Note D — SKETCH,

Robert Langland's Visions of Pierce Plowman, were written about the year 1362. He represents himself as falling asleep on the Malvern Hills, and there beholding a series of visions, in describing which, he takes occasion to satirise the vices prevailing in the different classes of society, particularly the corruptions of the clergy. His prediction of the Reformation in England is most remarkable. As the date of these visions preceded Chaucer twenty years, the author must be considered the first English poet. He was a native of Shropshire, and fellow of Oriel College. Whitaker, who styles him the father of English Poetry, does not confirm the supposition that he was a monk of Worcester or Malvern. He thus paraphrases the opening lines.

"In early summer while sunshine was mild, I withdrew myself into a solitary place, surrounded with shrubs, in habit not like an Anchorite who keeps his cell, but like one of those unholy hermits who wander about the world to see and hear wonders; and on a May morning, reclining in a glade among the Malvern Hills, I slept from fatigue, and dreaming, beheld all the wealth and woe of the world."—Whitaker's (of Whalley) Ed. of Pierce Plowman: 1813.