ripen and dissolve ulcers, etc. Yea, the ground and foundation of all cere-cloth (so called from cera) is made of wax. HOGS Hampshire hogs are allowed by all for the best bacon, being our English Westphalian, and which, well ordered, hath deceived the most judicious palates. Here the swine feed in the forest on plenty of acorns (men's meat in the golden, hogs' food in this iron age); which, going out lean, return home fat, without either care or cost of their owners. Nothing but fulness stinteth their feeding on the mast falling from the trees, where also they lodge at liberty (not pent up, as in other places, to stacks of peas), which some assign the reason of the fineness of their flesh; which, though not all glorre (where no banks of lean can be seen for the deluge of fat), is no less delicious to the taste, and more wholesome for the stomach. Swine's flesh, by the way, is observed most nutritive of men's bodies, because of its assimilation thereunto. Yet was the eating thereof forbidden to the Jews, whereof this reason may be rendered (besides the absolute will of the law-giver), because in hot countries men's bodies are subject to the measles and leprosies, who have their greatest repast on swine's flesh. For the climate of Canaan was all the year long as hot as England betwixt May and Michaelmas; and it is penal for any butchers with us in that term to kill any pork in the public shambles. As for the manufacture of clothing in this county (diffused throughout the same) such as deny the goodness of Hampshire cloth, and have occasion to wear it, will be convinced of its true worth by the price which they must pay for it. (From the History of the Worthies of England.) JOHN OF TREVISA AND GEOFFREY CHAUCER THIS year a godly, learned, and aged servant of God ended his days; namely, John de Trevisa, a gentleman of an ancient family (bearing Gules, a Garbe, Or,), born at Crocadon in Cornwall, a secular priest, and Vicar of Berkeley; a painful and faithful translator of many and great books into English, as Polychronicon, written by Ranulphus of Chester, Bartholomæus De Rerum Proprietatibus, etc. But his masterpiece was the translating of the Old and New Testament; justifying his act herein by the example of Bede, who turned the Gospel of St. John in English. I know not which more to admire, his ability, that he could— his courage, that he durst-or his industry, that he did-perform so difficult and dangerous a task; having no other commission than the command of his patron, Thomas Lord Berkeley: which lord, as the said Trevisa observeth, had the Apocalypse in Latin and French, then generally understood by the better sort as well as English, written on the roof and walls of his chapel at Berkeley; and which not long since (namely, anno 1622), so remained, as not much defaced. Whereby we may observe, that, midnight being past, some early risers even then began to strike fire, and enlighten themselves from the Scriptures. It may seem a miracle, that the bishops being thus busy in persecuting God's servants, and Trevisa so obnoxious to their fury for this translation, that he lived and died without any molestation. Yet was he a known enemy to monkery; witness that (among many other) of his speeches, that he "had read how Christ had sent apostles and priests into the world, but never any monks or begging friars." But, whether it was out of reverence to his own aged gravity, or respect to his patron's greatness, he died full of honour, quiet, and age, little less than ninety years old. For, (1) He ended his translation of Polychronicon, (as appeareth by the conclusion thereof,) the 29th of Edward III. when he cannot be presumed less than thirty years of age. (2) He added to the end thereof, fifty (some say more) years of his own historical observations. Thus as he gave a Garbe or Wheatsheaf for his arms, so, to use the prophet's expression, "the Lord gathered him as a sheaf into the floor," Micah iv. 12, even full ripe and ready for the same. We may couple with him his contempo ary, Geoffrey Chaucer, born (some say) in Berkshire, others in Oxfordshire, most and truest in London. If the Grecian Homer had seven, let our English have three places contest for his nativity. Our Homer, I say; only herein he differed: Mæonides nullas ipse reliquit opes: "Homer himself did leave no pelf: " whereas our Chaucer left behind him a rich and worshipful estate. His father was a vintner in London; and I have heard his arms quarrelled at, being Argent and Gules strangely contrived, and hard to be blazoned. Some more wits have made it the dashing of white and red wine, (the parents of our ordinary claret), as nicking his father's profession. But were Chaucer alive, he would justify his own arms in the face of all his opposers, being not so devoted to the Muses, but he was also a son of Mars. He was the prince of English poets; married the daughter of Pain Roëc, king of arms in France, and sister to the wife of John of Gaunt, king of Castile. Wit He was a great refiner and illuminer of our English tongue; and, if he left it so bad, how much worse did he find it! ness Leland thus praising him:— Prædicat Algerum merito Florentia Dantem, Italia et numeros tota, Petrarche, tuos. "Of Alger Dants Florence doth justly boast, To whom our language owes its eloquence." Indeed, Verstegan, a learned antiquary, condemns him, for spoiling the purity of the English tongue by the mixture of so many French and Latin words. But he who mingles wine with water, though he destroys the nature of water, improves the quality thereof. I find this Chaucer fined in the Temple two shillings for striking a Franciscan friar in Fleet Street; and it seems his hands ever after itched to be revenged, and have his pennyworths out of them, so tickling religious Orders with his tales, and yet so pinching them with his truths, that friars, in reading his books, know not how to dispose their faces betwixt crying and laughing. He lies buried in the south aisle of St. Peter's, Westminster; and since hath got the company of Spenser and Drayton, a pair royal of poets, enough almost to make passengers' feet to move metrically, who go over the place where so much poetical dust is interred. (From the Church History of Britain.) THE GOOD YEOMAN THE good yeoman is a gentleman in ore, whom the next age may see refined; and is the wax capable of a genteel impression, when the prince shall stamp it. Wise Solon (who accounted Tellus the Athenian the most happy man, for living privately on his own lands) would surely have pronounced the English yeomanry "a fortunate condition," living in the temperate zone betwixt greatness and want; an estate of people almost peculiar to England. France and Italy are like a die, which hath no points between cinque and ace-nobility and peasantry. Their walls, though high, must needs be hollow, wanting filling-stones. Indeed, Germany hath her boors, like our yeoman; but, by a tyrannical appropriation of nobility to some few ancient families, their yeomen are excluded from ever rising higher, to clarify their bloods. In England, the temple of honour is bolted against none who have passed through the temple of virtue; nor is a capacity to be genteel denied to our yeoman, who thus behaves himself: MAXIM I He wears russet clothes, but makes golden payment.—Having tin in his buttons, and silver in his pocket. If he chance to appear in clothes above his rank, it is to grace some great man with his service; and then he blusheth at his own bravery. Otherwise, he is the surest landmark whence foreigners may take aim of the ancient English customs; the gentry more floating after foreign fashions. MAXIM II In his house he is bountiful both to strangers and to poor people. -Some hold, when hospitality died in England, she gave her last groan amongst the yeomen of Kent. And still, at our yeoman's table, you shall have as many joints as dishes; no meat disguised with strange sauces; no straggling joint of a sheep in the midst of a pasture of grass, beset with salads on every side; but solid, substantial food. No servitors (more nimble with their hands, than the guests with their teeth) take away meat, before stomachs are taken away. Here you have that which in itself is good, made better by the store of it, and best by the welcome to it. MAXIM III He hath a great stroke in making the knight of the shire.Good reason, for he makes a whole line in the subsidy book; where, whatsoever he is rated, he pays without any regret, not caring how much his purse is let blood, so it be done by the advice of the physicians of the State. MAXIM IV He seldom goes far abroad, and his credit stretcheth further than his travel. He goes not to London, but se defendendo to save himself of a fine, being returned of a jury; where seeing the king once, he prays for him ever afterwards. MAXIM V In his own country he is a main man in juries.—Where, if the judge please to open his eyes in matter of law, he needs not to be led by the nose in matters of fact. He is very observant of the judge's item, when it follows the truth's imprimis; otherwise (though not mutinous in a jury,) he cares not whom he displeaseth, so he pleaseth his own conscience. MAXIM VI He improveth his land to a double value by his good husbandry. -Some grounds that wept with water, or frowned with thorns, by draining the one, and clearing the other, he makes both to laugh and sing with corn. By marl and limestones burnt, he bettereth his ground; and his industry worketh miracles, by turning stones into bread. Conquest and good husbandry both enlarge the king's dominions; the one, by the sword, making the acres more in number; the other, by the plough, making the same acres more in value. Solomon saith, "The king himself is maintained by husbandry." Pythis, a king, having discovered rich mines in his kingdom, employed all his people in digging of them; whence tilling was wholly neglected, insomuch as a great famine ensued. His queen, sensible of the calamities of the country, invited the king her husband to dinner, as he came home hungry from overseeing his workmen in the mines. She so contrived it, that the bread and meat were most artificially made of gold; and the king was much delighted with the conceit thereof, till at last he called for real meat to satisfy his hunger. "Nay," said the queen, "if you employ all your subjects in your mines, you must expect to feed upon gold; for nothing else can your kingdom afford.” |