Some twelvemonths ago,
A hundred or so,
The pope went to visit the devil,
And if you’ll attend,
You’ll find, to a friend,
Old Nick can behave very civil.
How do’st do, quoth the seer,
What a plague brought you here;
I suppose ’twas some whimsical maggot—
Come draw tow’rds the fire,
I pr’thee sit nigher;
Here, sirrah, lay on t’other faggot.
You’re welcome to hell,
I hope friends are well,
At Paris, Madrid, and at Rome;
But, since you elope,
I suppose, honest pope,
The conclave will hang out the broom.
All jesting aside,
His Holiness cried,
Give the pope and the devil their dues;
Believe me, old dad,
I’ll make thy heart glad
For faith I have brought thee rare news.
There’s a plot to beguile
An obstinate isle,
Great Britain, that heretic nation,
Who so slyly behav’d
In hopes to be sav’d
By the help of a curs’d reformation.
We shall never have done
If we burn one by one,
Nor destroy the whole heretic race;
For when one is dead,
Like the fam’d hydra’s head,
Another springs up in his place.
Believe me, Old Nick,
We’ll show them a trick,
A trick that shall serve for the nonce,
For this day before dinner,
Or else I’m a sinner,
We’ll kill all their leaders at once.
When the parliament sits
And all try their wits
In consulting of old mealy papers,
We’ll give them a greeting
Shall break up their meeting
And set them all cutting their capers.
There’s powder enough
And combustible stuff
In thirty and odd trusty barrels;
We’ll send them together
The Lord can tell whither,
And decide at one blow all their quarrels.
When the king and his son
And the parliament’s gone,
And the people are left in the lurch,
Things will take their old station
In yon cursed nation
And I’ll be the head of the church.