THE singularly interesting fragment of early English literature known as Cocke Lorelles Bote, is a satirical poem of four hundred and fourteen lines, in which various classes of society, chiefly of the lower order, are passed under review in rapid succession. The glimpse we obtain of each class is only momentary, but the author with some well chosen phrase, in that short time sketches their failings.

The original from which this poem is reprinted, is in black-letter, and is preserved in the Garrick Collection, British Museum. It is considered unique, but unfortunately it is imperfect at the beginning.

It was printed in London, by Wynkyn de Worde, and bears no date, but may safely be ascribed to the early part of the reign of Henry the Eighth. The idea of the “Bote,” in which so many different characters are gathered together, is supposed to have been taken from Sebastian Brandt’s “Shyp of Folys,” which was translated into English by Alexander Barclay, and printed by Pynson at the beginning of the sixteenth century. What gives weight to this suggestion, is the fact that the wood-cuts with which the original of Cocke Lorell is illustrated, are similar to those used in the “Ship of Folys.”

The hero of the poem was the leader of a notorious band of robbers which infested the metropolis, and was probably alive at the time of its publication. He is mentioned by Samuel Rowlands in “Martin Mark-all, Beadle of Bridewell, his Defence and Answere to the Belman of London,” printed in 1610, who describes him in these terms:—“After him, succeeded by general councell, one Cocke Lorrell, the most notorious knave that ever lived: by trade he was a tinker, often carrying a panne and a hammer for show: but when he came to a good booty, he would cast his profession in a ditch, and play the padder,[1] and then would away, and as hee past through the toune, crie, ‘Ha you any worke for a tinker?’ To write of his knaveries it would aske a long time: I referre you to the old manuscript remayning on record in Maunder’s Hall.[2] This was he that reduced and brought in forme the Catalogue of Vagabonds, or Quarterne of Knaves, called the five and twentie Orders of Knaves: but because it is extant, and in every mans shop, I passe them over.... This Cocke Lorrell continued among them longer than any of his predecessors before him, or after him, for he ruled almost two and twentie yeares, until the yeare An. Dom. 1533, and about the five and twenty yeare of K. Henry the Eight.”

The “Catalogue of Vagabonds” to which Rowlands alludes in the above extract as having been written by Cocke Lorell, is a tract printed by John Awdely in 1565, and of which a second edition was issued by the same printer in 1575. It is not improbable that Awdely may have himself been the compiler of the “Catalogue.” A copy of the edition of 1575 is in the Bodleian Library, the quaint title of which is as follows:—“The Fraternitye of Vacabondes. As wel of ruflyng Vacabondes, as of beggerly, of Women as of Men, of Gyrles as of Boyes, with their proper names and qualities. With a description of the crafty company of Cousoners and Shifters. Whereunto also is adioyned the XXV Orders of Knaues, otherwyse called a Quartern of Knaues Confirmed for euer by Cocke Lorell.

The Vprightman speaketh.

Cocke Lorell aunswereth.

Imprinted at London by John Awdely, dwellynge in little Britayne Streete withoute Aldersgate, 1575.”

Dr. Bliss describes the above mentioned tract at length, in the “British Bibliographer,” Vol. II., p. 12, and makes further allusion to it in his edition of Earle’s “Microcosmography,” p. 256, published in 1811.

One of the earliest, if not the earliest, printed mention of the Bote occurs in Thomas Feylde’s “A contrauersye bytwene a louer and a Jaye. [Colophon.] Imprynted at London in Fletestrete at the sygne of the Sonne by Wynkyn de Worde.” The Lover in the preceding verses apostrophizes Nature regarding his passion for his mistress, at which the Jay thus expostulates:—

The next mention of Cocke Lorell is in a black-letter poem, preserved in the Bodleian Library, without date or printer’s name, entitled “Doctour Double Ale.”

The Rev. Charles H. Hartshorne, in “Ancient Metrical Tales,” reprinted “Doctour Double Ale,” but rendered the last line cocke losels bota.

In pointing out this error, Mr. Collier says, that in John Heywood’s “Epigrams upon three hundred proverbs,” printed in 1566, mention is made of Cocke Lorelles Bote, under the heading of

“A BUSY BODY

Later on we find that the rascal is not forgotten, for Ben Jonson in his masque of the “Gypsies Metamorphosed,” has introduced him as feasting the Evil One, in a song which continued popular for some considerable time, and was frequently printed as a broadside, copies of which are in the Pepysian and Ashmolean Collections.

The first verse is as follows:—

In 1807, the Rev. William Beloe, in his “Anecdotes of Literature and Scarce Works,” Vol. I., p. 393, called attention to the following tract, but unfortunately he changed the title to “Cocke Lorells Vote,” in place of “Bote.” That this was a misprint may be inferred from the fact, that in another place in the same work, he makes reference to a passage in Bishop Percy’s Reliques, where the correct title is given.

Dibdin, who appears never to have seen the work, but says he was “indebted to Mr. H. Ellis of the British Museum” for specimens “of this singular performance” has fallen into the droll blunder of writing “of the licentious and predatory character of its Author, ... one Cock Lorell,” whose “popularity has, I believe, escaped the notice of our chroniclers.”[3]

The poem was presented to the members of the Roxburghe Club in 1817, by the Rev. Henry Drury, but the impression was limited to thirty-five copies, two of which were printed on vellum.

It was again printed at Edinburgh for Stanley and Blake in 1817, from a transcript made by the Rev. Joseph Stevenson, with an introductory notice by Mr. James Maidment. This reprint has become almost as rare as the Roxburghe Club edition, only forty copies having been taken.

The Percy Society, in 1843, issued an edition of the “Bote” to its members, with a preface by Dr. E. F. Rimbault. The rarity of the two first mentioned reprints, and the form, apart altogether from the comparative scarcity of the last, has led to the reprinting once more of this poem. The writer begs to acknowledge his obligations to both Mr. Maidment’s and Dr. Rimbault’s editions as supplying the material for the foregoing notice. While aware that there is little that is new which can be said about Cocke Lorell, he trusts that this edition may be favourably received, if for no other reasons than these, that while it avoids the many inaccuracies of the Edinburgh edition, it omits the modern punctuation which has been introduced into the Percy Society’s reprint.

The present impression is limited to one hundred and one copies, one of which is printed on vellum.

J. P. EDMOND.