“THE PEDLAR'S PACK.=
“Needles and pins! Needles and pins!
Lads and lasses, the fair begins!
Ribbons and laces
For sweet smiling faces;
Glasses for quizzers;
Bodkins and scissors;
Baubles, my dears,
For your fingers and ears;
Sneeshing for sneezers;
Toothpicks and tweezers;
Garlands so gay
For Valentine's day;
Fans for the pretty;
Jests for the witty;
Songs for the many
Three yards a penny!
I'm a jolly gay pedlar, and bear on my back,
Like my betters, my fortune through brake and
through briar;
I shuffle, I cut, and I deal out my pack;
And when I play the knave, 'tis for you to play
higher!
In default of a scrip,
In my pocket I slip
A good fat hen, lest it die of the pip!
When my cream I have sipp'd,
And my liquor I've lipp'd,
I often have been, like my syllabub—whipp'd.
But a pedlar's back is as broad as its long,
So is his conscience, and so is his song!”
“An arrant Proteus!” said Uncle Timothy, “with the harp of Urien, and the knavery of Autolicus. But we must have him in, and see what further store of ballads he hath in his budget.”
And he rose a second time; but was anticipated by the Squire Minstrel, who entered, crying, “Largess! gentles, largess! for the poor harper of merry Stratford-upon-Avon.”
The personage making this demand was enveloped in a large, loose camlet cloak, that had evidently passed through several generations of his craft till it descended to the shortest. His complexion was of a brickdust rosiness, through which shone dirtiness visible; his upper-lip was fortified with a huge pair of sable mustachios, and his nether curled fiercely with a bushy imperial. His eyes, peering under his broad-brimmed slouched beaver, were intelligent, and twinkled with good humour. His voice, like his figure, was round and oily; and when he doffed his hat, a shock of coal-black wiry hair fell over his face, and rendered his features still more obscure.
“Well, goodman Harper,” cried Uncle Timothy, after viewing attentively this singular character, “what other Fittes, yet unsung, have you in your budget?”
“A right merry and conceited infinity!” replied the minstrel. “Nutmegs for Nightingales! a Balade of a priest that loste his nose for saying of masse, as I suppose; a most pleasant Ballad of patient Grissell; a merry new Song how a Brewer meant to make a Cooper cuckold, and how deere the Brewer paid for the bargaine; a merie newe Ballad intituled the pinnyng of the Basket; the Twenty-Five orders of Fooles; a Ditty delightful of Mother Watkin's ah; A warning well wayed, though counted a tale; and A prettie new Ballad, intytuled
'The crowe sits upon the wall,
Please one, and please all!
written and sung by Dick Tarlton! * Were it meet for you, most reverend and rich citizens, to bibo with a poor ballad-monger, I would crave your honours to pledge with me a cup to his merry memory.”
“Meet!” quoth Uncle Timothy. “Grammercy! Dick Tarlton is meat, ay, and drink too, for the best wit in Christendom, past, present, and to come!
* Tarlton was a poet. “Tarlton's Toys” (see Thomas Nash's
“Terrors of the Night,” 4to. 1594,) had appeared in 1586. He
had some share in the extemporal play of “The Seven Deadly
Sins.” In 1578, John Allde had a licence to publish
“Tarlton's device upon this unlooked-for great snowe.” In
1570, the same John Allde “at the long shop adjoyning unto
Saint Mildred's Church in the Pultrye,” published “A very
Lamentable and Wofull Discours of the Fierce Fluds, which
lately Flowed in Bedford Shire, in Lincoln Shire, and in
many other Places, with the Great Losses of Sheep and other
Cattel, the 5th of October, 1570.” We are in possession of
an unique black-letter ballad, written by Tarlto. It has
a woodcut of a lady dressed in the full court costume of the
time, holding in her right hand a fan of feathers.
“A prettie newe Ballad, intytuled:
The crowe sits upon the wall,
Please one and please all.
To the tune of, 'Please one and please all.'
Imprinted at London for Henry Kyrkham, dwelling at the
little North doore of Paules, at. the Sygne of the blacke
Boys.” Tarlton's wife, Kate, was a shrew; and, if his own
epigram be sooth, a quean into the bargain.
“Woe to thee, Tarjton, that ever thou were born,
Thy wife hath made thee a cuckold, and thou must wear the
horn:
What, and if she hath? Am I a whit the worse?
She keeps me like a gentleman, with money in my purse.”
He was not always so enduring and complaisant: for on one
occasion, in a storm, he proposed, to lighten the vessel by
throwing his lady overboard!
Thy calling, vagrant though it be, shall not stand in the way of a good toast. What say you, my friends, to a loving cup with the harper, to Dick Tarlton, and Merrie England? The cup went round; and as the harper brushed his lips after the spicy draught, so did his right mustachio!
Uncle Timothy did not notice this peculiarity.
“Might I once more presume, my noble masters,” said the harper. “I would humbly——”
“Thou art Lord of Misrule for to-night,” replied Uncle Timothy. “Go on presuming.”
“The memory of the immortal Twenty-nine, and their patron, Holy Saint Thomas of Canterbury!”
And the minstrel bowed his head reverently, crossed his hands over his breast, and rising to his harp, struck a chord that made every bosom thrill again.
“Thy touch hath a finish, and thy voice a harmony that betoken cultivation and science.”
As the middle-aged gentleman made this observation, the mustachio that had taken a downward curve, fell to the ground; its companion, (some conjuror's heir-loom,) played at follow my leader; and the solitary imperial was left alone in its glory.
The harper, to hide his confusion, hummed Lo-doiska.
Uncle Timothy, espying the phenomenon, fixed his wondering eyes full in the strange man's face, and exclaimed, “Who, and what art thou?”
“I'm a palmer come from the Holy Land.” (Singing.)
“Doubtless!” replied Uncle Timothy. “A palmer of traveller's tales upon such ignoramuses as will believe them. Why, that mysterious budget of thine contains every black-letter rarity that Captain Cox * of Coventry rejoiced in, and bibliomaniacs sigh for. Who, and what art thou?”
* Laneham, in his Account of the Queen's Entertainment at
Killingworth Castle, 1575, represents this military mason
and bibliomaniac as “marching on valiantly before, clean
trust, and gartered above the knee, all fresh in a velvet
cap, flourishing with his ton sword and describing a
procession of the Coventry men in celebration of Hock
Tuesday, he introduces “Fyrst, Captain Cox, an od man I
promiz yoo; by profession a mason, and that right skilfull;
very cunning in fens, and hardy az Gavin; for hiz ton-sword
hangs at hiz tabbz eend; great oversight hath he in matters
of storie: for az for King Arthur z book, Huon of Burdeaus,
the foour sons of Ay mon, Bevys of Hampton, the Squyre of lo
degree, the Knight of Courtesy, the Wido Edyth, the King and
the Tanner, Robin-hood, Adam Bel, Clim of the Clough and
William of Cloudsley, the Wife lapt in a Morels Skin, the
Sakfull of Nuez, Elynor Rumming, and the Nutbrown Maid.
“What should I rehearz heer, what a bunch of Ballets and
Songs, all auncient; and Broom broom on Hill, So Wo iz me
begon, troly lo, Over a Whinny Meg, Hey ding a ding, Bony
lass upon a green, My hony on gave me a bek, By a bank as I
lay: and a hundred more he hath fair wrapt up in parchment,
and bound with a whip cord. To stay ye no longer heerin, I
dare say he hath as fair a library for theez sciencez, and
az many goodly monuments both in prose and poetry, and at
after noonz can talk az much without book, az ony inholder
betwixt Brainford and Bagshot, what degree soever he be.”
“Suppose, signors, I should be some eccentric nobleman in disguise,—or odd fish of an amateur collecting musical tribute to win a wager,—or suppose-”
“Have done with thy supposes!” cried the impatient and satirical-nosed gentleman.
“Or, suppose—Uncle Timothy!” Here, with the adroitness of a practised mimic, the voice was changed in an instant, the coal-black wiry wig thrown off, the bushy imperial sent to look after the stray mustachios, the thread-bare camlet cloak and rusty beaver cast aside, and the chaffing quaffing, loud-laughing Lauréat of Little Britain stood confessed under a stucco of red ochre!
“Was there ever such a mountebank varlet!” shouted the middle-aged gentleman, holding fast his two sides.
“I followed close upon your skirts, and dogged you hither.”
“Dogged me, puppy!”
“Mr. Moses, the old clothesman, provided my mendicant wardrobe, and mine host lent the harp, which belongs to an itinerant musician, who charms his parlour company with sweet sounds. I intended, dear Uncle Timothy, to surprise and please you.”
“And in truth, Benjamin, thou hast done both. I am surprised and pleased!” And drawing nearer, with a suppressed voice, he added, “When sick and sorrowful, sing me that old harper's song. When thou only art left to smooth my pillow, and close my eyes sing me that old harper's song!
''Twill make me pass the cup of anguish by,
Mix with the blest, nor know that I had died.
“And you, Jacob Jollyboy,to plot against me with that Israelitish retailer of cast-off duds, Mr. Moses!” continued the satirical-nosed gentleman, labouring hard to conceal his emotion under a taking-to-task frown exceedingly imposing and ludicrous.
Mr. Jollyboy looked all confusion and cutlets.. “Where do you expect to go when you die?”
“Where Uncle Timothy goes, and 'je suis content, 'as the Frenchman said to not half so dainty a dish of smoking-hot Scotch collops as I have the honour to set before you.” And Mr. Jollyboy breathed, or rather puffed again.
The Lauréat,
“Neat, trimly drest,
Fresh as a bridegroom,” and his face new wash'd,
re-entered, and with his usual urbanity did the honours of the supper-table.
The Scotch collops having been despatched with hearty good will, Uncle Timothy restricted our future libations to one single bowl. “And mind, Benjamin, only one!” This was delivered with peculiar emphasis. Mr. Bosky bowed obedience to the behest; and, as a nod is as good as a wink, he nodded to Mr. Jollyboy.
The bowl was brought in, brimming and beautiful; and it was five good acts of a comedy to watch the features of Uncle Timothy. He first gazed at the bowl, then at the landlord, then at the lauréat, then at us, and then at the bowl again!
“Pray, Mr. Jollyboy,” he inquired, “call you this a bowl, or a caldron?”
Mr. Jollyboy solemnly deposed as to its being a real bowl; the identical bowl in which six little Jollyboys had been christened.
“Is it your intention, Mr. Jollyboy, to christen us too? Let it be tipplers, then, mine host of the Tabard!”
“As to the christening, Uncle Timothy, that would be nothing very much out of order—seeing
That some great poet says, I'll take my oath,
Man is an infant, but of larger growth.
“Besides,” argued Mr. Bosky, Socratically, the dimensions of the bowl were not in the record; and as I thought we should be too many for a halfcrown sneaker of punch-”
“You thought you would be too many for me! And so you have been. Sit down, Mr. Jollyboy, and help us out of this dilemma. Take a drop of your own physic.”
Mr. Jollyboy respectfully intimated he would rather do that than break his arm; and took his seat at the board accordingly.
“But,” said Uncle Timothy, “let us have the entire dramatis personæ of the harper's interlude. We are minus his groom of the stole. Send our compliments over the way for Mr. Moses.”
Mr. Moses was summoned, and he sidled in with a very high stock, with broad pink stripes, and a very low bow—hoping “de gentlemensh vash quite veil.”
“Still,” cried Mr. Bosky, “we are not all mustered. The harp!” And instantly the lauréat “with flying fingers touched the” wires.
“A song from Uncle Timothy, for which the musical bells of St. Saviour's tell us there is just time.” He then struck the instrument to a lively tune, and the middle-aged gentleman sang with appropriate feeling,