A Select Collection of Old English Plays Volume I Part 83

147. Proof.

148. Advise.

149. Encourage.

150. Shut.

151. A play on the similarity of the words _Latin_ and _Latten_.

152. Fetters.

153. A celebrated place for foot-pads.

154. This word, in its present sense, _shoals_, seems to be unglossed.

155. i.e., Haunt Shooter's Hill in the chance of meeting with prey.

156. Constable.

157. Heel.

158. Error, misdoings.

159. According to your bidding.

160. Sobriety of conduct.

161. i.e., How light my heart is.

162. Doxy.

163. Comrade, friend.

164. _Ale-stake_, a maypole, a sign before an alehouse. Chaucer, in "The Pardoner's Prologue," calls it ale-stake--

"But first, quod he, here at this ale-stake I wil both drynke and byten on a cake."

--_Bell's Chaucer_, iii. 68.

165. Query, an euphemism for _theft_.

166. Nearest.

167. The colophon is: Enprynted by me Wynken de Worde.

168. Mr Child, in "Four Old Plays," Cambridge, U.S., 1848.

169. Old copy reads _shepe_.

170. Owneth.

171. Mistrust.

172. Guerdon, recompense.

173. _Health_, in a spiritual sense.

174. These were what were called friars-limiters.

175. At the charge of the place.

176. By Jesus, I'll pull thee by the sweet ears.

177. The pardoner quotes a proverb.

178. See a long note in Nare's, edition 1859, in v. The sense is really equivalent to our modern _rigmarolle_.

179. Original has _eyoteles_.

180. Treat.

181. Always, continually.

182. The colophon is: Imprinted by Wyllyam Rastell the v. day of Apryll the yere of our lorde M.CCCCC.x.x.xIII. c.u.m priuilegio. The only copy known, formerly Heber's, is now in the library of the Duke of Devons.h.i.+re.

183. Another work must in future be added to the list of Wynkyn de Worde's pieces, although only a fragment of it was very recently discovered by Mr Rodd, of Newport Street. It is the last leaf of a tract, the running t.i.tle of which is "Ragmannes Rolle," and it purports to be a collection of the names and qualities of good and bad women in alternate stanzas. The meaning of "Ragman's Roll" may be seen in Todd's "Johnson's Dictionary," _vide_ "Rigmarolle;" but in the following Envoy, Wynkyn de Worde speaks of "King Ragman," a new personage in history. It is inserted only as a literary curiosity.

"Explicit Ragmannes rolle.

"Lenvoy of the prynter.

"Go lytyl rolle, where thou arte bought or solde, Amonge fayre women behaue the manerly: Without rewarde of any fee or golde, Saye as it is, touchynge trouthe hardely: And yf that they do blame thee wrongfully, Excuse thy prynter, and thy selfe also, Layenge the faute on kynge Ragman holly Whiche dyde the make many yeres ago.

Finis.

--nprynted at London, in the Fletestrete, at the ----e of the Sonne, by Wynkyn de Worde."

The words "Enprynted" and "Signe," have been partly torn away, with the corner of the leaf. See the poem printed from a MS. in Hazlitt's "Popular Poetry," i. 68-78, and compare "Towneley Mysteries," p. 311.

184. This interlude has now been again collated with the Dublin copy, and a certain number of inaccuracies removed.

185. b.o.n.e.rly or bonairely, i.q., _debonaire_.

186. See Halliwell's Dictionary, in v. This word is very common, yet its precise meaning rather obscure. It is used where its import is equivalent to _folks_.

187. _Storlde_ in old copy.

188. See Halliwell in v.

189. Distribute.

190. Seat, throne.

191. Move.