Geoffrey Chaucer

I should in reason tell you the condition
Of each of them, his rank and his position,

He was on hand at Alexandria’s fall.
He had often sat in precedence to all
The nations at the banquet board in Prussia.
He had fought in Lithuania and in Russia,
No Christian knight more often; he had been
In Moorish Africa at Benmarin,
At the siege of Algeciras in Granada,
And sailed in many a glorious armada
In the Mediterranean, and fought as well
At Ayas and Attalia when they fell
In Armenia and on Asia Minor’s coast.
Of fifteen deadly battles he could boast,
And in Algeria, at Tremessen,

And he was wise,
Despite his prowess, honored in men’s eyes,
Meek as a girl and gentle in his ways.
He had never spoken ignobly all his days
To any man by even a rude inflection.
He was a knight in all things to perfection.