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And round about the pole does make
A circle, like a bear at stake,
That at the chain's end wheels about,
And overturns the rabble-rout:
For after solemn proclamation

In the bear's name, (as is the fashion
According to the law of arms,
To keep men from inglorious harms)
That none presume to come so near
As forty foot of stake of bear,
If any yet be so fool-hardy,
T'expose themselves to vain jeopardy,
If they come wounded off, and lame,
No honour's got by such a maim,
Although the bear gain much, being bound
In honour to make good his ground
When he's engag'd, and takes no notice,
If any press upon him, who 'tis,
But lets them know, at their own cost,
That he intends to keep his post.
This to prevent, and other harms,
Which always wait on feats of arms,
(For in the hurry of a fray

'Tis hard to keep out of harm's way;)
Thither the knight his course did steer,
To keep the peace 'twixt dog and bear,
As he believ'd h' was bound to do
In conscience and commission too;
And therefore thus bespoke the squire:
"We, that are wisely mounted higher
Than constables in curule wit,
When on tribunal bench we sit,
Like speculators should foresee,
From Pharos of authority,
Portended mischiefs farther than
Low Proletarian tything-men;
And therefore, being inform'd by bruit
That dog and bear are to dispute,
For so of late men fighting name,
Because they often prove the same,
(For where the first does hap to be,
The last does coincidere)

Quantum in nobis, have thought good
To save th' expense of Christian blood,
And try if we, by mediation
Of treaty and accommodation,
Can end the quarrel, and compose
The bloody duel without blows.
Are not our liberties, our lives,
The laws, religion, and our wives,
Enough at once to lie at stake
For covenant and the cause's sake?
But in that quarrel dogs and bears,
As well as we, must venture theirs?
This feud, by Jesuits invented,
By evil counsel is fomented;
There is a Machiavilian plot,
(Though every nare olfact it not)
And deep design in 't to divide
The well-affected that confide,
By setting brother against brother,
To claw and curry one another.
Have we not enemies plus satis,
That cane et angue pejus hate us?
And shall we turn our fangs and claws
Upon our own selves without cause?
That some occult design doth lie
In bloody cynarctomachy,

Is plain enough to him that knows

How saints lead brothers by the nose.

I wish myself a pseudo-prophet,
But sure some mischief will come of it,
Unless by providential wit,'

Or force, we averruncate it.
For what design, what interest,
Can beast have to encounter beast?
They fight for no espoused cause,
Frail privilege, fundamental laws,
Nor for a thorough reformation,
Nor covenant nor protestation,
Nor liberty of consciences,

Nor lords and commons' ordinances;
Nor for the church, nor for church-lands,
To get them in their own no-hands;
Nor evil counsellors to bring

To justice, that seduce the king;
Nor for the worship of us men,
Though we have done as much for them.
Th' Egyptians worship'd dogs, and for
Their faith made internecine war.
Others ador'd a rat, and some
For that church suffer'd martyrdom.
The Indians fought for the truth
Of th' elephant and monkey's tooth:
And many, to defend that faith,
Fought out mordicus to death;
But no beast ever was so slight,
For man, as for his God, to fight.
They have more wit, alas! and know
Themselves and us better than so:
But we, who only do infuse
The rage in them, like boute-feus,
'Tis our example that instils
In them th' infection of our ills.
For, as some late philosophers
Have well observ'd, beasts that converse
With man take after him, as hogs
Get pigs all th' year, and bitches dogs.
Just so, by our example, cattle
Learn to give one another battle.

We read in Nero's time, the heathen,
When they destroy'd the Christian brethren,
They sew'd them in the skins of bears,
And then set dogs about their ears;
From whence, no doubt, th' invention came
Of this lewd antichristian game "

To this, quoth Ralpho, "Verily
The point seems very plain to me:
It is an antichristian game,
Unlawful both in thing and name.
First, for the name; the word bear-baiting
Is carnal, and of man's creating;
For certainly there's no such word
In all the scripture on record;
Therefore unlawful, and a sin;
And so is (secondly) The thing:
A vile assembly 'tis, that can
No more be prov'd by scripture, than
Provincial, classic, national,
Mere human creature-cobwebs all.
Thirdly, It is idolatrous;

For when men run a-whoring thus
With their inventions, whatsoe'er
The thing be, whether dog or bear,
It is idolatrous and pagan,
No less than worshiping of Dagon."
Quoth Hudibras, "I smell a rat;
Ralpho, thou dost prevaricate:
For though the thesis which thou lay'st
Be true ad amussim, as thoų say'st;

101

(For that bear-baiting should appear

Jure divino lawfuller

Than synods are, thou dost deny

Totidem verbis, so do I)

Yet there's a fallacy in this;
For if by sly homœosis,
Tussis pro crepitu, an art
Under a cough to slur a f-t,
Thou would sophistically imply
Both are unlawful, I deny."

"And I," quoth Ralpho, "do not doubt
But bear-baiting may be made out,
In gospel-times, as lawful as is
Provincial or parochial classis;
And that both are so near of kin,
And like in all, as well as sin,

That, put them in a bag, and shake them,
Yourself o' th' sudden would mistake them,
And not know which is which, unless
You measure by their wickedness;
For 'tis not hard t' imagine whether

O' th' two is worst, though I name neither."
Quoth Hudibras, "Thou offer'st much,
But art not able to keep touch.
Mira de lente, as 'tis i' th' adage,
Id est, to make a leek a cabbage;
Thou wilt at best but suck a bull,
Or shear swine, all cry, and no wool;
For what can synods have at all,
With bear that's analogical?
Or what relation has debating
Of church affairs with bear-baiting?
A just comparison still is

Of things ejusdem generis:

And then what genus rightly doth
Include and comprehend them both?
If animal, both of us may
As justly pass for bears as they;
For we are animals no less,
Although of different specieses.
But Ralpho, this is no fit place,
Nor time, to argue out the case:
For now the field is not far off,
Where we must give the world a proof
Of deeds, not words, and such as suit
Another manner of dispute:
A controversy that affords
Actions for arguments, not words;
Which we must manage at a rate
Of prowess and conduct adequate

To what our place and fame doth promise,
And all the Godly expect from us.
Nor shall they be deceiv'd, unless
We're slurr'd and outed by success;
Success, the mark no mortal wit,
Or surest hand, can always hit:
For whatsoe'er we perpetrate,
We do but row, w' are steer'd by Fate,
Which in success oft disinherits,
For spurious causes, noblest merits.
Great actions are not always true sons
Of great and mighty resolutions;
Nor do the bold'st attempts bring forth
Events still equal to their worth;
But sometimes fail, and in their stead
Fortune and cowardice succeed.
Yet we have no great cause to doubt,
Our actions still have borne us out;

Which, though they're known to be so ample,
We need not copy from example;

We're not the only person durst
Attempt this province, nor the first.
In northern clime a valorous knight
Did whilom kill his bear in fight,
And wound a fiddler: we have both
Of these the objects of our wroth,
And equal fame and glory from
Th' attempt, or victory to come.
'Tis sung there is a valiant Mamaluke,
In foreign land yclep'd —;

To whom we have been oft compar'd
For person, parts, address, and beard;
Both equally reputed stout,

And in the same cause both have fought;
He oft in such attempts as these
Came off with glory and success:
Nor will we fail in th' execution,
For want of equal resolution.
Honour is like a widow, won
With brisk attempt and putting on;
With entering manfully, and urging,
Not slow approaches, like a virgin."

This said, as erst the Phrygian knight,
So our's, with rusty steel did smite
His Trojan horse, and just as much
He mended pace upon the touch;
But from his empty stomach groan'd,
Just as that hollow beast did sound,
And, angry, answer'd from behind,
With brandish'd tail and blast of wind.
So have I seen, with armed heel,

A wight bestride a Commonweal,

While still, the more he kick'd and spurr'd, The less the sullen jade has stirr'd.

PART I CANTO II.

THE ARGUMENT.

The catalogue and character
Of th' enemies best men of war,
Whom, in a bold harangue, the knight
Defies, and challenges to fight:
H' encounters Talgol, routs the bear,
And takes the fiddler prisoner,
Conveys him to enchanted castle,
There shuts him fast in wooden Bastile.

THERE was an ancient sage philosopher,
That had read Alexander Ross over,
And swore the world, as he could prove,
Was made of fighting and of love.
Just so romances are, for what else
Is in them all, but love and battles?

th' first of these w' have no great matter
To treat of, but a world o' the latter,
In which to do the injur'd right,
We mean, in what concerns just fight.
Certes our authors are to blame,
For, to make some well-sounding name
A pattern fit for modern knights
To copy out in frays and fights,
(Like those that a whole street do raze,
To build a palace in the place,)
They never care how many others
They kill, without regard of mothers,

Or wives, or children, so they can
Make up some fierce, dead-doing man,
Compos'd of many ingredient valours,
Just like the manhood of nine tailors:
So a wild Tartar, when he spies

A man that's handsome, valiant, wise,
If he can kill him, thinks t' inherit
His wit, his beauty, and his spirit:
As if just so much he enjoy'd,
As in another is destroy'd:

For when a giant's slain in fight,

And mow'd o'erthwart, or cleft downright,
It is a heavy case, no doubt,

A man should have his brains beat out,
Because he's tall, and has large bones,
As men kill beavers for their stones.
But as for our part, we shall tell
The naked truth of what befell,
And as an equal friend to both

The knight and bear, but more to troth,
With neither faction shall take part,
But give to each his due desert,
And never coin a formal lie on't,

To make the knight o'ercome the giant.
This b'ing profest, we've hopes enough,
And now go on where we left off.

They rode, but authors having not
Determin'd whether pace or trot,
(That is to say, whether tollutation,
As they do term't, or succussation)
We leave it, and go on, as now
Suppose they did, no matter how;
Yet some, from subtle hints, have got
Mysterious light it was a trot.
But let that pass: they now begun
To spur their living engines on:
For as whipp'd tops and handy'd balls,
The learned hold, are animals;
So horses they affirm to be
Mere engines made by geometry,
And were invented first from engines,
As Indian Britains were from penguins.
So let them be, and, as I was saying,
They their live engines ply'd, not staying
Until they reach'd the fatal champaign
Which th' enemy did then encamp on;
The dire Pharsalian plain, where battle
Was to be wag'd 'twixt puissant cattle
And fierce auxiliary men,

That came to aid their brethren;
Who now began to take the field,
As knight from ridge of steed beheld.
For as our modern wits behold,
Mounted a pick-back on the old,
Much further off, much further he,
Rais'd on his aged beast, could see;
Yet not sufficient to descry
All postures of the enemy:

Wherefore he bids the squire ride further,
T'observe their numbers and their order,
That when their motions he had known,
He might know how to fit his own.
Meanwhile he stopp'd his willing steed,
To fit himself for martial deed:
Both kinds of metal he prepar'd,
Either to give blows or to ward;
Courage and steel, both of great force,
Prepar'd for better or for worse.
His death-charg'd pistols he did fit well,
Drawn out from life-preserving vittle.

These being prim'd, with force he labour'd
To free's sword from retentive scabbard;
And after many a painful pluck,
From rusty durance he bail'd tuck:
Then shook himself, to see that prowess
In scabbard of his arms sat loose;
And, rais'd upon his desperate foot,
On stirrup-side he gaz'd about,
Portending blood, like blazing star,
The beacon of approaching war.
Ralpho rode on with no less speed
Than Hugo in the forest did;
But far more in returning made;
For now the foe he had survey'd,
Kang'd, as to him they did appear,
With van, main-battle, wings, and rear.
I' th' head of all this warlike rabble,
Crowdero' march'd, expert and able.
Instead of trumpet and of drum,

That makes the warrior's stomach come,
Whose noise whets valour sharp, like beer
By thunder turn'd to vinegar,

(For if a trumpet sound, or drum beat,
Who has not a month's mind to combat?)
A squeaking engine he apply'd

Unto his neck, on north-east side, Just where the hangman does dispose, To special friends, the knot of noose: For 'tis great grace, when statesmen straight Dispatch a friend, let others wait. His warped ear hung o'er the strings, Which was but souse to chitterlings : For guts, some write, ere they are sodden, Are fit for music or for pudden; From whence men borrow every kind Of minstrelsy by string or wind. His grisly beard was long and thick, With which he strung his fiddle-stick; For he to horse-tail scorn'd to owe For what on his own chin did grow. Chiron, the four-legg'd bard, had both A beard and tail of his own growth; And yet by authors 'tis averr'd, He made use only of his beard. In Staffordshire, where virtuous worth Does raise the minstrelsy, not birth, Where bulls do choose the boldest king And ruler o'er the men of string,

(As once in Persia, 'tis said,

Kings were proclaim'd by a horse that neigh'd,)

He, bravely venturing at a crown,

By chance of war was beaten down,

And wounded sore: his leg, then broke,
Had got a deputy of oak;

For when a shin in fight is cropt,

The knee with one of timber's propt,
Esteem'd more honourable than the other,
And takes place, though the younger brother.
Next march'd brave Orsin3, famous for
Wise conduct, and success in war;

A skilful leader, stout, severe,
Now marshal to the champion bear.
With truncheon tipp'd with iron head,
The warrior to the lists he led ;
With solemn march, and stately pace,
But far more grave and solemn face;

So called from crowd, a fiddle.

* Joshua Gosling, who kept bears at Paris Garden in Southwark.

Grave as the emperor of Pegu,
Or Spanish potentate, don Diego.
This leader was of knowledge great,
Either for charge or for retreat:
He knew when to fall on pell-mell,
To fall back, and retreat as well.
So lawyers, lest the Bear defendant,

And plaintiff Dog, should make an end on't,
Do stave and tail with writs of error,
Reverse of judgment, and demurrer,
To let them breathe a while, and then
Cry "Whoop," and set them on agen.
As Romulus a wolf did rear,
So he was dry-nurs'd by a bear,
That fed him with the purchas'd prey
Of many a fierce and bloody fray;
Bred up, where discipline most rare is,
In military Garden Paris:

For soldiers, heretofore, did grow
In gardens just as weeds do now,
Until some splay-foot politicians
T' Apollo offered up petitions

For licensing a new invention

They 'ad found out of an antique engine,

To root out all the weeds, that grow

In public gardens, at a blow,
And leave th' herbs standing.

Quoth sir Sun,

"My friends, that is not to be done."

[ye,

"Not done!" quoth Statesman; "yes, an't please
When 'tis once known, you'll say 'tis easy."
"Why then let's know it," quoth Apollo:
"We'll beat a drum, and they'll all follow."
"A drum!" quoth Phœbus, "Troth that's true,
A pretty invention, quaint and new:
But though of voice and instrument
We are th' undoubted president,
We such loud music do not profess,
The Devil's master of that office,
Where it must pass; if 't be a drum,
He'll sign it with Cler. Parl. Dom. Com.;
To him apply yourselves, and he
Will soon dispatch you for his fee."
They did so; but it prov'd so ill,
They'd better let them grow there stiil.
But to resume what we discoursing
Were on before, that is, stout Orsin;
That which so oft by sundry writers
Has been apply'd t' almost all fighters,
More justly may be ascrib'd to this
Than any other warrior, (viz.)
None ever acted both parts bolder,
Both of a chieftain and a soldier.
He was of great descent, and high
For splendour and antiquity,
And from celestial origine
Deriv'd himself in a right line;
Not as the ancient heroes did,

Who, that their base-births might be hid
(Knowing they were of doubtful gender,
And that they came in at a windore)
Made Jupiter himself, and others
O'th' gods, gallants to their own mothers,
To get on them a race of champions,
(Of which old Homer first made lampoons)
Arctophylax, in northern sphere,
Was his undoubted ancestor;
From him his great forefathers came,
And in all ages bore his name:
Learn'd he was in med'cinal lore,

For by his side a pouch he wore,

Replete with strange hermetic powder,

That wounds nine miles point-blank with solder;
By skilful chymist, with great cost,
Extracted from a rotten post;

But of a heavenlier influence

Than that which mountebanks dispense;
Though by Promethean fire made,

As they do quack that drive that trade.
For as when slovens do amiss

At others' doors, by stool or piss,
The learned write, a red-hot spit
B'ing prudently apply'd to it,
Will convey mischief from the dung
Unto the part that did the wrong;
So this did healing, and as sure

As that did mischief, this would cure.
Thus virtuous Orsin was endued
With learning, conduct, fortitude,
Incomparable; and as the prince
Of poets, Homer, sung long since,
A skilful leech is better far

Than half a hundred men of war;
So he appear'd, and by his skill,
No less than dint of sword, could kill.
The gallant Bruin march'd next him,
With visage formidably grim,

And rugged as a Saracen,

Or Turk of Mahomet's own kin,
Clad in a mantle della guerre
Of rough impenetrable fur;
And in his nose, like Indian king,
He wore, for ornament, a ring;
About his neck a threefold gorget,
As rough as trebled leathern target;
Armed, as heralds cant, and langued,
Or, as the vulgar say, sharp-fanged:
For as the teeth in beasts of prey
Are swords, with which they fight in fray,
So swords, in men of war, are teeth
Which they do eat their vittle with.
He was by birth, some authors write,
A Russian, some a Muscovite,

And 'mong the Cossacks had been bred,
Of whom we in diurnals read,
That serve to fill up pages here,
As with their bodies ditches there.
Scrimansky was his cousin-german,
With whom he serv'd, and fed on vermin;
And when these fail'd, he'd suck his claws,
And quarter himself upon his paws:
And though his countrymen, the Huns,
Did stew their meat between their bums
And th' horses' backs o'er which they straddle,
And every man ate up his saddle;

He was not half so nice as they,

But ate it raw when 't came in's way.

He 'ad trac'd the countries far and near,

More than Le Blanc the traveller,
Who writes, he spous'd in India,
Of noble house, a lady gay,
And got on her a race of worthies,
As stout as any upon Earth is.
Full many a fight for him between
Talgol and Orsin oft had been,
Each striving to deserve the crown
Of a sav'd citizen; the one

To guard his bear, the other fought
To aid his dog; both made more stout
By several spurs of neighbourhood,
Church-fellow-membership, and blood;

But Talgol, mortal foe to cows,
Never got aught of him but blows;
Blows, hard and heavy, such as he
Had lent, repaid with usury.

Yet Talgol 3 was of courage stout,
And vanquish'd oftener than he fought;
Inur'd to labour, sweat, and toil,
And, like a champion, shone with oil:
Right many a widow his keen blade,
And many fatherless, had made;
He many a boar and huge dun-cow
Did, like another Guy, o'erthrow;
But Guy, with him in fight compar'd,
Had like the boar or dun-cow far'd:

With greater troops of sheep h' had fought
Than Ajax or bold Don Quixote;
And many a serpent of fell kind,
With wings before and stings behind,
Subdued; as poets say, long agone,

Bold sir George, saint George, did the dragon.
Nor engine, nor device polemic,

Disease, nor doctor epidemic,

Though stor'd with deletery med'cines,
(Which whosoever took is dead since)
E'er sent so vast a colony

To both the under worlds as he;
For he was of that noble trade,
That demi-gods and heroes made,
Slaughter, and knocking on the head,
The trade to which they all were bred;
And is, like others, glorious when
'Tis great and large, but base, if mean:
The former rides in triumph for it,
The latter in a two-wheel'd chariot,
For daring to profane a thing
So sacred with vile bungling.

Next these the brave Magnano 4 came,
Magnano, great in martial fame;
Yet when with Orsin he wag'd fight,
'Tis sung he got but little by 't:
Yet he was fierce as forest-boar,
Whose spoils upon his back he wore,
As thick as Ajax' seven-fold shield,
Which o'er his brazen arms he held;
But brass was feeble to resist
The fury of his armed fist;
Nor could the hardest ir'n hold out
Against his blows, but they would through 't,
In magic he was deeply read,
As he that made the brazen head;
Profoundly skill'd in the black art,
As English Merlin for his heart;
But far more skilful in the spheres,
Than he was at the sieve and shears.
He could transform himself in colour,
As like the Devil as a collier;
As like as hypocrites, in show,
Are to true saints, or crow to crow.

Of warlike engines he was author, Devis'd for quick dispatch of slaughter: The cannon, blunderbuss, and saker, He was th' inventor of, and maker:

3 A butcher in Newgate-market, who afterwards obtained a captain's commission for his rebellious bravery at Naseby.

4 Simeon Wait a tinker, as famous an independent preacher as Burroughs; who, with equal blasphemy to his Lord of Hosts, would style Oliver Cromwell the Archangel giving battle to the Devil.

The trumpet and the kettle-drum
Did both from his invention come.
He was the first that e'er did teach
To make, and how to stop a breach.
A lance he bore with iron pike,

Th' one half would thrust, the other strike;
And when their forces he had join'd,
He scorn'd to turn his parts behind.

He Trulla lov'd, Trulla, more bright
Than burnish'd armour of her knight;
A bold virago, stout and tall,

As Joan of France, or English Mall":
Through perils both of wind and limb,
Through thick and thin she follow'd him
In every adventure h' undertook,
And never him or it forsook:

At breach of wall, or hedge surprise,
She shar'd i' th' hazard and the prize;
At beating quarters up, or forage,
Behav'd herself with matchless courage,
And laid about in fight more busily
Than th' Amazonian dame Penthesile.
And though some critics here cry shame,
And say our authors are to blame,
That (spite of all philosophers,

Who hold no females stout. but bears,

And heretofore did so abhor

That women should pretend to war,
They would not suffer the stout'st dame

To swear by Hercules's name)
Make feeble ladies, in their works,
To fight like termagants and Turks;
To lay their native arms aside,
Their modesty, and ride astride;
To run a-tilt at men, and wield
Their naked tools in open field;
As stout Armida, bold Thalestris,

And she that would have been the mistress
Of Gundibert, but he had grace,

And rather took a country lass;

They say, 'tis false, without all sense,
But of pernicious consequence

To government, which they suppose
Can never be upheld in prose;
Strip Nature naked to the skin,
You'll find about her no such thing.
It may be so, yet what we tell
Of Trulla, that's improbable,
Shall be depos'd by those have seen 't,
Or, what's as good, produc'd in print;
And if they will not take our word,
We'll prove it true upon record.

The upright Cerdon next advanc't,
Of all his race the valiant'st:
Cerdon the Great, renown'd in song,
Like Herc'les, for repair of wrong:
He rais'd the low, and fortify'd
The weak against the strongest side:

5 The daughter of James Spenser, debauched by Magnano the tinker. So called, because the tinker's wife or mistress was commonly called his trull.

6 Alluding, probably, to Mary Carlton, called Kentish Moll, but more commonly the German Princess; a person notorious at the time this First Part of Hudibras was published. She was transported to Jamaica 1671; but returning from transportation too soon, she was hanged at Tyburn Jan. 22, 1672-3.

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