Next came Cerdon, the cobbler, in whom it pleased contemporary ingenuity to find a Colonel Hewson, soldier and preacher, who had been a cobbler in his youth, and whom somebody had thought to satirise by a printed dissertation on boots. Butler's satire runs through all the embroidery of mock heroic illustration with which he has overlaid the simple fabric of his story. The fiddler, the bear-leader, the butcher, the tinker and his trull, the cobbler and the ostler, are simply persons of a Brentford rabble, in whom, except indeed in Cerdon, Butler saw neither Presbyterians nor Independents. They are the lovers of sport against whom Presbyterian and Independent Hudibras and Ralpho prepare war. Bear-baiting had been forbidden under the Commonwealth. Cerdon, the repairer of old boots, the piercer of stout leather with his awl,

Cerdon the Great, renowned in song,
Like Herc'les, for repair of wrong:
He raised the low, and fortified
The weak against the strongest side:

Ill has he read that never hit

On him in Muse's deathless writ.

He had a weapon keen and fierce,

That through a bull-hide shield would pierce And cut it in a thousand pieces,

Though tougher than the knight of Greece his,
With whom his black-thumbed ancestor

Was comrade in the ten years' war:
For when the restless Greeks sat down
So many years before Troy town,

And were renowned, as Homer writes,
For well-soled boots,2 no less than fights,
They owed that glory only to

His ancestor, who made them so.

The numerous rabble was drawn out
Of several counties round about,
From villages remote, and shires,
Of east and western hemispheres:
From foreign parishes and regions,
Of different manners, speech, religions,
Came men and mastiffs; some to fight
For fame and honour, some for sight.
And now the field of death, the lists,
Were entered by antagonists,

And blood was ready to be broached,
When Hudibras in haste approached,
With squire and weapons, to attack 'em:
But first thus from his horse bespake 'em:
"What rage, O citizens! what fury
Doth you to these dire actions hurry?
What strum, what phrenetic mood,
Makes you thus lavish of your blood,
While the proud Vies your trophies boast
And unrevenged walks
ghost? 3

What towns, what garrisons might you
With hazard of this blood subdue,
Which now ye are bent to throw away
In vain, untriumphable fray!
Shall Saints in civil bloodshed wallow
Of Saints, and let the Cause lie fallow?
The Cause for which we fought and swore
So boldly, shall we now give o'er?
Then, because quarrels still are seen
With oaths and swearings to begin,
The Solemn League and Covenant
Will seem a mere God-dam-me rant;
And we, that took it, and have fought,
As lewd as drunkards that fall out.
For as we make war for the King
Against himself the self-same thing,
Some will not stick to swear we do
For God and for Religion too:
For if bear-baiting we allow,
What good can Reformation do?
The blood and treasure that's laid out,
Is thrown away, and goes for nought.
Are these the fruits o' the Protestation,
The prototype of Reformation,

Which all the Saints, and some, since Martyrs,
Wore in their hats like wedding garters,

When 'twas resolved by either House
Six members' quarrel to espouse?

Did they for this draw down the rabble,
With zeal and noises formidable,
And make all cries about the town
Join throats to cry the Bishops down?
Who having round begirt the palace
(As once a month they do the gallows),
As members gave the sign about,
Set up their throats with hideous shout.
When tinkers bawled aloud to settle
Church discipline, for patching kettle:
No sow-gelder did blow his horn
To geld a cat, but cried, Reform.
The oyster-women locked their fish up,
And trudged away, to cry, No Bishop.

ghost. Waller's ghost. Sir William Waller, a Presbyterian and a general of the Parliamentary army, who had taken Winchester. Chichester, Hereford, and Tewkesbury, ended his career of successful conflict in the west of England with defeat at Devizes-"the Vies."

The mouse-trap men laid save-alls by,
And 'gainst evil counsellors did cry.
Botchers left old clothes in the lurch,
And fell to turn and patch the Church.
Some cried the Covenant instead
Of pudding-pies and ginger-bread;
And some for brooms, old boots and shoes,
Bawled out to purge the Commons' House.
Instead of kitchen-stuff, some cry,
A Gospel-preaching Ministry;

And some, for old suits, coats, or cloak,
No surplices nor service-book.
A strange harmonious inclination
Of all degrees to Reformation.
And is this all? Is this the end

To which these carryings on did tend?
Hath public faith, like a young heir,
For this ta'en up all sorts of ware,
And run into every tradesman's book,
"Till both turned bankrupts, and are broke?
Did Saints for this bring in their plate,
And crowd as if they came too late?

For when they thought the Cause had need on't,
Happy was he that could be rid on't.

"Shall we that took the covenant for reformation, give dogs and bears a dispensation? What will malignants say? I charge you all go home, but surrender first the fiddler, who is the chief author and engineer of mischief. He and that engine of vile noise on which illegally he plays shall both be brought to condign punishment. Do this, or force shall make you do it." This said, he clapped his hand on sword, to show he meant to keep his word. But Talgol answered the Knight stoutly with a volley of abuse. "Was there no dispute for him to settle between the caterwauling brethren, that he must come to interrupt a better sort of disputants and spoil their sport? Was there no committee sitting, wherein he might cheat, with holiness and zeal, all parties and the commonweal! If he would save his hide and bones from stones and cudgel, let him tremble and vanish, while there was yet time."

At this the knight grew high in wroth,
And lifting hands and eyes up both,
Three times he smote on stomach stout,

From whence, at length, these words broke out:

"Was I for this entitled 'Sir,' to be braved by a butcher? Thou shalt eat thy words, like tainted beef, and pay dear for them.

"Nor shall it e'er be said, that wight
With gantlet blue, and bases white,
And round blunt truncheon by his side,
So great a man at arms defied

With words far bitterer than wormwood,
That would in Job or Grizel stir mood.
Dogs with their tongues their wounds do heal;
But men with hands, as thou shalt feel."

This said, with hasty rage he snatched
His gun-shot, that in holsters watched;
And bending cock, he levelled full
Against th' outside of Talgol's skull;

Vowing that he should ne'er stir further,
Nor henceforth cow nor bullock murther.
But Pallas came in shape of rust,
And 'twixt the spring and hammer thrust
Her Gorgon shield, which made the cock
Stand stiff, as 'twere transformed to stock.
Meanwhile fierce Talgol, gathering might,
With rugged truncheon charged the knight;
But he with petronel upheaved

Instead of shield, the blow received.
The gun recoiled, as well it might,
Not used to such a kind of fight,

And shrunk from its great master's gripe,
Knocked down and stunned by mortal stripe.
Then Hudibras, with furious haste,
Drew out his sword; yet not so fast,

But Talgol first, with hardy thwack,

Twice bruised his head, and twice his back.

But when his nut-brown sword was out,
With stomach huge he laid about,
Imprinting many a wound upon
His mortal foe, the truncheon.
The trusty cudgel did oppose
Itself against dead-doing blows,
To guard its leader from fell bane,
And then revenged itself again.
And though the sword (some understood)
In force had much the odds of wood,
Twas nothing so; both sides were balanced
So equal, none knew which was valiant'st;
For wood, with honour being engaged,
Is so implacably enraged,

Though iron hew and mangle sore,
Wood wounds and bruises honour more.
And now both knights were out of breath,
Tired in the hot pursuit of death;
Whilst all the rest amazed stood still,
Expecting which should take, or kill.
This Hudibras observed; and fretting,
Conquest should be so long a getting,
He drew up all his force into
One body, and that into one blow;
But Talgol wisely avoided it
By cunning sleight; for had it hit
The upper part of him, the blow
Had slit, as sure as that below.

Meanwhile the incomparable Colon,
To aid his friend, began to fall on;
Him Ralph encountered, and straight grew

A dismal combat 'twixt them two:

The one armed with metal, the other with wood, This fit for bruise, and that for blood.

With many a stiff thwack, many a bang,

Hard crab-tree and old iron rang ;

While none that saw them could divine

To which side conquest would incline;

Until Magnano, who did envy

That two should with so many men vic,
By subtle stratagem of brain
Performed what force could ne'er attain;
For he, by foul hap, having found
Where thistles grew, on barren ground,
In haste he drew his weapon out,
And having cropped them from the root,
He clapped them underneath the tail
Of steed, with pricks as sharp as nail.
The angry beast did straight resent

As if he had been beside his sense,
Striving to disengage from thistle,
That galled him sorely under his tail;
Instead of which, he threw the pack
Of squire and baggage from his back,
And blundering still, with smarting rump,
He gave the knight's steed such a thump
As made him reel. The knight did stoop,
And sat on farther side aslope.
This Talgol viewing, who had now
By flight escaped the fatal blow,

He rallied, and again fell to 't;

For catching foe by nearer foot,

He lifted with such might and strength,
As would have hurled him thrice his length,
And dashed his brains (if any) out;
But Mars, who still protects the stout,
In pudding-time came to his aid,
And under him the Bear conveyed;
The Bear, upon whose soft fur-gown

The knight with all his weight fell down,
The friendly rug preserved the ground,
And headlong knight, from bruise or wound:
Like feather-bed betwixt a wall
And heavy brunt of cannon-ball.

As Sancho on a blanket fell,

And had no hurt, ours fared as well
In body, though his mighty spirit,
Being heavy, did not so well bear it.
The Bear was in a greater fright,
Beat down, and worsted by the knight;
He roared, and raged, and flung about,
To shake off bondage from his snout:
His wrath inflamed, boiled o'er, and from
His jaws of death he threw the foam:
Fury in stranger postures threw him,
And more than ever herald drew him:
He tore the earth, which he had saved
From squelch of knight, and stormed and raved,
And vexed the more, because the harms
He felt were 'gainst the law of arms:

For men he always took to be

His friends, and dogs the enemy;

Who never so much hurt had done him,

As his own side did falling on him:
It grieved him to the guts, that they,
For whom he had fought so many a fray
And served with loss of blood so long,
Should offer such inhuman wrong;
Wrong of unsoldier-like condition,
For which he flung down his commission,
And laid about him, till his nose
From thrall of ring of cord broke loose.
Soon as he felt himself enlarged.
Through thickest of his foes he charged,
And made way through the amazed crew,
Some he o'er-ran, and some o'erthrew,
But took none; for, by hasty flight,
He strove to escape pursuit of knight,
From whom he fled with as much haste
And dread, as he the rabble chased;
In haste he fled, and so did they,
Each and his fear a several way.
Crowdero only kept the field,
Not stirring from the place he held.
Though beaten down, and wounded sore,
I' the fiddle, and a leg that bore

One side of him, not that of bone, But much its better, the wooden one. He spying Hudibras lie strewed Upon the ground, like log of wood, With fright of fall, supposéd wound, And loss of urine, in a swound,

In haste he snatched the wooden limb
That, hurt in the ankle, lay by him,
And fitting it for sudden fight,
Straight drew it up, to attack the knight;
For getting up on stump and huckle,
He with the foe began to buckle,
Vowing to be revenged for breach
Of crowd and skin upon the wretch,
Sole author of all detriment
He and his fiddle underwent.

But Ralpho (who had now begun
To adventure resurrection
From heavy squelch, and had got up
Upon his legs, with sprainéd crup)
Looking about, beheld pernicion
Approaching knight from fell musician,
He snatched his whinyard up, that fled
When he was falling off his steed
(As rats do from a falling house),
To hide itself from rage of blows;
And, winged with speed and fury, flew
To rescue knight from black and blue.
Which, ere he could achieve, his sconce
The leg encountered twice and once:
And now 'twas raised to smite again,
When Ralpho thrust himself between.
He took the blow upon his arm,
To shield the knight from further harm;
And, joining wrath with force, bestowed
On the wooden member such a load,
That down it fell, and with it bore
Crowdero, whom it propped before.

Now Ralpho set his foot upon the prostrate fiddler, prisoner of war. He gently set upright the fallen Hudibras.

To rouse him from lethargic dump,

He tweaked his nose; with gentle thump
Knocked on his breast, as if it had been
To raise the spirits lodged within.
They, wakened with the noise, did fly
From inward room to window eye,
And gently opening lid, the casement,
Looked out, but yet with some amazement.
This gladded Ralpho much to see,
Who thus bespoke the knight: quoth he,
Tweaking his nose, "You are, great sir,
A self-denying conqueror;

As high, victorious, and great,
As e'er fought for the Churches yet,
If you will give yourself but leave
To make out what you already have;
That's victory. The foe, for dread
Of your nine-worthiness, is fled;
All, save Crowdero, for whose sake
You did the espoused Cause undertake:
And he lies prisoner at your feet,
To be disposed as you think meet,
Either for life, or death, or sale,
The gallows, or perpetual jail:

For one wink of your powerful eye
Must sentence him to live or die.
His fiddle is your proper purchase,
Won in the service of the Churches;
And by your doom must be allowed
To be, or be no more, a crowd."

Hudibras rose in wrath against Crowdero; but Ralpho withstood his fury, in a speech bristling with satire on the spirit of the Puritans during the recent civil war. Crowdero's hands were bound behind

him, his wooden leg was restored to its former place and use.

Ralpho dispatched with speedy haste,

And having tied Crowdero fast,

He gave Sir Knight the end of cord,
To lead the captive of his sword

In triumph, whilst the steeds he caught,
And them to further service brought.
The squire in state rode on before,
And on his nut-brown whinyard bore
The trophy fiddle and the case,
Leaning on shoulder like a mace.
The knight himself did after ride,
Leading Crowdero by his side;
And towed him, if he lagged behind,
Like boat, against the tide and wind.
Thus grave and solemn they marched on,
Until quite through the town they'd gone;
At further end of which there stands
An ancient castle, that commands
The adjacent parts; in all the fabric
You shall not see one stone nor a brick,
But all of wood; by powerful spell
Of magic made impregnable;
There's neither iron bar nor gate,
Portcullis, chain, nor bolt, nor grate;
And yet men durance there abide,
In dungeon scarce three inches wide;
With roof so low, that under it
They never stand, but lie or sit,
And yet so foul, that whoso is in,
Is to the middle-leg in prison;
In circle magical confined,

With walls of subtle air and wind,
Which none are able to break thorough,
Until they're freed by head of borough.
Thither arrived, the adventurous knight
And bold squire from their steeds alight
At the outward wall, near which there stands
A bastile, built to imprison hands;
By strange enchantment made to fetter
The lesser parts, and free the greater:
For though the body may creep through,
The hands in grate are fast enough:
And when a circle about the wrist
Is made by beadle exorcist,

The body feels the spur and switch,

As if 'twere ridden post by witch,

At twenty miles an hour pace,

And yet ne'er stirs out of the place.

On top of this there is a spire

On which Sir Knight first bids the squire,

The fiddle and its spoils, the case,

In manner of a trophy place.

That done, they ope the trap-door gate,

And let Crowdero down thereat;

Crowdero making doleful face,

Like hermit poor in pensive place,
To dungeon they the wretch commit,
And the survivor of his feet;

But the other that had broke the peace,
And head of knighthood, they release,
Though a delinquent false and forged,
Yet being a stranger, he's enlarged;
While his comrade, that did no hurt,
Is clapped up fast in prison for't.
So Justice, while she winks at crimes,
Stumbles on innocence sometimes.

So ends Canto the Second, and thus begins Canto the Third, and last of the First Part of "Hudibras":

Ah me! what perils do environ

The man that meddles with cold iron !1
What plaguy mischiefs and mishaps
Do dog him still with after-claps!

For though Dame Fortune seem to smile,

And leer upon him for a while,

She'll after show him, in the nick

Of all his glories, a dog-trick.

This any man may sing or say,

I' the ditty called, What if a day ?2

For Hudibras, who thought he had won
The field, as certain as a gun;

And having routed the whole troop,
With victory was cock-a-hoop,

Thinking he had done enough to purchase
Thanksgiving-day among the Churches,

Wherein his mettle and brave worth
Might be explained by Holder-forth,
And registered, by fame eternal,
In deathless pages of diurnal,
Found in few minutes, to his cost,
He did but count without his host,
And that a turn-stile is more certain
Than, in events of war, Dame Fortune.

1 Ay me, how many perils do enfold
The righteous man to make him daily fall.
Faerie Queene, I. viii. i.

2 "What if a day?" was a very popular song, by Thomas Campion, a physician of the days of Elizabeth and James I., who was also musician and poet. Thomas Campion died in 1619, and this one of his songs seems to have been written at the end of Elizabeth's reign. This is the song:

What if a day, or a month, or a year,

Crown thy delights

With a thousand sweet contentings; May not the change of a night or an hour

Cross thy delights

With as many sad tormentings ?
Fortune, honour, beauty, youth,
Are but blossoms aging;
Wanton pleasures, doting love,
Are but shadows flying.

All our joys are but toys,
Idle thoughts deceiving;
None hath power of an hour

Of his life's bereaving.

In the third volume of Mr. Edward Arber's "English Garner," a delightful series of "ingatherings from our History and Literature" in very cheap and very handsome volumes, one of the pieces given is "A Book of Airs" published, before May, 1601, by Dr. Thomas Campion and Philip Rosseter, Lutenest.

The dogs chased the bear, but the scattered crowd, seeing the coast clear, faced about. The bear, too, finding the dogs too many for a safe retreat, faced about,

Faced the proud foe, and fled, and faced,
Retiring still, until he found

He had got th' advantage of the ground.

Then he resolved to die with honour in the field,

And sell his hide and carcase at

A price as high and desperate
As e'er he could.

A free fight followed between dogs and bear, till Bruin fell,

-yet falling fought,

And being down still laid about;

As Widdrington, in doleful dumps,
Is said to fight upon his stumps.1

The bear would have been killed if Trulla and Cerdon had not been quick, in the nick of time, to rescue him. He was recovered, much wounded,

but with all his wounds in front.

But gentle Trulla into th' ring

He wore in 's nose conveyed a string,

With which she marched before, and led

The warrior to a grassy bed,

As authors write, in a cool shade,
Which eglantine and roses made
Close by a softly murmuring stream,

and so forth, and so forth to find Orsin. As Butler is now amusing himself with the conventionalities of fashionable poets, Orsin beats his breast for loss of his dear crony bear, till

Echo, from the hollow ground, His doleful wailings did resound More wistfully, by many times, Than in small poet's splay-foot rhymes, That make her in their ruthful stories To answer t' interrogatories.

The grief of Orsin turns to anger.

Thirst of revenge, and wrath, in place
Of sorrow, now began to blaze.
He vowed the authors of his woe
Should equal vengeance undergo;
And with their bones and flesh pay dear
For what he suffered, and his bear.

He will seek Hudibras, not Bruin. On his way he meets with the returning crowd.

Honour, revenge, contempt, and shame, Did equally their breasts inflame.

1 For Witherington needs must I wail as one in doleful dumps, For when his legs were smitten off, he fought upon his stumps.

In the later version of "Chevy Chase." See "Shorter English Poems," page 103.

'Mong these the fierce Magnano was,
And Talgol, foe to Hudibras;
Cerdon and Colon, warriors stout,
And resolute, as ever fought;
Whom furious Orsin thus bespoke :
"Shall we," quoth he, "thus basely brook
The vile affront that paltry ass,
And feeble scoundrel, Hudibras,
With that more paltry ragamuffin,
Ralpho, with vapouring and huffing,
Have put upon us, like tame cattle,

As if th' had routed us in battle?"

Cerdon shares in the thirst for vengeance, but comforts Orsin with hopeful tidings of his bear. And so they all join in force in search of Hudibras, to whom the heroic song returns, now blending with the theme of war a theme of love:

Triumphant laurels seemed to grow
Nowhere so green as on his brow;
Laden with which, as well as tired
With conquering toil, he now retired
Unto a neighbouring castle by,
To rest his body, and apply

Fit medicines to each glorious bruise
He got in fight, reds, blacks, and blues,
To mollify the uneasy pang

Of every honourable bang,

Which being by skilful midwife drest,
He laid him down to take his rest.
But all in vain. He had got a hurt
O' the inside, of a deadlier sort,
By Cupid made, who took his stand
Upon a widow's jointure land
(For he, in all his amorous battels,
No advantage finds like goods and chattels),
Drew home his bow, and, aiming right,
Let fly an arrow at the knight.

But the Lady for whom Hudibras suffered

Used him so like a base rascallion,
That old Pyg—what d'ye call him ?—malion,
That cut his mistress out of stone,
Had not so hard a hearted one.

She had especially one cross-grained freak,

She could love none but only such

As scorned and hated her as much.

Like a rowing sculler Hudibras must look one way and move another. He had borne her disdain till he resolved to waive his suit, or for a while play least in sight. So he had kept away from her some months, and would have avoided her yet longer, but that his victory

Did set his thoughts agog, and ope
A door to discontinued hope,
That seemed to promise he might win
His dame too, now his hand was in.

For had he not both valour and wit?