Whene'er to drink you are inclin'd, Or cutty-sarks run in your mind, Think, ye may buy the joys o'er dear,' Remember Tam o' Shanter's mare.

'O'er dear, too dear.

No. XXXIV.

THE WITCHES' SONG.

BEN JONSON.

"From the Masque of Queens, presented at Whitehall, Feb. 2d, 1609."

I WITCH.

I HAVE been all day looking after

A raven feeding upon a quarter;

And, soone as she turn'd her beak to the south,

I snatch'd this morsell out of her mouth.

2 WITCH.

I have beene gathering wolves haires,

The madd dogges foames, and adders eares;
The spurging of a deadman's eyes :

And all since the evening starre did rise.

3 WITCH.

I last night lay all alone

On the ground, to heare the mandrake grone;

And pluck'd him

up, though he grew

full low:

And, as I had done, the cocke did crow.

4 WITCH.

And I ha' beene chusing out this scull
From charnell houses that were full;
From private grots, and publike pits;
And frighted a sexton out of his wits.

By day; and, when the childe was a-sleepe
At night, I suck'd the breath; and rose,
And pluck'd the nodding nurse by the nose.

6 WITCH.

I had a dagger: what did I with that?

Killed an infant to have his fat.

A piper it got at a church-ale,

I bade him again blow the wind ï' the taile.

7 WITCH.

A murderer, yonder, was hung in chaines ;

The sunne and the wind had shrunke his veines: I bit off a sinew; I clipp'd his haire ;

I brought off his ragges, that danced i' the

ayre.

8 WITCH.

The scrich-owles egges and the feathers blacke, The bloud of the frogge, and the bone in his backe I have been getting; and made of his skin

A purset, to keep Sir Cranion in.

9 WITCH.

And I ha' beene plucking (plants among)
Hemlock, henbane, adders-tongue,
Night-shade, moone-wort, libbards-bane;
And twise by the dogges was like to be tane.

10 WITCH.

I from the jawes of a gardener's bitch

Did snatch these bones, and then leap'd the ditch: Yet went I back to the house againe,

Kill'd the blacke cat, and here is the braine.

11 WITCH.

I went to the toad, breedes under the wall,
I charmed him out, and he came at my call;
I scratch'd out the eyes of the owle before;

I tore the batt's wing: what would

you

have more?

DAME.

Yes: I have brought, to helpe your vows, Horned poppie, cypresse boughes,

The fig-tree wild, that growes on tombes, And juice that from the larch-tree comes, The basiliske's bloud, and the viper's skin: And now our orgies let's begin.