and men whose heads
Do grow beneath their shoulders.
l. 23. Stranger then strangers, &c. The 'Stranger then strangest' of some MSS. would form a natural climax to the preceding list of marvels. But 'strangers' is the authoritative reading, and forms the transition to the next few lines. The reference is to the unpopularity in London of the numerous strangers whom wars and religious persecution had collected in England. Strype (Annals, iv) prints a paper of 1568 in which the Lord Mayor gives to the Privy Council an account of the strangers in London. In 1593 there were again complaints of their presence and threats to attack them. 'While these inquiries were making, to incense the people against them there were these lines in one of their libels: Doth not the world see that you, beastly brutes, the Belgians, or rather drunken drones and faint-hearted Flemings; and you fraudulent father (sic. Query 'faitor'), Frenchmen, by your cowardly flight from your own natural countries, have abandoned the same into the hands of your proud, cowardly enemies, and have by a feigned hypocrisy and counterfeit show of religion placed yourself here in a most fertile soil, under a most gracious and merciful prince; who hath been contented, to the great prejudice of her own natural subjects, to suffer you to live here in better case and more freedom then her own people—Be it known to all Flemings and Frenchmen that it is best for them to depart out of the realm of England between this and the 9th of July next. If not then to take that which follows: for that there shall be many a sore stripe. Apprentices will rise to the number of 2336. And all the apprentices and journeymen will down with the Flemings and strangers.'
Another libel was in verse, and after quoting it the official document proceeds: 'The court upon these seditious motives took the most prudent measures to protect the poor strangers, and to prevent any riot or insurrection.' Among other provisions, 'Orders to be given to appoint a strong watch of merchants and others, and like-handicrafted masters, to answer for their apprentices' and servants' misdoing.' Strype's Annals, iv. 234-5.
In the same year a bill was promoted in Parliament against aliens selling foreign wares among us by retail, which Raleigh supported: 'Whereas it is pretended that for strangers it is against charity, against honour, against profit to expel them: in my opinion it is no matter of charity to relieve them. For first, such as fly hither have forsaken their own king: and religion is no pretext for them; for we have no Dutchmen here, but such as come from those princes where the gospel is preached; yet here they live disliking our church,' &c. Birch, Life of Raleigh, p. 163.
I have thought it worth while to note these more recent references as Grosart refers to the rising against strangers on May-day, 1517.
l. 29. by your priesthood, &c. In 1581 a proclamation was issued imposing the penalty of death on any Jesuits or seminary priests who entered the Queen's dominions, and in 1585 Parliament again decreed that all Jesuits and seminary priests were to leave the kingdom within forty days under the capital penalty of treason. The detection, imprisonment, torture, and execution of disguised priests form a considerable chapter in Elizabethan history. Donne's companion looks so strange that he runs the risk of arrest as a seminary priest from Rome, or Douay. See Strype's Annals, passim, and Meyer, Die Katholische Kirche unter Elisabeth, 1910.
Page 160, l. 35. and saith: 'saith' is the reading of all the earlier editions, although Chambers and the Grolier Club editor silently alter it to an exclamatory 'faith'—turning it into a statement which Donne immediately contradicts. The 'saith' is a harshly interpolated 'so he says'. One MS. adds 'he', and possibly the pronoun in some form has been dropped, e.g. 'sayth a speakes'.
ll. 37-8. Made of the Accents, &c. It is perhaps rash to accept the 'no language' of A25, Q, and the Dyce MS. But the last two represent, I think, an early version of the Satyres, and 'no language' (like 'nill be delayed', Epithal. made at Lincolns Inn) is just the sort of reading that would tend to disappear in repeated transmission. It is too bold for the average copyist or editor. But its boldness is characteristic of Donne; it gives a much better sense; and it is echoed by Jonson in his Discoveries: 'Spenser in affecting the ancients writ no language.' In like manner Donne's companion, in affecting the accents and best phrases of all languages, spoke none. I confess that seems to me a more pointed remark than that he spoke one made up of these.
l. 48. Jovius or Surius: Paolo Giovio, Bishop of Nocera, among many other works wrote Historiarum sui temporis Libri XLV. 1553. Chambers quotes from the Nouvelle Biographie Générale: 'Ses œuvres sont pleines des mensonges dont profita sa cupidité.'