v. 18. _My fedders freshe as is the emrawde grene_]—_emrawde,_ i. e. emerald. So Ovid in his charming verses on Corinna’s parrot;
“Tu poteras virides pennis hebetare smaragdos.”
v. 22. _My proper Parrot, my lytyll prety foole_]—_proper_, i. e. pretty, handsome (elsewhere Skelton uses “proper” and “prety” as synonymes: see note, p. 125. v. 127).
“I pray thee what hath ere the Parret got, And yet they say he talkes in great mens bowers? ... A good _foole_ call’d with paine perhaps may be.”
Sidney’s _Arcadia_, lib. ii. p. 229. ed. 1613.
v. 26. _mute_] i. e. mew: see note _ad l._
v. 30. _Quis expedivit psittaco suum chaire_]—_chaire_—ΧΑΙΡΕ. From Persius, _Prol._ 8.
Page 3. v. 31. _Dowse French of Parryse_] _Dowse_, i. e. sweet, soft. Chaucer’s Prioress spoke French
“After the scole of Stratford atte bowe, For _Frenche of Paris_ was to hire unknowe.”
v. 38. _ryall_] i. e. royal. In the marginal note on this line, “Katerina universalis vitii ruina, Græcum est” is an allusion to the Greek καθαρίζω or καθαρός.
v. 40. _Parrot, saves habler Castiliano_] See note _ad l._ “Parrot, can you speak Castilian?” is a question which Spanish boys at the present day frequently address to that bird.
v. 41. _With fidasso de cosso in Turkey and in Trace_]—_fidasso de cosso_ is perhaps lingua franca,—some corruption (see marginal note on the line) of the Italian _fidarsi di se stesso_: _Trace_, i. e. Thrace.
From Horace, _Carm._ iii. iv. 65 (where “consilî”).
Page 4. v. 50. _An almon now for Parrot_] I know not if these words occur in any writer anterior to the time of Skelton; but they afterwards became a sort of proverbial expression.
Page 4. v. 51. _In Salve festa dies, toto theyr doth best_]—_theyr_, i. e. there. Skelton has two copies of verses, which begin “Salve, festa dies, toto,” &c.: see vol. i. pp. 190, 191.
v. 67. _Iobab was brought vp in the lande of Hus_] “Verisimile est Jobum eumdem esse cum Jobabo, qui quartus est ab Esaü ... Duces in ista opinione sequimur omnes fere antiquos Patres quos persuasit, ut ita sentirent, additamentum in exemplaribus Græcis, Arabicis et in antiqua Vulgata Latina appositum: ‘Job vero habitabat in terra Hus, inter terminos Edom et Arabiæ, et antea vocabatur Jobab,’” &c. _Concordantiæ Bibl. Sacr. Vulg. Ed._ by Dutripon, in v. _Job. ii._