"The goods of this poor man sold at an out-cry.
His wife turn'd out of doors, his children forc'd
To beg their bread."
And again in Middleton's "Chast Mayd in Cheape-side" [Dyce's edit. iv. 58:]
"I'll sell all at an out-cry."
Again in Ben Jonson's "Catiline," act ii. sc. 3—
"Their houses, and fine gardens, given away,
And their goods, under the spear at outcry."
Upon which last passage Mr Whalley observes, that "the Roman way of selling things by auction was setting up a spear; and hence the phrase sub hasta vendere."
[231] See Evans's "Collection of Old Ballads," i. 292.
The story of Whittington and his Cat, though under different names, is common to various languages. Messrs Grim have pointed it out in German, and it is given in Italian as one of [the "Facetie" of the] celebrated Arlotto under the following title: "Il Piovano, a un prete che fece mercantia di palle, dice la novella della gatte." He relates it of a mercante Genovese avventurato il quale navigando fu portato dalla fortuna a una isola lontanissima. The story was probably borrowed in English and assigned to Whittington: it is noticed in "Eastward Hoe" as "the famous fable of Whittington and his Puss." This play was written soon after 1603, and the ballad in Evans's collection is [certainly in its present form] not so old. The "Novella" was printed in Italy [soon after 1500]; and Arlotto, to whom it is attributed, died in 1483.
[232] [Old copy, Hope, a half peny, &c. This appears to be an allusion to the proverb,
"At the west-gate came Thornton in,
With a hop, a halfpenny, and a lamb's skin."