CERTAIN VERSES WRITTEN By severall of the Authors Friends; TO BE RE-PRINTED WITH THE Second Edition OF GONDIBERT.
LONDON, Printed in the Year, 1653.
Certain Verses written by several of the Authors Friends, to be reprinted with the second Edition of GONDIBERT.
Upon the PREFACE.
ROom for the best of Poets heroick,
If you'l believe two Wits and a Stoick;
Down go the
Iliads, down go the
AEneidos,
All must give place to the
Gondiberteiados.
For to
Homer and
Virgil he has a just Pique,
Because one
[...]s writ in Latin, the other in Greek:
Besides an old grudge (our Critics they say so)
With
Ovid, because his Sirname was
Naso.
[Page 4] If Fiction the fame of a Poet thus raises,
What Poets are you that have writ his praises?
But we justly quarrel at this our defeat,
You give us a stomach, he gives us no meat.
A Preface to no Book, a Porch to no house:
Here is the Mountain but where is the Mouse?
But, oh,
America must breed up the Brat,
From whence 'twill return a
West- Indy Rat.
For
Will to
Virginia is gone from among us,
With thirty two Slaves, to plant
Mundungus.
Vpon the Prefaece of GONDIBERT.
Mar. Epig.
Lasciva est nobis Pagina vita proba est.
AS
Martial's life was grave and sad,
Wanting the mirth his Verses had:
Even so, this our long Preface shows,
What ere we want, our Book has nose.
To Sir W. DAVENANT.
1.
AFter so many sad mis-haps,
Of drinking, riming, and of claps,
I pitty most thy last relaps.
2.
That having past the Soldiers pains,
The States-mens Arts, the Seamens gains.
With
Gondibert to break thy brains.
3.
And so incessantly to ply it,
To sacrifice thy sleep, thy diet,
Thy businesse; and what's more, our quiet.
4.
And all this stir to make a story,
Not much superior to
John Dory,
Which thus in brief I lay before ye.
5.
All in the land of
Lombardie,
A Wight there was of Knights degree,
Sir
Gondibert y
[...]leap'd was he.
6.
`This
Gondibert (as says our Author)
Got the good will of the Kings daughter,
A shame it seems, the Divel ought her.
7.
So thus succeeded his Disaster,
Being sure of the Daughter of his Master,
He chang'd
his[?] Princess for a Playster.
8.
Of person he was not ungratious,
Grave in Debate, in Fight audacious;
But in his Ale most pervicatious.
9.
And this was cause of his sad Fate,
For in a Drunken-street Debate
One night, he got a broken Pate.
10.
Then being Cur'd, he would not tarry,
But needs this simpling girl would marry
Of
Astragon the Apothecary.
11.
To make the thing yet more Romancie,
Both wise and rich you may him fancie;
Yet he in both came short of
Plancy.
12.
And for the Damsel, he did wooe so,
To say the truth, she was but so-so,
Not much unlike her of
Toboso.
13.
Her beauty, though 'twas not exceeding,
Yet what in Face and shape was needing,
She made it up in Parts and Breeding.
14.
Though all the Science she was rich in,
Both of the Dairy and the Kitchin:
Yet she had knowledge more bewitching.
15.
For she had learn'd her Fathers skill,
Both of th'Alimbick and the Still,
The Purge, the Potion, and the Pill.
16.
But her chief Talent was a Glister,
And such a hand to administer,
As on the Breech hath made no blister.
17.
So well she handled
Gondibert,
That though she did not hurt that part,
She made a blister on his heart.
18.
Into the Garden of her Father:
Garden, said I; or Back-side rather,
One night she went a Rose to gather.
19.
The Knight he was not far behind,
Full soon he had her in the wind;
(For Love can smell, though he be blind.)
20.
Her businesse she had finish'd scarcely,
When on a gentle bed of Parsly
Desunt
[...].
Full fair & soft he made her Arse-ly.
Vpon the continuation of GONDIBERT.
THy Verses feet to run so fast,
And thine alas in fetters plac't;
I alwayes thought, and now I see't,
Thy brain's less itable then thy feet.
This, 'tis, to be severe to us,
For naming Gods and
Pegasus[?].
Could'st thou but such a horse have shap't,
Thou hadst with gallant
Massie scap't,
Or couldst thou but frame
Gyges Ring,
Long since (poor
Will) th' hadst been a Wing,
Thou liest not there for any plot,
But 'cause a Poet thou art not.
Nor kenst thou
Daphne how thy rimes should rage
And lift the Poet ore the walled stage:
'Tis not a Moat can have the fate or power,
To hold the Muses, nor great
Caesars Tower,
Homer and
Virgil both thy back-friends have
The priviledge to break out of their grave,
And they that slight them must not hope to thrive
But lie confin'd and buried alive.
Nor think it strange thou art not spar'd,
But cast into a Goale unheard,
Those antient
Bards no better sped,
Condemn'd by thee though never read:
Naso made
Dedalus the Seas to cross,
Though the rash
Icarus were at a loss.
[Page 9] But this our Anti-Naso's Muse doth flutter,
Like stubble-goose that scarce gets ore the gutter.
These colours that thev nere may faile,
Were laid in Sack and Northdown Ale.
The Author upon himself.
I Am old
Davenant with my Fustian quill,
Though skill I have not.
I must be writing still
On
Gondibert,
That is not worth a fart.
Waller and
Cowly, 'tis true, have prais'd my book,
But how untruly
All they that read may look;
Nor can old
Hobbs
Defend me from dry bobbs.
Then no more I'le dabble, nor pump fancy dry,
To compose a Fable,
Shall make
Will Crofts to cry,
Oh gentle Knight,
Thou writ'st to them that shite.
A Letter sent to the good Knight.
THou hast not been thus long neglected,
But we thy four best friends expected,
Ere this time thou hadst stood corrected.
But since that Planet govenes still,
That rules thy tedious Fustian Quill
'Gainst Nature and the Muses will.
When by thy friend's advice and care,
'Twas hop'd in time thou wouldst despaire
To give ten pounds to write it faire.
Lest thou to all the world wouldst shew it,
We thought it fit to let thee know it,
Thou art a damn'd insipid Poet.
Vpon Fighting WILL
THe King knights
Will for fighting on his side,
Yet when
Will comes for fighting to be try'd,
There is not one in all the Armies can
Say they ere felt, or saw this fighting man.
[Page 11] Strange that the Knight should not be known i'th Field,
A Face well charg'd tho nothing in his Shield.
Sure fighting
Will like
Basilisk did ride
Among the Troops, and all that saw
Will dy'd,
Else how could
Will for fighting be a Knight,
And none alive that ever saw
Will fight.
In pugnacem Daphnem.
Pugnacem Daphnem Rex ordine donat Equestri,
Sed quod pugnasset cum foret ille reus,
Arma virum
(que) serum se vel sensisse rogatus,
Vel vidisse quidem Miles utrin
(que) negat.
Tantum equitis mirer campos latuisse per omnes,
Insignem vultu Parma sit alba licet,
Scilicet aspectu victor Basiliscus obibat
Agm
[...]na sub monstro quae periere novo.
Pugnando haud aliter referet calcaria Daphnis,
Cui pugnae testis nemo superstes erat.
Ad eundem.
De titulo ablato non recte
Daphni querêris
Facti in te causum
Daphni Senatus habet.
Jwe d
[...]cus perdis, si vitam ure tueris,
Testis abest culpae, testis honoris abest.
In Daphnen Causedicum.
IT being prov'd that fighting
Will nere fought,
The Judges straight for other treasons fought.
On that, point-blank two witnesses did swear,
Such, and such words from his mouth they did hear.
In answer to which by a speech
Will shows,
Alas, that his words are drawn through his nose,
Through his nose it was the witnesses cry'd,
But
Will has none, so again they ly'd.
Thus with a lost nose the fame he bears,
To have won both his enemies ears,
And now by his Poetry sure
Will knows
How to turn those ears again into nose.
The Poet is angry being censured by One he knowes not.
DAphne, in scorn, not knows me. In all shows
More know
Jack Puddin, than
Jack Puddin knows.
Titulus compitis Londini cum licentia imponendus.
A Letter sent out of the Countrey.
Monstrū hic horrendum nomine Dapb [...] nuperrime captum in Insulas Barbadas contendentem visui Anglorum [...] natum, uti ex scriptis placet inter Helvetios, valde enim de rebus istorum gestis, (quorum ne p [...]li pendimus) animo aestuat; Londini propugnaculo à Parliamento Anglae incarceratus, non quidem inter [...], sed ferociorum animalium domic [...] in lucrum Domini Backster manct; Philosophorum nonnulli de forma quaerentes, nihil nisi illum non ess [...] Elephantem ausi sunt affirmari Ille [...] Proboscis deest, sed per nasum trahit, & tamen proh Deorum miracula) nasum non habet. sed quasi per minima formina nasutum, Ballenae instar, [...]vomit, vomit, quid ni illum Cetum esse ex elogio Germant cujusdam Leviatham satis constat.
Vpon the Author.
DEnham come help me to laugh at old
Daph,
Whose fancies are higher than Chaff,
He abuses
All our Muses,
And would it not make a man laugh till he burst,
That he would be thought of all Poets the first,
That is of all Rimers the worst?
Daphne wert thou not content
For to vent
Thy fancies without our consent,
But hadst the face
In thy Preface
To laugh at all those that had written before,
When we thy best friends to the number of four
Advis'd thee to scribble no more.
Canto 2.
RAis'd by a Prince of
Lombard blood,
D. of
[...]
An antick fabrick long hath stood
Of
Podian flint, and
Parian free-stone
Mingled as you shall see stone,
A part whereof height
Cripples Region,
Contains of half men a whole Legion,
Who still have been
from ancient lore
For three
swift Centuries and more
Friends to the Debtors and the Drinkers,
And foes unto the Smiths and Clinkers.
When in the Churchyard or the Ally,
Occasion serves them, forth they sally,
Both horse and foot; but now I wrong'um,
There's neither horse nor foot among'um
But those that are for horse accounted,
Are on tall woodden Engines mounted,
On which in
Lombard Autors notion,
They abuse the
Property of Motion.
But for the foot'tis more improper,
For they move not on foot, but crupper,
And having neither leg nor stump,
Advance themselves on hand and rump.
A stand they make. A stand d'ye cal't?
The word, of Art is, make a halt.
Then steps forth a
Grave Eastern Cripple,
One that could fight, and talk, and tipple,
[Page 16] Brave friends, quoth he,
Power is a liquor,
Makes hands more bold, and wit more quicker,
It is a
tree whose boughs and branches
Serve us instead of legs and hanches,
It is a Hill to whose command,
Men walk by Sea
and sail by Land.
But what's our power unless we know it?
And knowledge what? unless we show it.
Behold the Knight who late did marry
The daughter of our pothecary,
Hurried to durance like a stinkard,
By
Oswald Smith, and
Borgia Clinkard,
And him like to a
civil sheep,
In Gaole (
Nice Statesmens Pound) they'l keep.
This said, you might have seen (for such is
The force of eloquence) their crutches
Ind
[...]'d with diligence in th'eys and noses
Of such as had them, flames and rose
[...]
Their
Nerves of Wyer new heat makes limber,
And rage ev n animates their timber.
Then as a pack of
Regian Hounds
Pursuing ore the
[...] grounds
A
Tuscan Stag, if in the wind
A flock of
Brescian sheep they find,
Calabrian Swine,
or Pagan Goats,
In blou
[...] they bath their
Cannon throats,
And in the trembling entrails hasten
Their well experien
[...]'d teeth to fasten,
With such
Croaetion rage the stout
Grave Cripples did the Bailiffs rout.
[Page 17] Thus rescuing
Gondibert they save him,
Then to a
Berkshire Coachman gave him.
The Bailiffs being sled, or dead all,
The Knight pulls out an
antique meadal,
On the reverse whereof was graved,
Cross and Harp.
Th' a
[...]liance betwixt
Christ and
David.
Quoth he of rescu'd Knighthood carry
This just reward, broach of
Canary,
Or
Belgian Brande wine the
Vessel
Wherewith the
Argonauts of
Tesel,
When
Mars and
Neptune them engages,
Inflame their flegmatick courages.
He safe return'd here joy and mirth a
bounded 'twixt
Astragon and
Birtha.
Thus leave we them in humour jolly:
Free from
old Roman Melancholy.
Thus far in the Authors own words, Now a little in his own way.
1. Sunk near his evening Region was the Sun,
(But though the Sun can near be said to sink,
Yet when his beams from our dull eyes are run,
He of the Oceans moysture seems to drink.)
(And though the Ocean be as far remote
From him as we, yet such is the false light,
Or mortal eye, that though for truth we kn
[...]w't,
We yet believe our own deceiving sight.)
(Nor without cause) for what our eyes behold
Unto our sence most evident hath been:
But still we doubt of things by others told,
(For Faith's the evident of things not seen.)
2. When
Gondibert and
Birtha went to bed,
(For it the Custome was of
Lombard Brides,
That on the day when they were married,
They never slept till
Sol his visage hides.)
(For though bright
Sol doth never close his eyes,
When he resignes our hemisphere to night,
Bold Ethnicks, say, that he with
Thetis lyes.
And make him but alay adulterous light.)
3. The Posts were of
abstersive Ebony,
(Though no
abstersiveness in
Posts we find,
In powder tane (the
learned not deny)
It cleanses choler, and in pills, breaks wind.)
(So when a Sword is forg'd of solid Steel,
It serves for nothing but to cut and wound,
But when to powder turn'd,
shy virgins feel
It cures green-sickness, & the spleen makes sound.)
4. The Curtains in well-shadowed colours wrought,
(For though old
Astragon his child had bred
To his own trade, yet something she was taught
By her
Nice Mother (who was
gravely dead)
(His limbeck though the sooty Chymist broke
As she past by (when out th'Elixar flew)
And (though) as a grave modern Author spoke
The power of Potion, Purge and Pill, she knew.)
(Yet something had she gain'd of female lore,
Though much she was in med'cinal science skild,
She and th'experienc'd maid had samplers store,
And could the needle or the distaff weild.)
5. The sheets so nicely fine, none could have thought
Them spun from course
Batavian Freisters toyls,
But by the fingers of
Arachne wrought,
From the most subtile of the
Silkwormes spoyles.
There
Birtha lay, but when the K
nt. drew nigh,
She seem'd to fly from what she long'd t'enjoy,
Orna her self was not than she more shie,
Gartha more nice, nor
Rodalind more coy.
But when
great Natures office was unseal'd
A womans womb
Then through
Loves limbeck his elixar flew
Motion & heat, things
stiff as if congeal'd,
Dissolv'd to
Amber suds, and
Rainbow dew.
TO DAPHNE.
On his Incomparable Incomprehensible Poem
GONDIBERT.
CHear up small Wits; now you shall crowned
Daphne himself is turn'd into a tree.
(Nor think it strange, for our great Author can be;
Clap stones to
Hirmigil, and make her Man:)
Go gather sprigs, nor can you strip him bare;
For all the ancient Wreaths sall to his share.
Poor
Homer's eyes by his
unshaded light
Again put out, who bids the world Good-night,
And is as much eclips'd by one more blind,
As is his by our new
Hectors out-shin'd:
Virgil, thou hast no Wit, and
Naso is
More short of
Will, than is
Will's Nose of his;
Can silence
T
[...]o, and the
Fairy- Queen,
Thou all by
Will unread, and most unseen.
Nor shall we ere hear more of great
Tom-I humb,
For
Gondibert and
Oswald strike all dumb.
Thus then secur'd, thy Babe shall not miscarry,
Since all do bow to Fames
Fine Secretary.
So have I heard the great
Leviathan,
Let me speak true, and not bely a man,
Reign in the Deep and with tyrannick Power
Both Costick
Codd, and squallid
Sprats devour.
An Essay in Explanation of Mr. Hobbs, where he tells the Author, The Vertues you distribute there among so many Noble persons, represent the Image but of one Mans Vertue to my Fancy, which is your own,
CANTO 1.
1.
OF all Ill Poets by their
Lumber known,
Who nere Fame's favor wore, yet sought them long,
Sir
Daphne gives precedency to none,
And breeds most business for
abstersive Song.
2.
From untaught Childhood, to mistaking Man,
An ill-performing Agent to the Stage;
With
Albovin in
Lumbar he began,
With
Gondibert in
Lumber ends his rage.
3.
Rime was his studied Art; Rime which was bad;
Rime meant for charms to keep th'devil in aw;
Rime which with Fustian lin'd, & Nonsense clad,
More needful is, than Finger, Shirt or Straw.
4.
To conquer Reason, Nature's common gift,
Fein'd Art, sophisticated Rime devis'd,
While those who cannot their weak judgements list
To discern sense, and with hard words surpris'd.
5.
Yet Laws of Verse rescue but doubtfully
From one ill Poet all good Poets fame;
Till against Rime, the wise Rimes help apply,
Which soberly tells
Will he is to blame.
On GONDIBERT.
CLose-stools thus made by
Astragon we have,
That will both singer, drugs, & paper save;
On stool of Ebony, O Reader sit,
Or else poor
Gondibert will be beshit:
For things
abstersive will avail,
As well to purge, as wipe the Tail.
The Poets Hot Coc [...]les.
THus Poets passing time away,
Like Children at Hot cockles play;
All strike by turn, and
Will is strook,
(And he lies down that writes a Book.)
Have at thee
Will, for now I come,
Spread thy hand faire upon thy Bomb,
For thy much insolence, bold
Bard,
And little sense I strike thus hard.
Whose hand was that? 'twas
Jaspar Mayne;
Nay there you're out, lie down again.
With
Gondibert, Preface and all
See where the
Doctor comes to maul
The Authors hand, 't will make him reel;
No,
Will lies still and does not feel;
That Book's so light, 'tis all one whether
You strike with that, or with a Feather:
But room for one new come to Town,
That strikes so hard he'll knock him down:
The hand he knows since it the place
Has toucht more tender then his face.
Important Sheriff, now thou ly'st down
We'll kiss thy Hands, and Clap our own.
Preface, page 25. That his writings are adapted to an easie musical Singer, which the Reader may judge by these following Verses.
OSwald, Paradin, Rolalind, Hugo, Hubert, Aribert,
Hurgonil, Astolpho, Borgia, Goliha,
[...].
Croatian, Lumbards, Hums, Vasco, Darg
[...], Orna,
Astragon, Hermogild, ulsinor, O
[...]go, Thula,
Epithetes that will serve for any Substantives either in this part or the next.
NIce, Wise, Important, Eager, Grave, Busy. Recorded
[...]. Abs
[...]ive,
[...]le
Roman, Experienc'd.
Upon the Authors writing [...] name (as in the Title of his Bock) D'avenant.
AS severall Cities made thier claim
Of
[...]omers birth to have the same;
So after ages will not want
Towns claiming to be
Avena
[...]t.
Great doubt there is, where now it lies,
Whether in
Lombard or the
Skies.
Some say by
Avenant no place is meant,
And that this
Lombard is without descent;
And as by
Bilke men mean ther's nothing there,
So com from
Avenant, means from
No. where.
Thus
Will in
[...]
D' Avenant to grace
Has made a No ch in's
[...] like that in's face,
[...] it we
[...] the Autho
[...] of
Harrigo,
Had styl'd himself
D'aphne D' Avenantigo.
FINIS.