[486] John Scogan was the famous court buffoon, attached to the household of Edward IV., whose head Justice Shallow makes the youthful Falstaff break at the court gate (Henry IV. Part II. act iii. sc. 2), though Falstaff is represented as having died at least twenty years before Scogan could have been born. In regard to him, see Doran’s Court Fools, pp. 123-30. “Scogan’s choice,” in Morton’s day, seems to have been a popular expression, signifying that a choice of some sort is better than no power to choose at all. It was derived probably from the story of Scogan, that he was once ordered to be hanged, but allowed the privilege of choosing the tree. He escaped the penalty by being unable to find a tree to his liking. Morton uses the expression again, see infra, [*137]. But the reference here is as obscure as “the poem.”
[489] “Ye Roman Goddes Flora.” (Bradford, p. 237.)
[490] In regard to the arrest of Morton by Standish, in June, 1628, see supra, [27-9].
[492] Morton here confounds his experience in Boston, two years later, with that at Plymouth in 1628. In 1630 the master of the Gift refused to carry him back to England. (Supra, [44].) In the spring of 1628, however, no vessel seems to have arrived at Plymouth from England, as Allerton then brought over an assortment of goods, and came in a fishing-vessel by way of the Maine stations. (Bradford, p. 232.) Allerton returned to London in the course of the succeeding summer or autumn, but it is not probable then any vessel left Plymouth in June, 1628, bound for England. (Supra, [29].)
[493] It was not until towards the close of the summer of the next year that Morton returned to Massachusetts in company with Allerton. (Supra, [36-7].)
[494] Morton implies above that the “Poem” which follows was written shortly after the events to which it relates occurred, and before his return to New England in 1629. It was then, it seems, “in use” in London. The name of Ben Jonson appears in the margin of the original edition, as of this reprint, and opposite the first two lines, as above. Exactly what this signifies it is impossible now to say. Some critics that I have consulted are inclined to think that Jonson, who was then about fifty-five years old and at the height of his fame, may have written all the verses. Others suggest that Morton, by putting the name in the margin, meant to imply that Jonson wrote them all, and that this was another of the unscrupulous tricks of the author of the New Canaan. Neither explanation commends itself to my judgment. The first five verified lines are a paraphrase of five lines at the beginning of one of Jonson’s productions, for a poem it is not. In his published works (Gifford’s ed. [1816], vol. viii. p. 241) they appear as follows:—
“I sing the brave adventure of two wights,