NovelGuide: The Canterbury Tales: Novel Summary: The Miller's Tale

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The Miller's Tale

A Reeve who was a carpenter rented one of his rooms to an Oxford student by the name of Fly Nicholas.  One day, Fly Nicholas decided to seduce the farmer's wife, and when she consented to his wishes, they devised a way to occupy her husband so that they could be together.  Nicholas tricks her husband into thinking that another Noah's flood is coming, and makes him hide in a tub that is nailed above the house for the time that the flood comes.  The husband does this, and Nicholas and the wife are able to make love all evening.  Absalon, another young man who is in love with the Reeve's wife, comes over to the house to try to court the lady, but she and Nicholas reject him.  Nicholas and his lover are terribly mean, and she tricks Absalon, sticking her butt out the window and having him kiss it.  When Nicholas tries to make Absalon kiss his butt, Absalon sticks him with a hot poker, and when Nicholas cries for water, the husband thinks that this is the sign that the flood is coming, and so he falls out of his tub and much chaos ensues throughout the town.