Eat not, I hote thee, ere hunger thee take,
And send thee of his sauce, to savour with thy lips:

And keep some 'till supper-time, and sit not too long,

And rise up, ere appetite have eaten his fill.

Let not SIR SURFEIT sit on thy board:

Leve him not, for he is lecherous and licorous of

tongue;

And after many manner of meat his maw is ahunger'd.

And if thou diet thee thus, I dare lay my ears

That Physick shall his furred cloak for his food sell, And his cloak of Calabrie, with all his knops 3 of gold,

And be fain, by my faith, his physick to let.+ And learn to labour with hand; for live-lodes is sweet.

For murderers are many leeches: Lord hem amend! They do men die, by their drinks, ere destiny it would.

1 Believe. Sax.

The physicians of the middle ages were principally Jews, who learnt their art from the Arabians. A considerable colony of this people was established in the kingdom of Naples. The medical school of Salerno is well known.

Buttons. Sax. ; literally, knobs. › Life-leading; we now say livelihood.

• To leave.

By St. Paul (quoth Pierce) these are profitable words!

Wend thee Hunger when thou wilt, yet well be thou

ever!

For this is a lovely lesson, Lord it thee for-yield!

Bihote' God! (quoth Hunger) hence ne will I wend,

Till I have dined, by this day, and drunken both.

I have no penny, (quoth Pierce) pullets for to

buy,

Ne neither goose, ne grys; but two green cheeses,
A few curds, and cream, and an haver-cake3
And two loaves, of beans and bran, bake for my
folk.

And yet, 4 I say by my soul, I have no salt bacon,
Ne no cokeney, by Christ! collops for to make.

5

And I have parsely, and porets, and many coleplants,

And eke a cow and a calf, and a cart-mare

To draw a-field my dung the while the drought lasteth;

And by this live-lod I must live 'till Lammas time. By that, I hope to have harvest in my croft; .. And then I may dight1 my dinner as my dear liketh. [Here, says the margin, the poor folk feed Hunger] And all the poor people tho, peas-cods fet;

Beans and baken apples they brought in their laps, Chyboles, and chervil, and ripe cherries many,

2

And proffer'd Pierce these presents to please with
Hunger.

All Hunger ate in haste, and asked after more:
Then poor folk, for fear, fed Hunger yern3
With green poret, and peasen; to poison him they
thought.

By that it nighed to harvest; new corn came tocheaping:4

Then was the folk fain, and fed Hunger with the best;

With good ale, as GLUTTON taught, and gart Hunger asleep.

And tho would WASTER no work, but wandren about;

Ne no beggar eat bread that beans in were,

• Dress my dinner as me pleaseth.

Ciboule. Fr. Cipolla. Ital.; a species of onion.

• Eagerly. Sax.

• Glad, Sax.

♦ Cheap.

• Made. Sax.

2

But of coket and clermatin, or else of clean wheat. Ne no half-penny ale in no wise drink,

But of the best and the brownest that in burth 3 is to

1

sell. Labourers that have no land to live on but their

hands

Deigned not to dine a day night4 old worts:5

May no penny-ale them pay, nor no piece of bacon; But if it be fresh flesh, other fish fried, other bake, And that chaud or plus chaud, for chilling of her maw, &c.

The following passage has the marginal admonition "Reade thys;" indeed the prediction with which it concludes is very curious.

And now is Religion a rider, a roamer by street, A leader of lovedays, and a loud beggar,

2

6

A particular sort of bread.

Perhaps another sort of bread used at breakfast. 3 Booth ? or borough?

4 In some editions the word not is omitted, which will only increase the perplexity. The meaning, as the line stands here (from edit. 1550), seems to be, that "labourers, &c. refused their usual dinner (or rather supper) of old worts or cabbage ;" this, however, is strangely expressed. • Cabbage.

• Loveday (says Tyrwhitt, note on v. 260.) is a day appointed for the amicable settlement of differences.

A pricker of a palfrey from manor to manor,
An heap of hounds at his- as he lord were:
And, but if his knave1 kneel, that shall his cope

bring,

He loured on him, and asked who taught him courtesy ?

Little had lords to done to give lands from their heirs

To Religious, that have no ruth though it rain on

In many places there the parsons be by hemself at

ease;

Of the poor have they no pity: and that is her charity!

And they letten them as lords, her lands lie so broad..

AND THERE SHALL COME A KING and confess you religious,

And beat you, as the Bible telleth, for breaking of

your rule,

2

And amend monials, monks, and canons,

And put hem to her penance→→→

And then shall the Abbot of Abingdon, and all his

issue for ever

HAVE A KNOCK OF A KING, AND INCURABLE

THE WOUND.

A male servant

• Nuns.