v. 50. _craked_] i. e. talked vauntingly.
v. 60. _tyrid_] A term in falconry: the hawk _tired_ on what was thrown to her, when she pulled at and tore it.
—— _a chase_] Compare a passage in that curious tract, by Walter Smith, _xii Mery Jests of the wyddow Edyth_;
“Her potage & eke her ale were well poudred With an holsome influence that surgeons call Pouder Sinipari that wil make on cast his gall:”
in consequence of which, she is compelled suddenly to quit the supper-table, and,
“When that she was vp, she got her foorth apace, And er she had walkt xxx fote, she marked _a chase_ And eftsones another, thrugh the Hal as she yede,” &c.
“A _chase_ at tennis is that spot where a ball falls, beyond which the adversary must strike his ball to gain a point or chace. At long tennis, it is the spot where the ball leaves off rolling.” Douce’s _Illust. of Shakespeare_, i. 485. Compare our author’s _Why come ye nat to Courte_, v. 880. vol. ii. 53.
Page 157. v. 63. _corporas_] i. e. communion-cloth, the fine linen cloth used to cover the _body_, or consecrated elements.
v. 65. _gambawdis_] i. e. gambols, pranks.
—— _gery_] “_Gerysshe_, wylde or lyght heeded _farouche_.” Palsgrave’s _Lesclar. de la Lang. Fr._, 1530. fol. lxxxviii. (Table of Adiect.).
Lydgate’s _Fall of Prynces_, B. iii. leaf lxxvii. ed. Wayland.
“And as a swalowe _geryshe_ of her flyghte, Twene slowe and swifte, now croked nowe vpright.”
Tyrwhitt explains “_gery_—changeable.” _Gloss._ to Chaucer’s _Cant. Tales_. Richardson observes that in the present passage of Skelton “it seems to be _giddy_ (sc.) with turning round.” _Dict._ in v.
v. 69. _the rode loft_] A loft (generally placed just over the passage out of the church into the chancel,) where stood the _rood_,—an image of Christ on the cross, with figures of the Virgin Mary and Saint John on each side of it: compare v. 126 of the present poem;
“His hawke then flew vppon _The rode with Mary and John”_.
v. 73. _And cryed, Stow, stow, stow!_] So Fansy, in our author’s _Magnyfycence_, exclaims to his hawk,
“_Stowe_, byrde, _stowe, stowe_! It is best I fede my hawke now.”
“But _stow_, bird, stow, See now the game’s afoote, And white-mail’d Nisus, He is flying to’t.”
_Odes_, p. 250, appended to _Natures Embassie_, 1621.