All religions and nations, their humours and fashions Rich or poore, knave or whoore, dwarfish or tall Sheep or shrew, Ile avow, well I know will all bow, If they be but wel steep’d, with a Pot of Good Ale.
O Ale, ab alendo, thou liquor of life, I wish that my mouth were as big as a Whale, But then ’twere to little, to reach thy least title, That belongs to the Praise of a Pot of Good Ale.
Thus many a vertue to you I have showed, And not any vice in all this long tale, But after the Pot, there commeth a shot, And that is the Blot of a Pot of Good Ale.
Well, said my friend, the blot I will beare, You have done very well, it is time to strike saile, We’ll have six Pots more, though we dye on the score, To make all this good of a Pot of Good Ale.
We may be pardoned for omitting “the valiant battell fought between the Norfolk Cock and the Wisbich Cock.”
Returning again to the Roxburghe Collection. A Health to all Good Fellowes is a very quaint old drinking song, having beneath its title a wood-cut no less quaint than the letterpress. It was printed about the commencement of the seventeenth century, for Henry Gossen. The author is unknown; possibly he was Martin Parker or Lawrence Price. {325} No copy beyond that in the Roxburghe Collection is known to be in existence. The tune is a good one.
A HEALTH TO ALL GOOD-FELLOWES:
or,
The good Companions Arithmeticke.
To the tune of To drive cold Winter away.