CHATEAU-Chinon, a town of France in Nivernois, and capital of Morvan, with a considerable manufacture of cloth. E. Long. 3. 48. N. Lat. 47. 2.

CHATEAU-Dauphin, a very strong castle of Piedmont in Italy, and in the marquirate of Saluces, belonging to the king of Sardinia. It was taken by the combined army of France and Spain in 1744, and was restored by the treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle.

CHATEAU-du-Loir, a town of France in the Maine, famous for sustaining a siege of seven years against the Count of Mans. It is seated on the river Loir, in E. Long. 0. 25. N. Lat. 47. 40.

CHATEAU-Dun, an ancient town of France, and capital of the Dunois, with a castle and rich monastery; seated on an eminence near the river Loir, in E. Long. 1. 26. N. Lat. 48. 4.

CHATEAU-Nerf, the name of several towns of France, viz. one in Perche; another in Angoumois, on the river Charente, near Angouefline; a third in Berry, seated seated on the river Cher; and several other small places.

**Château-Portien**, a town of France, in Champagne, and in a district called Portien, with a castle built on a rock, near the river Aine. E. Long. 4° 23'. N. Lat. 49° 35'.

**Château-Renaud**, a town of France in the Gâtinais, where clothes are made for the army, and where there is a trade in saffron. E. Long. 2° 25'. N. Lat. 48° 0. This is also the name of a town of Touraine, in France, with the title of a marquisate. E. Long. 2° 41'. N. Lat. 47° 22'.

**Château-Roux**, a town of France, in Berry, with the title of a duchy. It has a cloth-manufacture, and is seated in a very large pleasant plain on the river Indre, in E. Long. 1° 47'. N. Lat. 46° 49'.

**Château-Thierry**, a town of France, in Champagne, with the title of a duchy, and a handsome castle on an eminence, seated on the river Maine, in E. Long. 3° 23'. N. Lat. 49° 12'.

**Château-Villain**, a town of France, in Champagne, with a castle, and the title of a duchy; seated on the river Aujon. E. Long. 2° 59'. N. Lat. 48° 0.

**Chatel**, or **Château**, a town of Lorraine, in the Vosges, seated on the river Moselle, eight miles from Mirecourt.

**Chatel-Aillon**, a maritime town of France, in Saintonge, five miles from Rochelle; formerly very considerable, but is now greatly decayed.

**Chatel-Chalons**, a town of France, in Franche Comté, remarkable for its abbey of Benedictine nuns. E. Long. 5° 25'. N. Lat. 46° 50'.

**Chatelet**, a town of the Netherlands, in Namur, seated on the Sambre, in the bishopric of Liège. E. Long. 4° 28'. N. Lat. 50° 25'.

**Chatelet**, the name of certain courts of justice established in several cities in France. The grand châtelet at Paris, is the place where the prelatical or ordinary court of justice of the provost of Paris is kept; consisting of a prelatical, a civil chamber, a criminal chamber, and a chamber of policy. The little châtelet is an old fort, now serving as a prison.

**Chatellerault**, a town of France, in Poitou, with the title of a duchy; seated in a fertile and pleasant country, on the river Vienne, over which there is a handsome stone-bridge. E. Long. 0° 40'. N. Lat. 46° 24'.

**Chatham**, a town of Kent, adjoining to Rochester, and seated on the river Medway. It is the principal station of the royal navy; and the yards and magazines are furnished with all sorts of naval stores, as well as materials for building and rigging the largest men of war. The entrance into the river Medway is defended by Sheerness and other forts; and, in the year 1757, by direction of the duke of Cumberland, several additional fortifications were begun at Chatham; so that now the ships are in no danger of an infilt, either by land or water. It has a church; a chapel of ease; and a ship used as a church for the sailors; it has likewise about 500 houses, mostly low, and built with brick; the streets are narrow, and paved; and it contains about 3000 inhabitants. The principal employment of the labouring hands is ship-building in the king's yard, and private docks. E. Long. 0° 40'. N. Lat. 51° 20'.

**Chatigan**, a town of Asia, in the kingdom of Bengal, on the most easterly branch of the river Ganges. It is but a poor place, though it was the first Portuguese settled at in these parts, and who still keep a fort of possession. It has but a few cotton manufactures; but affords the best timber for building of any place about it. The inhabitants are too suspicious of each other, that they always go armed with a sword, pistol, and blunderbuss, not excepting the priests. It is subject to the Great Mogul. E. Long. 91° 10'. N. Lat. 23° 0.

**Chatillon-sur-Seine**, a town of France, in Burgundy, divided into two by the river Seine. It is 32 miles from Langres, and 40 from Dijon; and has iron-works in its neighbourhood. E. Long. 4° 33'. N. Lat. 47° 45'.

**Chatre**, a town of France, in Berry, seated on the river Indre, 37 miles from Bourges. It carries on a considerable trade in cattle. E. Long. 1° 55'. N. Lat. 46° 35'.

**Chatels**, a Norman term, under which were anciently comprehended all moveable goods; those immoveable being termed *fief*, or *fee*.

**Chatels**, in the modern sense of the word, are all sorts of goods, moveable or immoveable, except such as are in the nature of freehold.

**Chatterer**, in ornithology. See *Angeles*.

**Chaucer** (Sir Geoffrey,) an eminent English poet in the 14th century, born at London in 1328. After he left the university he travelled into Holland, France, and other countries. Upon his return he entered himself in the Inner-temple, where he studied the municipal laws of England. His first station at court was page to Edward III. and he had a pension granted him by that prince till he could otherwise provide for him. Soon after we find him gentleman of the king's privy chamber; next year, shield-bearer to the king. Esteemed and honoured, he spent his younger days in a constant attendance at court, or for the most part living near it, in a square stone house near the Park-gate at Woodstock, still called Chaucer's house.

Soon after, having got the duke of Lancaster for his patron, Chaucer began every day to rise in greatness. In 1373 he was sent, with other persons, to the republic of Genoa to hire ships for the king's navy (our want of shipping in those times being usually supplied by such means); and the king was so well satisfied with his negotiation, that, on his return, he obtained a grant of a pitcher of wine daily in the port of London, to be delivered by the butler of England; and soon after was made comptroller of the customs for wool, wool-fells, and hides; an office which he discharged with great diligence and integrity. At this period, Chaucer's income was about £1000 a year; a sum which in those days might well enable him to live, as he says he did, with dignity in office, and hospitality among his friends. It was in this meridian blaze of prosperity, in perfect health of body and peace of mind, that he wrote his most humorous poems. His satires against the priests were probably written to oblige his patron the duke of Lancaster, who favoured the cause of Wickliff, and endeavoured to expose the clergy to the indignation of the people. In the last year of Edward III. our poet was employed in... in a commission to treat with the French; and in the beginning of king Richard's reign, he was in some degree of favour at court.

The duke of Lancaster at last finding his views checked, began to abandon Wickliffe's party: upon which, Chaucer likewise, how much ever he had espoused that divine's opinions, thought it prudent to conceal them more than he had done. With the duke's interest that of Chaucer entirely sunk; and the former passing over sea, his friends felt all the malice of the opposite party. These misfortunes occasioned his writing that excellent treatise The Testament of Love, in imitation of Boethius on the consolation of philosophy. Being much reduced, he retired to Woodstock, to comfort himself with study, which produced his admirable treatise of the Alphabete.

The duke of Lancaster at last furnishing him with troubles, married lady Catharine Swynford, sister to Chaucer's wife; so that Thomas Chaucer, our poet's son, became allied to most of the nobility, and to several of the kings of England. Now the sun began to shine upon Chaucer with an evening ray; for by the influence of the duke's marriage, he again grew to a considerable share of wealth. But being now 70, he retired to Dunnington-castle near Newbury. He had not enjoyed this retirement long before Henry IV., son of the duke of Lancaster, assumed the crown, and in the first year of his reign gave our poet marks of his favour. But however pleasing the change of affairs might be to him at first, he afterwards found no small inconveniences from it. The measures and grants of the late king were annulled; and Chaucer, in order to procure fresh grants of his pensions, left his retirement, and applied to court: where, though he gained a confirmation of some grants, yet the fatigue of attendance, and his great age, prevented him from enjoying them. He fell sick at London; and ended his days in the 72d year of his age, leaving the world as though he despised it, as appears from his song of Elie from the Frise. The year before his death he had the happiness, if at his time of life it might be so called, to see the son of his brothers-in-law (Hen. IV.) seated on the throne. He was interred in Westminster abbey; and in 1556, Mr Nicholas Bingham, a gentleman of Oxford, at his own charge, erected a handsome monument for him there. Caxton first printed the Canterbury tales; but his works were first collected, and published in one volume folio, by William Thynne, London, 1542. They were afterwards reprinted in 1561, 1598, 1602. Oxford, 1721.

Chaucer was not only the first, but one of the best poets which these kingdoms ever produced. He was equally great in every species of poetry which he attempted; and his poems in general possess every kind of excellence, even to a modern reader, except melody and accuracy of measure; defects which are to be attributed to the imperfect state of our language, and the infancy of the art in this kingdom at the time when he wrote. "As he is the father of English poetry," says Mr Dryden, "so I hold him in the same degree of veneration as the Grecians held Homer, or the Romans Virgil; he is a perpetual fountain of good sense, learned in all sciences, and therefore speaks properly on all subjects: as he knew what to say, so he knows also when to leave off; a continence which is practised by few writers, and scarcely by any of the ancients, except Virgil and Horace." This character Chaucer certainly deserved. He had read a great deal; and was a man of the world, and of sound judgement. He was the first English poet who wrote poetically, as Dr Johnson observes in the preface to his dictionary, and (he might have added) who wrote like a gentleman. He had also the merit of improving our language considerably, by the introduction and naturalization of words from the Provencal, at that time the most polished dialect in Europe.