Caxton's Blanchardyn and Eglantine, c. 1489 : from Lord Spencer's unique imperfect copy, completed by the original French and the second English version of 1595

§ 32. The Present Participle.

The Present Participle ending in -yng, -ynge (scarcely in -ing), has the same functions as in Modern English; for tocoming, see above, § 29, p. lxvii.

With regard to voice, there are but few exceptions to its active meaning. Desplesaunt = displeasing occurs in Blanchardyn, 27/19; 'thy lyffe is to me so gretly displeasaunte.' But several times it has the passive sense = displeased:—

Byfore whiche cyte was yet Kyng Alymodes at siege wyth his oost, wherof the fayr the proude pucell in amours was sore displaysaunt, Blanchardyn, 127/11; but on thys day . . . so desplaysaunt ne sory was he neuer as I shal make hym for the, Charles the Grete, 62/3; the noble flory pes was moche dysplaysaunte for the

necessyte of the frensshe men, ibid. 124/26; wher fore thadmyral was so dysplaysaunt and angry that he wende to haue dyed, ibid. 143/14. The verb displease occurs also several times in the phrase: dysplayse you not, ibid. 113/20, 146/34; and in the past participle dysplaysed, Aymon, 464/19, 510/8.

Malory has beholdyng = beholden:—

Ye are the man in the world that I am most beholdyng to, Morte Darthur, 42/24; I am moche beholdyng vnto hym, ibid. 86/22; me semeth ye ar moche beholdynge to this mayden, ibid. 476/32; therfor ye are the more beholdyng vnto god than any other man to loue hym and drede hym, ibid. 640/11; beholden occurs, ibid. 86/11, 89/5. Cf. Skeat, Notes to Langland, p. 161. Instead of holden [B, A], we find in [C] the form holdinge.

This represents a common corruption, which appears also in beholding, as used for beholden by Shakspere and others, see Richard III., II. i. 129; Julius Cœsar, III. ii. 70; and Abbott, Shakspere Grammar, 3rd ed., sect. 372.