Those tooth-lesse Toyes that dropt out by mis-hap",
Bee but as lightning to a thunder-clap.
Shall then that foule infamous Cyned's hide
Laugh at the purple wales of others' side?
Not, if he were as neere as, by report,
The stewes had wont be to the tenis court.
Hee, that, while thousands envy at his bed,
Neighs after bridals and fresh-maydenhead:
While slavish Juno dares not looke awry,
To frowne at such imperious rivalry;
Not tho' shee sees her wedding jewels drest,
To make new bracelets for a strumpet's wrest;
Or, like some strange disguised Messaline,
Hires a night's lodging of his concubine;
Whether his twilight-torch of love doe call
To revels of uncleanly musicall,
Or midnight playes, or taverns of new wine,
Hy, ye white aprons, to your land-lord's signe ;
When all, save tooth-lesse age or infancie,
Are summon'd to the Court of Venerie.
Who list excuse? when chaster dames can hire
Some snout-fayre stripling to their apple-squire1o;
Whom, staked up like to some stallion-steed,
They keepe with egs and oysters for the breed.
O Lucine! barren Caia hath an heire,
After her husband's dozen years' despayre.
And now the bribed mid-wife sweares apace,
The bastard babe doth beare his father's face.
But hath not Lelia past her virgine yeares?
For modest shame (God wot!) or penall feares?
He tels a merchant tidings of a prise,
That tells Cynedo of such novelties;
Worth little lesse than landing of a whale,
Or Gades' spoyles, or a churl's funerale.
Go bid the banes and poynt the bridall-day,
His broking baud hath got a noble prey :
A vacant tenement, an honest dowre
Can fit his pander for her paramoure;
That hee, base wretch, may clog his wit-old" head,
And give him hansell of his Hymen-bed.
Ho! all ye females that would live unshent",
Fly from the reach of Cyned's regiment.
If Trent be drawn to dregs and Low refuse,
Hence, ye hot lechour, to the steaming stewes.
"Those tooth-lesse Toyes that dropt out by mis-hap. Alluding to what he calls his own Toothless Satires.
apple-squire-See Note 19, p. 286.
hansell-earnest.
Tyber, the famous sinke of Christendome,
Turn thou to Thames, and Thames run towards Rome.
Whatever damned streame but thine were meete,
To quench his lusting liver's boyling heat?
Thy double draught may quench his dog-daies' rage
With some stale Bacchis, or obsequious page,
When writhen Lena makes her safe-set showes
Of wooden Venus with fayre limned browes;
Or like him more some vayled Matrone's face,
Or trayned prentise trading in the place.
The close adulteresse, where her name is red,
Comes crauling from her husband's lukewarme bed,
Her carrion skin bedaub'd with odors sweet,
Groping the postern with her bared feet.
Now play the Satyre whoso list for mee,
Valentine self, or some as chaste as hee.
In vaine shee wisheth long Alchmæna's night,
Cursing the hasty dawning of the light;
And, with her cruell ladie-starre uprose,
Shee seeks her third roust on her silent toes;
Besmeared all with loathsome smoke of lust,
Like Acheron's stemes, or smoldring sulphur dust:
Yet all day sits she simpring in her mew",
Like some chast dame, or shrined say nct in shew;
Whiles hee lies wallowing with a westy hed "
And palish carkasse, on his brothel-bed,
Till his salt bowels boyle with poysonous fire;
Right Hercules with his second Deianire.
O Esculape! how rife is phisicke made,
When ech brasse-basen can professe the trade
Of ridding pocky wretches from their paine,
And doe the beastly cure for ten-grotes' gaine!
All these and more deserve some blood-drawne lines,
sixe cords beene of too loose a twine:
22 Yet all day sits shee simpring in her mew.
A mew was a place of confinement where hawks were kept till they had moulted. Hence the King's "Mews" that place having been formerly full of mews where the king's hawks were kept. See Reed's Shakespeare, Vol. XIV. p. 280. and Todd's Spenser, Vol. II. p. 161. Our author, Book IV. Sat. 4, has
Or tend his spar-hauke mantling in her MEW.
And, Book VI, when describing the use made by an old belle of her false teeth, he says
And with them grinds SOFT-SIMPRING ALL THE DAY.
Qu. Should not this be wefty-head, that is waving, shaking, palsied.
Stay till my beard shal sweepe mine aged brest,
Then shall I seeme an awfull Satyrist;
While now my rimes rellish of the fertile still,
Some nose-wise Pedant saith; whose deep-seen skill
Hath three times construed eyther Flaccus ore,
And thrise rehears'd them in his Triviall floare".
So let them taxe mee for my hote bloode's rage,
Rather than say I doted in my age.
OLD driveling Lolio drudges all he can
To make his eldest sonne a gentleman.
Who can despayre that sees another thrive 5,
By lone of twelve-pence to an oyster-wive"?
When a craz'd scaffold, and a rotten stage",
Was all rich Nævius his heritage.
Nought spendeth he for feare, nor spares for cost;
And all he spendes and spaires beside is lost.
Himselfe goes patch'd like some bare Cottyer",
Least he might ought the future stocke appeyre 3.
24 But my sixe cords beene of too loose a twine: Stay till my beard shul sweepe mine aged brest, Then shall I seeme an awfull Satyrist.
-Ah, si fas dicere! sed fas
Tunc, cùm ad canitiem, et nostrum istud vivere triste,
Aspexi, et nucibus facimus quæcunque relictis.
25 And thrise rehears'd them in his TRIVIALL FLOARE.
Triviall floare, from Trivium, a common resort, may mean his School-Room.
25 Who can despayre that sees another thrive.
The Oxford edition reads to see. I have restored the genuine reading from the editions of 1598, and 1599.
21 By lone of twelve-pence to an oyster-wive.
Probably by lending small sums to oyster-women for the purchase of their daily stock, for which an oppressive and usurious interest was demanded. Mr. Colquhoun, in his Treatise on the Police of the Metropolis, states this practice to be carried to a great extent, at this day, in London: many persons supporting themselves by lending enough to improvident barrow-women to purchase the stock of the day, for which they receive after the rate of six-pence for five shillings.
28 When a craz'd scaffold, and a rotten stage.
See Note 27, p. 287.
29 Cottyer-cottager. appeyre-impair.
Let giddy Cosmius change his choyce aray,
Like as the Turke his tents, thrise in a day;
And all to sun and ayre his sutes untold
From spightfull mothes, and frets, and hoary mold;
Bearing his paune-layd lands upon his backe,
As snayles their shels, or pedlers doe their packe.
Who cannot shine in tissues and pure gold,
That hath his lands and patrimonie sold?
Lolioe's side-cote is rough Pampilian,
Guilded with drops that downe the bosome ran;
White carsy hose, patched on eyther knee,
The very embleme of good husbandrie;
And a knit night-cap made of coursest twine,
With two long labels button'd to his chin:
So rides he mounted on the market-day,
Upon a straw-stu'ft pannell all the way,
With a maund charg'd with houshold merchandise,
With egs, or white-meat, from both dayries;
And with that byes he rost for Sunday-noone,
Proud how he made that week's provision.
Else is he stall-fed on the workey-day,
With browne-bread crusts soften'd in sodden whay;
Or water-grewell; or those paups of meale,
That Maro makes his Simule and Cybeale :
Or once a weeke, perhaps, for novelty,
Reez'd bacon soords" shall feast his family;
And weens this more than one egge cleft in twaine,
To feast some patrone and his chappelaine;
Or more than is some hungry gallant's dole,
That in a dearth runs sneaking to a hole,
And leaves his man and dog to keepe his hall
Least the wild roome should run forth of the wall.
Good man! him list not spend his idle meales
In quinsing plovers, or in winning quailes ";
Nor toot in Cheap-side baskets earne and late 36
To set the first tooth in some novell-cate.
That Maro makes his Simule and Cybeale.
Simula is used in ancient Latin Deeds for a manchet, or white-loaf. I can explain the passage no farther.
33 Reex'd bacon soords-i. e. reechy remnants of bacon, Soord is still used in Warwickshire at least, and probably elsewhere, to denote the rind or thick skin of bacon.
list not spend-i. e. list not to spend.
35 In quinsing plovers, or in winning quailes.
Quinsing descriptive of the noise made by the plover, similar to the effect of the quinsy on the organs of speech :-winning means whining.
35 Nor toot in Cheap-side baskets earne and late,
To set the first tooth in some novell-cate..
Tooting means searching. See Todd's Spenser, vol. i. p. 53. Earne, is early. Novell-cate means New-cake.
Let sweet-mouth'd Mercia bid what crowns she please
For halfe-red cherries, or greene garden-pease,
Or the first artichoks of all the yeare,
To make so lavish cost for little cheare:
When Lolio feasteth in his reveling fit,
Some starved pullen 3 scoures the rusted spitt.
For else how should his sonne maitained bee
At Ins of Court or of the Chancery:
There to learne law, and courtly carriage,
To make amendes for his meane parentage;
Where he, unknowne, and ruffling as he can,
Goes currant ech-where for a gentleman?
While yet he rousteth at some uncouth signe,
Nor never red his tenure's second line.
What broker's lousy wardrop cannot reach
With tissued panes to prancke each peasant's breech *° ?
Couldst thou but give the wall, the cap, the knee,
To proud Sartorio that goes stradling by:
Wer't not the needle, pricked on his sleeve,
Doth by good hap the secret watch-word give?
But hear'st thou Lolioe's sonne? gin not thy gate"
Untill the evening oule or bloody-batt:
Never untill the lamps of Paule's beene light,
And niggard lanternes shade the moon-shine night
Then, when the guiltie bankrupt, in bold dread,
From his close cabin thrusts his shrinking head,
That hath bene long in shady shelter pent
Imprisoned for feare of prisonment;
May be some russet-cote Parochian 42
Shall call thee cosen, friend, or countryman,
And, for thy hoped fist crossing the streete,
Shall in his father's name his god-son greete.
The tailor stays thy leisure,
To deck thy body with his RUFFLING treasure.
Mr. Malone says "A ruffler in our author's time signified a noisy and turbulent swaggerer; and the word ruffling may here be applied in a kindred sense to dress." See his Note on the passage in the Taming of the Shrew, Act xiv. Sc. 3.
rousteth-roosts, or lodges.
With tissued panes to prancke each peasant's breech.
Probably with squares of tissue (a rich stuff made of silk, and silver or gold thread, woven together) to dress out, or ornament, &c. The Oxford Editor, not understanding the word panes in this sense, spells it pains, having found it paines in the
Probably, some homely clad inhabitant of the Parish where he was born.
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