WHY COME YE NAT TO COURTE?
[Page 36.] v. 290.
“Into a mouse hole they wolde
Rynne away and crepe,
Lyke a mayny of shepe;
Dare nat loke out at dur,” &c.
The proper punctuation is,
“Into a mouse hole they wolde
Rynne away and crepe;
Lyke a mayny of shepe,
Dare nat loke out at dur,” &c.
NOTES.
[Page 110.]—“Page 40. v. 252. Heue and how rombelow]” I might have added, that “heaue and hoe Rumbelo” occurs in a nonsensical song (No. 31) in Ravenscroft’s Pammelia, 1609.
[Page 124.]—“Page 54. v. 118. For to kepe his cut, &c.]” So in the Coventry Mysteries, the Pharisee says to the woman taken in adultery;
“We xal the teche with carys colde
A lytyl bettyr to kepe thi kutte.”
MS. Cott. Vesp. D viii. fol. 123.
[Page 132.]—“Page 66. v. 485. at a brayde]” This expression is used here in connexion with singing: and in one of the Christmas Carols printed for the Percy Society, p. 51, we find,
“Wherefor syng we alle atte a brayde, nowell.”
[Page 147.]—“Page 84. v. 1078. Enhached] i. e. Inlaid,” &c. I ought to have observed that, though in the preceding line Skelton calls this beauty-spot a “sker” (scar), he means the wart already mentioned;
“Her beautye to augment,
Dame Nature hath her lent
A warte vpon her cheke,
Who so lyst to seke
In her vysage a skar,” &c.
v. 1041.
and see too v. 1064.
[Page 148.]—“Page 86. v. 1151.
She is playnly expresse
Egeria, the goddesse,
And lyke to her image,
Emportured with corage,
A louers pilgrimage]
I must leave the reader to form his own idea of the meaning of the last two lines,” &c. The following lines of Lydgate may be cited as somewhat resembling the present passage;
“To hym appered a monstruous ymage
Parted on twayne of colour and corage,” &c.
Fall of Prynces, B. vi. leaf cxxxiiii. ed. Wayland.
[Page 157.] last line but one. “The gist or point of this satire had a noble origin, or there must be an extraordinary coincidence of thought in the Beoni, or Topers, a ludicrous effusion of the great Lorenzo de Medici, when a young man.” Dallaway was led to this remark by the following passage in Spence’s Anecdotes, &c.; “Skelton’s poems are all low and bad: there’s nothing in them that’s worth reading.—P. [Mr. Cleland, who was by, added, that the Tunning of Ellinor Rummin, in that author’s works, was taken from a poem of Lorenzo de’ Medici’s].” p. 173. ed. 18-20.—I Beoni, observes Mr. D’Israeli (referring to Roscoe’s Life of Lorenzo de’ Medici, i. 290), “was printed by the Giunti in 1568, and therefore this burlesque piece could never have been known to Skelton.” Amen. of Lit. ii. 79.
[Page 166.]—“Page 102. v. 229.... fonny is, I suppose, foolishly amorous,” &c. I ought to have said “fonny, i. e. to fon, to be foolishly amorous,” &c.
[Page 172.] line 3. for “v. 490,” read “v. 400.”
[Page 176.]—“Page 113. v. 560. mote I hoppy] i. e. may I have good hap.” Rather, I believe—may I hop. “Hoppy, to hop or caper. Exm.” Grose’s Prov. Gloss. ed. 1839.
[Page 184.]—“Page 121. v. 46. dud frese] i. e. coarse frieze.” But in Prompt. Parv. we find “Dudde clothe. Amphibolus. Burrus.” ed. 1499.
[Page 188.]—“Page 125. v. 178. Soche pelfry thou hast pachchyd.” Add to note on this line,—Dekker, describing “The Blacke Arte” (or “Picking of Lockes”), tells us that “The gaines gotten is Pelfry.” The Belman of London, &c. sig. F 4. ed. 1608.
[Page 190.] “—— goliardum].” “Goliardeis, one who gains his living by following rich men’s tables, and telling tales and making sport for the guests. See on this word the Introduction to the Poems of Walter Mapes.” Wright’s Gloss, to Piers Ploughman.
[Page 195.]—“Page 133. v. 3. In your crosse rowe nor Christ crosse you spede]” Add to note on this line that—in The Boke of Curtasye we find;
“Yff that thou be a ȝong enfaunt,
And thenke tho scoles for to haunt,
This lessoun schulle thy maister the merke,
Cros Crist the spede in alle thi werke.”
The sec. Boke, p. 7. (printed for the Percy Society.)
[Page 206.]—“Page 157. v. 73 ... So Fansy, in our author’s Magnyfycence, exclaims to his hawk,” &c. But, though Fansy calls his bird a hawk, it appears to have been an owl.
[Page 207.]—“Page 157. v. 78 ... Juliana Barnes.” Read “Juliana Berners.”
[Page 244.]—“Page 246. v. 658. a pystell of a postyke]” Cotgrave has “Postiquer. To play the vagrant Impostor,” &c.: “Postiqueries. Cousening sleights,” &c.: “Postiqueur. A wandering impostor,” &c.
[Page 271.]—“Page 297. v. 2211. rede] i. e. advice.” Read “i. e. advise.”
[——] “Page 298. v. 2233. rode] i. e. road, cross.” Read “i. e. rood, cross.”
[Page 284.]—“Page 326, v. 397 ... Cole’s Dict.” Read “Coles’s Dict.”
[Page 311.]—“Page 380. v. 474. The carpettis within and tappettis of pall].” I may just notice that in an unpublished book of Kings Payments, in the Chapter-House, we find, under the first year of Henry 8;
| “Item to Corneles Vanderstrete opon his waraunt for xv Tappettes made for Wyndowes at the towre | ix s.” |
[Page 328.]—“Page 410. v. 1219 ... but, though Skelton was in all probability an author as early as 1583,” &c. Read “1483.”
[Page 345.]—“Page 14. v. 280.” Latter part of the note—“if ‘33ᵒ’ and ‘34’” &c. I ought to have mentioned that at the end of Why come ye nat to Courte (vol. ii. 67) we find (what is equally puzzling) “xxxiiii.”