Let us this Day, for it’s a Law divine,
Offer our mutual Hearts on Cupid’s Shrine;
Revel, whilst living, in the Joys of Love,
Like thund’ring Jove, and other Gods above;
For if we slight bright Venus while we’ve Breath,
There’ll be no Thoughts of loving after Death.
But being soon tir’d of Greenwich, I proceeded on my Pilgrimage to Gravesend, where, (and at Stroud, Rochester, and Chatham) the Vintners, Innkeepers, and Victuallers, are more extortioning than any Pawn-Broker, who has the Honesty to take no more than Cent. per Cent. for what Money they lend. Hereupon, bidding adieu to the County of Kent, I rambled through the County of Surry; but it being Assize-Time when I arriv’d at Kingston upon Thames, I found I was leap’d out of the Fryingpan into the Fire, for Provisions and Lodging were then as dear as a Suit of Law in Chancery; so that I rid forthwith into the County of Sussex, where I saw nothing but a Parcel of Bumpkins and Milk-Wenches returning all home, as drunk as David’s sow, from a Country-Wake. Thence, I went into Hampshire, where Rusticks are as fat as their Hogs and as liquorish as those who buy their Honey. In this County is Southampton, where the Sword of Sir Bevis is held in as much Veneration by the Towns People, as a Piece of Paper worn by ’Prentice-Boys, and Servant-Wenches on Valentine’s Day. Hence, I went to Portsmouth, betwixt which Place and Hell, the Soldiers garrison’d here say, there is but only a Sheet of brown Paper; however, it is honour’d by giving the Title of a Dutchess to Squintabella, alias Madamoiselle Louise de Querouaille. At this Sea-port, crossing the Water, I reached at the Distance of three Leagues, the Isle of Wight, and proceeded to Carisbrook Castle, which inwardly, (as well as outwardly) is much out of Repair, especially the Room in which King Charles I. was confin’d a Prisoner, a little before the horrid Murder perpetrated on him, the then prevailing Party, who under a Stratocracy or Army-Power, brought him to the Block, and then conspir’d to overthrow the well settled Constitution of this Kingdom with Anarchy, and Confusion which unparalleled Piece of Villany incited me to write ex tempore on the Wall of that fatal Place, the following Lines.
What dismal Horror, and as dismal Gloom,
Invades the hallow’d Silence of this Room!
Where Majesty in Mourning sat, to wait