Nay, Sir, can you spare me a crown? Thankfully I
Gave it as ransom. But as fiddlers still,
Though they be paid to be gone, yet needs will
Thrust one more jigg upon you; so did he
With his long complimented thanks vex me.
But he is gone, thanks to his needy want,
And the prerogative of my crown. Scant
His thanks were ended when I (which did see
All the court fill'd with such strange things as he)
Ran from thence with such or more haste than one
Who fears more actions doth haste from prison.
At home in wholesome solitariness
My piteous soul began the wretchedness
Of suitors at court to mourn, and a trance
Like his who dreamt he saw hell did advance
Itself o'er me: such men as he saw there
I saw at court, and worse, and more. Low fear
Becomes the guilty, not th' accuser; then
Shall I, none's slave, of high born or rais'd men
Fear frowns, and my mistress, Truth! betray thee
To th' huffing braggart, puft nobility?
No, no; thou which since yesterday hast been
Almost about the whole world, hast thou seen,
O Sun! in all thy journey vanity
Such as swells the bladder of our court? I
Think he which made your waxen garden, and
Transported it from Italy, to stand
With us at London, flouts our courtiers; for
Just such gay painted things, which no sap nor
Taste have in them, ours are!
[Footnote 165: fop, early form of macaroni.]
BEN JONSON.
(1573-1637.)
These two pieces are taken from Jonson's _Epigrams_.
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