You may range about the fair,
New tricks and sights to see;
And when your legs are weary,
Pray come again to me:
There's thread-bare Holofernes, 26
Whom Judith long hath slain;
With Guy of Warwick, St. George,27
And Rosamond's fair dame:
You'll find some pretty puppets too,
With many a nickey-nack;
But a glass of jolly sack, boys,
Is a cordial for the back.

The houses being low too,
Some players hither come;
But if my stars deceive men not,
They soon will know their doom :
There's other pretty strollers,

That crowd upon us here,

26 The "drama" of Judith and Holofernes was published with the following imprint: "To be sold, in the Booth of Lee and Harper, and only printed for and by G. Lee, in Blue Maid Alley, Southwark."

27 Poor Elkanah Settle, the City Laureat, after the Revolution, kept a booth in Bartholomew Fair, where, in a droll, called St. George for England, he acted in a dragon of green leather of his own invention.

That may have booths to let too,
Before their time I fear:

All these may prate and talk much,

Show tricks and bounce and crack;

But here's a glass of sack, boys,
That's a cordial for the back.

Come sit down then brisk lads all,
A bumper to the king;
Old England let's remember,

May peace and plenty spring:
Let war no more perplex you,

Your taxes soon will end;

The soldiers all disbanded,

And each man love his friend:

Be merry then, carouse boys,

See drawer what is't they lack;

And fetch a bottle neat boy,

That's a cordial for the back.

LXII.

The Countryman's Ramble through
Bartholomew Fair.

FROM the same MS. See also Durfey's Pills to Purge Melancholy, vol. i, p. 55, edit. 1707.

ADZOOKS ches went the other day to London town; In Smithfield such gazing,

Zuch thrusting and squeezing,

Was never known:

A zitty of wood, some volk do call it Bartledom Fair,

But ches zure nought but kings and queens live there.

In gold and zilver, zilk and velvet, each was drest, A lord in his zattin,

Was busy a prating,
Amongst the rest;

But one in blue jacket came, which some do

Adsheart he talk'd woundy witty to 'em all!

At last, adzooks, he made such sport I laugh'd aloud,

The rogue being flustered,
He flung me a custard

Amidst the crowd:

The volk vell a laughing at me, then the vezen zaid, Bezure Ralph, give it to Doll the dairy-maid.

I zwallow'd the affront, but stay'd no longer there ; I thrust and I scrambled,

Till further I rambled

Into the Fair;

Where trumpets and bagpipes, kettledrums, fidlers, all at work,

And the cooks zung, "Here's your delicate Pig

and Pork." 29

28 Here a knave in a foole's coate, with a trumpet sounding, or a drum beating, invites you, and would faine perswade you to see his puppets."-Bartholomew Faire, 1641.

29 Roasted pigs formed one of the great attractions of Bartholomew Fair in its palmy days. They were sold piping hot in booths and stalls. "If Bartholomew Faire should last a whole year, nor pigs nor puppetplayes would ever be surfeited of." Gayton's Festivious Notes on Don Quixot, 1654, p. 145. See also Ben Jonson's comedy of Bartholomew Fair. Pigs were not out of date when Ned Ward wrote his London Spy.

I look'd around to see the wonders of the Vair, Where lads and lasses,

With pudding-bag arses,

Zo nimble were:

Heels over-head, as round as a wheel they turned about,

Old Nick zure was in their breeches without doubt.

Most woundily pleas'd, I up and down the Vair

did range,

To zee the vine varies,
Play all their vagaries,

I vow 'twas strange;

I ask'd 'em aloud what country volk they were? A cross brat answer'd "che were cuckold-shire."

I thrust and shov'd along as well as e'er I could, At last did I grovel,

Into a dark hovel,

Where drink was sold;

They brought me cans which cost a penny, adsheart!

I'm zure twelve ne're could vill a country quart.