“Sir Jeffrie’s Ale-tub” alludes to two knights who were ruinously fined, and hardly escaped with life, for their patronage of Martin.
Chwere, i.e. “that I were,” alluding to their frequently adopting the corrupt phraseology of the populace, to catch the ears of the mob.
It is a singular coincidence that Arnauld, in his caustic retort on the Jesuits, said—“I do not fear your pen, but your penknife.” The play on the word, tells even better in our language than in the original—plume and canife.
I know of only one Laneham, who wrote “A Narrative of the Queen’s Visit at Kenilworth Castle,” 1575. He was probably a redoubtable satirist. I do not find his name in Ritson’s “Bibliographia Poetica.”
Alluding to the title of one of their most virulent libels against Bishop Cooper [“Hay any worke for Cooper,” which was a pun on the Bishop’s name, conveyed in the street cry of an itinerant trader, and was followed by another entitled] “More work for a Cooper.” Cooper, in his “Admonition to the People of England,” had justly observed that this Mar-Prelate ought to have many other names. See note, p. [510].
I will close this note with an extract from “Pappe with a Hatchet,” which illustrates the ill effects of all sudden reforms, by an apposite and original image.