Thopas, see note to Cant. Ta. B 2092), Chaucer _never_ allows such a word as _trewely_ (which etymologically ends in _-y_) to rime with French substantives in _-y-ë_, such as _fol-y-ë_, _Ielos-y-ë_ (Ital. _follia_, _gelosia_). But in fragment B, examples abound; e. g. _I_, _malady(e)_[186], 1849; _hastily_, _company(e)_, 1861; _generally_, _vilany(e)_, 2179; _worthy_, _curtesy(e)_, 2209; _foly(e)_, _by_, 2493, 2521; _curtesy(e)_, _gladly_, 2985; _foly(e)_, _utterly_, 3171; _foly(e)_, _hastily_, 3241; and many more.
This famous test, first proposed by Mr. Bradshaw, is a very simple but effective one; it separates the spurious from the genuine works of Chaucer with ease and certainty in all but a few cases, viz. cases wherein a spurious poem happens to satisfy the test; and these are rare indeed.
§ 9. TEST IV.--ASSONANT RIMES. Those who know nothing about the pronunciation of Middle English, and require an easy test, appreciable by any child who has a good ear, may observe this. Chaucer does not employ mere assonances, i. e. rimes in which only the vowel-sounds correspond. He does not rime _take_ with _shape_, nor _fame_ with _lane_. But the author of fragment B had no ear for this. He actually has such rimes as these: _kepe_, _eke_, 2125; _shape_, _make_, 2259; _escape_, _make_, 2753; _take_, _scape_, 3165; _storm_, _corn_, 4343; _doun_, _tourn_, 5469.