Page images
PDF
EPUB

This vice I liken to a weed

That husband-men have namèd tyne,
The which in corn doth root or breed;
The grain to ground it doth incline
It never ripeth, but rotteth in fine;
And even a like thing is to guess
Against all virtue, idleness.

The proud man may be patient,
The ireful may be liberal,
The gluttonous may be continent,
The covetous may give alms all,
The lecher may to prayer* fall;
Each vice bideth some good business,
Save only idle idleness.

As some one virtue may by grace
Suppress of vices many a one,

So is one vice once taken place

Destroyeth all virtues every one;

Where this vice cometh, all virtues are gone,

In no kind of good business

Can company with idleness.

An ill wind that bloweth no man good,
The blower of which blast is she;
The lyther lusts bred of her brood
Can no way breed good property;
Wherefore I say, as we now see,
No heart can think, or tongue express,
The harm that groweth of idleness!

To cleanse the corn, as men at need

Weed out all weeds, and tyne for chief,

Let diligence our weed-hook weed

All vice from us for like relief;

As faith may faithfully shew proof

By faithful fruitful business,
To weed out fruitless idleness.

* This word was constantly used as a dissyllable.

+ Lazy.

YE

WELCOME IS THE BEST DISH.

E be welcome, ye be welcome,
Ye be welcome one by one;

Ye be heartily welcome,

Ye be heartily welcome every one!

When friends like friends do friendly show
Unto each other high and low,

What cheer increase of love doth grow,
What better cheer than they to know!
This is welcome!

To bread or drink, to flesh or fish,
Yet welcome is the best dish!

In all our fare, in all our cheer
Of dainty meats sought far or near,
Most fine, most costly to appear,
What for all this, if all this gear
Lack this welcome?

This cheer, lo! is not worth one rush,
For welcome is the best dish!

Where welcome is, though fare be small,
Yet honest hearts be pleased withal;
When welcome want, though great fare fall,
No honest heart content it shall

Without welcome;

For honest hearts do ever wish

To have welcome to the best dish.

Some with small fare they be not pleased; Some with much fare be much diseased; Some with mean fare be scant appeased; But of all somes none is displeased

To be welcome!

Then all good cheer to accomplish,
Welcome must be the best dish.

Yet some to this will say that they
Without welcome with meat live may,
And with welcome without meat, nay!
Wherefore meat seems best dish, they say,
And not welcome!

But this vain saying to banish,

We will prove welcome here best dish.

Though in some case, for man's relief,
Meat without welcome may be chief;
Yet where man come, as here in proof,
Much more for love than hunger's grief,
Here is welcome.

Thorough all the cheer to furnish,
Here is welcome the best dish.

What is this welcome now to tell?
Ye are welcome, ye are come well,
As heart can wish your coming fell,
Your coming glads my heart each dell!
This is welcome!

Wherefore all doubts to relinquish,
Your welcome is your best dish.

Now as we have in words here spent
Declared the fact of welcome meant,
So pray we you to take the intent
Of this poor dish that we present
To your welcome,

As heartily as heart can wish;
Your welcome is here your best dish!

JOHN STILL.

1543-1607.

[THERE is little known of the life of John Still beyond the incidents of his preferments in the church. He was the son of William Still, of Grantham, in Lincolnshire, where he was

born in 1543. He took the degree of M.A. at Christ's College, Cambridge, where he was made Margaret Professor in 1570; and in subsequent years was elected Master of St. John's, and afterwards of Trinity College. In 1571 he was presented to the Rectory of Hadleigh, in Suffolk, commissioned one of the Deans of Bocking in 1572, collated to the vicarage of Eastmarham, in Yorkshire, in 1573, and installed Canon of Westminster and Dean of Sudbury in 1576. He was chosen prolocutor of convocation in 1588, promoted in 1592 to the see of Bath and Wells, and held the bishopric till his death in 1607, having amassed a large fortune by the Mendip lead mines in the diocese, and endowed an almshouse in Wales, to which he bequeathed £500. Bishop Still was twice married, and left a large family. His excellent character is attested by Sir John Harrington, who says, that he was a man 'to whom he never came, but he grew more religious, and from whom he never went but he parted more instructed.'

The comedy of Gammer Gurton's Needle was originally printed in 1575, but written several years earlier. It is composed in rhyme, and regularly divided into acts and scenes. The plot is meagre and silly, the whole of the five acts being occupied by a hunt after a needle which Gammer Gurton is supposed to have mislaid, but which is found, by way of catastrophe, in a garment she had been mending. The altercations, quarrels, mishaps, and cross-purposes, arising out of this circumstance constitute the entire substance of the piece. The dialogue is coarse, even for the age in which it was written, and the humour seldom rises above the level of clowns and buffoons.]

GAMMER GURTON'S NEEDLE.

BAC

DRINKING SONG.*

ACK and side go bare, go bare,
Both foot and hand go cold:

* Warton, in his History of Poets, iii. 206, quotes this song as the first Chanson à boire of any merit in our language.

He says it

But belly, God send thee good ale enough,
Whether it be new or old.

I can not eat, but little meat,

My stomach is not good;

appeared in 1551. This must be an oversight, if Still is to be considered the author, as he was then only eight years old. The comedy was produced in 1566, and printed for the first time in 1575. This song, observes Warton, has a vein of ease and humour which we should not expect to have been inspired by the simple beverage of those times.' Still less might it have been expected from the writer of the dialogue of this piece, the versification of which is harsh and lumbering. Whether Bishop Still really wrote the song, may be doubted. Mr. Dyce, in his edition of Skelton's works, gives another version of it from a MS. in his possession, which he says is certainly of an earlier date than 1575. The differences are very curious and interesting; but the most striking point of variance is the omission of the verse referring to Tyb, Gammer Gurton's maid, which suggests the probability that the song may have been originally an independent composition, of which Bishop Still availed himself, adapting it to the comedy by curtailments and a new verse with a personal allusion. There are many instances of a similar use being made of popular ballads by the old dramatists. How far this conjecture is justifiable, must be determined by a comparison between the above version and that given by Mr. Dyce, which is here subjoined in the orthography of the original.

backe & syde goo bare goo bare

bothe hande & fote goo colde

but belly god sende the good ale inowghe
whether hyt be newe or olde.

but yf that I may have trwly

good ale my belly full

I shall looke lyke one by swete sainte Johnn

were shoron agaynste the woole

thowte I goo bare take you no care

I am nothing colde

I stuffe my skynne so full within

of joly goode ale & olde.

I cannot eate but lytyll meate

my stomacke ys not goode

but sure I thyncke that I cowd dryncke

with hym that werythe an hoode

dryncke is my lyfe althowghe my wyfe

some tyme do chyde & scolde

yet spare I not to plye the potte
of joly goode ale & olde.

backe & syde, &c.

« PreviousContinue »