[E202] "Clarie." M. Lat. sclarea, from clarus = clear, and prefix ex. Called by the apothecaries clear-eye, translated into Oculus Christi, Godes-eie, and See-bright, and eye-salves made of it. Salvia Sclarea, Linn. "Called in French Ornale or Fonte-bonne; it maketh men dronke and causeth headache, and therefore some Brewers do boyle it with their Bier in steede of Hoppes."—Lyte's Dodoens, ed. 1578, p. 253.

[E203] "Coleworts." Dioscorides (quoted in Cogan's Haven of Health, p. 49) says (lib. 2, cap. 113) that "if they be eaten last after meats, they preserue the stomacke from surfetting, and the head from drunkennesse. Yea some write, that if one would drinke much wine for a wager, and not be drunke, but to haue also a good stomacke to meate, that he should eate before the banquet raw Cabage leaues with Vinegar so much as he list, and after the banquet to eate againe foure or fiue raw leaues, which practice is much vsed in Germanie.... The Vine and the Coleworts be so contrarie by nature that if you plant Coleworts neere to the rootes of the Vine, of it selfe it will flee from them. Therefore it is no maruaile if Colewortes be of such force against drunkennesse; But I trust no student will prooue this experiment, whether he may be drunken or not, if he eate Coleworte leaues before and after a feast."

[E204] The numerous virtues of this herb are thus summed up in the King's Coll. MS. of the Promptorium:

"Bis duo dat maratrum, febres fugat atque venenum,
Et purgat stomacum, sic reddit lumen acutum."

Macer gives a detailed account, in which the following remarkable passages occur: "Þe edderes wole ete fenel, when her yen dasnyÞ, and so she getiÞ ayene her clere sighte; and Þer Þoroghe it is founde and preved Þat fenel doÞ profit to mannis yene: Þe yen Þat ben dusked, and dasniÞ, shul be anoynted with Þe ius of fenelle rotis medeled with hony; and Þis oynement shalle put a-way alle Þe dasewenesse of hem, and make hem bry?t." The virtue of fennel in restoring youth, was a discovery attributed by Macer to serpents; "Þis prouiÞ auctours and filisoferis, for serpentis whan men (sic) olde, and willeth to wexe stronge, myghty, and yongly a-yean, Þei gon and eten ofte fenel, and Þei become yongliche and myghty."—MS. in the possession of H. W. Diamond, Esq. This herb is called in German Fenchel, Dutch Venckel. In Piers Plowman mention occurs of: "A ferthyng worth of fynkel-sede for fastinge daies;" C. vii. 360; spelt fenel in the other texts. "Fenkylle or fenelle, feniculum."—Prompt. Parv. "Fenelle or fenkelle, feniculum, maratrum."—Catholicon Anglicum.

[E205] "Andreas the Herborist writeth that the root of the Langdebeefe tyed or bounde to the diseased place, swageth the ache of the veynes (called Varix) being to muche opened or enlarged and fylled with grosse blood."—Lyte's Dodoens, 1578, p. 568. See also Gerard's Herbal, 1633.

This is no doubt Helminthia echioides, Linn., of which Parkinson (Paradisus) gives a good description and figure under this name, and says, "The leaves are onely used ... for an herbe for the pot among others." Lyte's reference is to some other plant which has "a purple flower."—Note by Mr. J. Britten, F.L.S.

[E206] "Leek." A remnant of A.S. porleac, from Lat. porrum and leac = a plant, Ger. lauch.

[E207] "Longwort," called in Lyte's Dodoens, p. 125, Sage of Jerusalem, "whiche herbe hath no particular vse in Physicke, but it is much vsed in Meates and Salades with egges, as is also Cowslippes and Prymeroses, whervnto in temperature it is much like." See also Gerard's Herbal, 1633, where it is called "Cowslips of Jerusalem."

[E208] "Liuerwort," so called from the liver shape of the thallus, and its supposed effects in disease of the liver. O. L. Ger. Steenleuerwnyt. According to Lyte's Dodoens, p. 59, "a soueraigne medicine against the heate and inflammation of the Lyuer, and all hoate Feuers or Agues." Anemone Hepatica, Linn.

The first portion of this note refers to a Cryptogam called Liverwort, having nothing to do with the plant meant by Tusser.—Note by Mr. J. Britten, F.L.S.

[E209] "Marigolds are hote and drye, an herbe well knowen and as vsual in the kitchin as in the hal: the nature whereof is to open at the Sunne rising, and to close vp at the Sunne setting. It hath one good propertie and very profitable for Students, that is by the vse thereof the sight is sharpened. And againe the water distilled of Marigolds when it flowreth, doth help the rednesse and inflammation of the eyes if it be dropped into them, or if a linnen cloth wet in the water be laid upon them. Also the powder of Marigolds dried, being put into the hollownesse of the teeth, easeth toothach. And the juice of the herbe mingled with a little salt, and rubbed often times vpon Warts, at length weareth them away."—Cogan's Haven of Health, ch. 63. Called in the Grete Herbal Mary Gowles, a name that seems to have originated in the A.S. mersc-mear-gealla = marsh-horse-gowl, the marsh marigold, or caltha, transferred to the exotic plant of our gardens and misunderstood as Mary Gold. It is often mentioned as Gold simply by our older poets:

"That she sprunge up out of the molde
Into a floure was named golde."
—Gower, ed. 1554, f. 120.

"The yellow marigold, the sunne's own flower," says Heywood in Marriage Triumphe, and "so called," says Hyll (Art of Gard. ch. xxx.), "for that after the rising of the sun unto noon, this flower openeth larger and larger; but after the noontime unto the setting of the sun the flower closeth more and more, so that after the setting thereof it is wholly shut up."

"The marigold observes the sun,
More than my subjects me have done."
—K. Charles I.

[E210] "Mercurie." A name rather vaguely applied in old works, probably the "Good Henry, Chenopodium Bonus Henricus." Called also "Allgood," Dutch algoede, Ger. allgut, from Lat. tota bona, Cotgrave and Palsgrave toutte bonne, on account of its excellent qualities as a remedy and as an esculent; hence the proverb: "Be thou sick or whole, put Mercury in thy koale."—Cogan, Haven of Health, ch. 28. "The Barons Mercury, or male Phyllon dronken, causeth to engender male children, and the Mayden Mercurie, or gyrles Phyllon dronken, causeth to engender Gyrles or Daughters."—Lyte's Dodoens, p. 78.

It is still much grown in some districts, as in Lincolnshire (where it is called "Marquerry"), being boiled and eaten as spinach.—Note by Mr. J. Britten, F.L.S.

[E211] "Nep," common Cat-mint. "Dronken with honied water is good for them that haue fallen from a lofte, and haue some bruse or squat, and bursting, for it digesteth the congeled and clotted bloud, and is good for the payne of the bowels, the shortnesse of breath, the oppillation or stopping of the breast, and against the Jaundice."—Lyte, p. 148. See also Gerard's Herbal, 1633. "Nepe, herbe, Coloquintida, cucurbita."—Prompt. Parv. "Neppe, an herbe, herbe du chat."—Palsgrave. Forby gives the Norfolk simile "as white as nep," in allusion to the white down which covers this plant.

The plant referred to in the quotation from the Prompt. Parv. is not that meant by Tusser.—Note by Mr. J. Britten, F.L.S.

[E212] "Orach," Atriplex hortensis, or sativa, formerly Arach, Prompt. Parv. Arage, in MS. Harl. 979 Arasches, Fr. arroche, from Low Lat. aurago from aurum = gold, by the addition to it of ago = wort, as in plantago, lappago, etc. At the same time its use in the cure of jaundice, aurugo, may have fixed upon the plant the name of the disease.

"Atriplicem tritam cum nitro, melle, et aceto,
Dicunt appositam calidam sedare podagram:
Ictericis dicitque Galenus tollere morbum
Illius semen cum vino sÆpius haustum."
—Macer, cap. xxviii. l. 7, quoted by Dr. Prior.

[E213] "Patience," called in Lyte's Dodoens, p. 559, "Wild Docke," and stated to be a remedy for jaundice, the "bitinges and stinginges of Scorpions," and the tooth ache, and if "hanged about the necke it doth helpe the kinges euill or swelling in the throte."

[E214] If the virtues of Penny Royal, as stated in Lyte's Dodoens, p. 232, be true, the use of it might now be advantageously adopted by the consumers of London drinking water. He says: "If at any time men be constrayned to drinke corrupt, naughtie, stinking, or salte water, throw Penny royal into it, or strow the pouder thereof into it, and it shall not hurte any bodie." It is sometimes called Pudding-grass, from its being used to make stuffings for meat, formerly called puddings. It is recommended by Andrew Boorde (Dyetary, ed. E.E.T. Soc. p. 281) as a remedy for melancholy, and to comfort the spirits of men.

[E215] "Primerose," from Pryme rolles, the name it bears in old books and MSS. The Grete Herball, ch. cccl. says: "It is called Pryme Rolles of pryme tyme, because it beareth the first floure in pryme tyme." It is also so called in Frere Randolph's Catalogue. Chaucer writes it in one word primerole. (See also MS. Addit. 11, 307, f. 37:

"He shal ben lyk the lytel bee
That seketh the blosme on the tre,
And souketh on the prumorole.")

Primerole is an abbreviation of Fr. primeverole, It. primaverola, dimin. of prima vera, from fior di prima vera = the first spring flower. Primerole, as an outlandish unintelligible word, was soon familiarized into prime rolles, and this into primrose. This is explained in popular works as meaning the first rose of the spring, a name that never could have been given to a plant that in form and colour is so unlike a rose. But the rightful claimant is, strange to say, the daisy, which in the South of Europe is a common and conspicuous flower in early spring, while the primrose is an extremely rare one, and it is the daisy that bears the name in all the old books. See Fuchs, Hist. Stirpium, 1542, p. 145, where there is an excellent figure of it, titled primula veris; and the Ortus Sanitatis, ed. Augsb. 1486, ch. cccxxxiii., where we have a very good woodcut of a daisy titled "masslieben, Premula veris, Latine." Brunfelsius, Novum Herbarium, ed. 1531, speaking of the Herba paralysis, the cowslip, says, p. 1590, expressly, "Sye wÜrt von etlichen Doctores Primula veris genaunt, das doch falsch ist wann Primula veris ist matsomen oder zeitlosen." Brunschwygk (De Arte Distillandi, 1500, book ii. c. viii.) uses the same words. The Zeitlose is the daisy. Parkinson (Th. Bot. p. 531) assigns the name to both the daisy and the primrose. Matthioli (ed. Frankfort, 1586, p. 653) calls his Bellis Major "Primo fiore maggiore, seu Fiore di prima vera, nonnullis Primula veris major" and figures the moon-daisy. His Bellis minor, which seems to be our daisy, he calls "Primo fiore minore, Fior di primavera, Gallis Marguerites, Germanis Masslieben." At p. 883, he figures the cowslip, and calls that also "Primula veris, Italis Fiore di primavera, Gallis primevere."—Dr. Prior's Pop. Names of British Plants. "Petie Mulleyn (whiche we call Cowslippe and Primerose) is of two sortes. The smaller sorte, which we call Primerose, Herbasculum minus, is of diuers kindes, as yellow and greene, single and dubble."—Lyte's Dodoens, p. 122.

Lupton (Book of Notable Things, v. 89) speaks of "Primroses, which some take to be Daisies."—Note by Mr. J. Britten, F.L.S.

[E216] "Rosemary," Lat. rosmarinus, sea-spray, from its usually growing on the sea-coast and its odour, is recommended by Lyte for fastening loose teeth. "Take of rewe a grete quantite, and sawge halfe als mekille, and rosemaryne the same quantitee."—MS. Linc. Med. f. 283. According to Andrew Boorde it is a remedy for "palses and for the fallynge syckenes, and for the cowghe, and good agaynst colde."

[E217] "Safron," Sp. azafran, from Arabic al zahafaran. On the cultivation, etc., of Saffron in England, there is a long account in Harrison's Description of England, book iii. cap. 24. See note E354.

[E218] "Spinage." "Called in Arabic Hispanach; 'ArabicÆ factionis principes Hispanach, hoc est, Hispanicum olus nominant.'—Fuchs, Hist. Stirp. p. 668. Dodoens (bk. v. 1. 5) tells us, 'Spinachiam nostra Ætas appellat, nonnulli spinacheum olus. Ab Arabibus et Serapione Hispanac dicitur.' Brunfelsius (ed. 1531) says expressly at p. 16, 'QuÆ vulgo spinachia hodie, Atriplex Hispaniensis dicta est quondam; eo quod ab Hispania primum allata est ad alias exteras nationes.' Tragus also calls it Olus Hispanicum; Cotgrave, Herbe d'Espaigne; and the modern Greeks spa?a???? [Greek: spanachion]."—Dr. R. A. Prior.

[E219] Lyte, p. 642, says: "Cyues or Rushe onions: this kinde of Leekes is called in English Cyues, and of Turner in Latine, Cepa pallacana, and in Greke Gethyun, which he Englisheth by al these names, a Cyue, a Civet, a Chyue, or Sweth."

[E220] "Tanzie," Fr. athanasie, contracted to tanacÉe and tanaisie. Lyte says, p. 18, that it was sold in the shops under the name of Athanasia, the Greek word for immortality, and that it was so called, "quod non cito flos inarexat." A cake used to be made in which tansy was one of the ingredients, and which was called Tansay-Cake. The following recipe for it is given in MS. Sloane 1986, f. 100:

"Breke egges in bassyn, and swynge hem sone,
Do powder of peper therto anone,
Then grynde tansay, tho juse owte wrynge,
To blynde with tho egges, withowte lesynge.
In pan or skelet thou shalt hit frye,
In buttur well skymm et wyturly,
Or white grece thou may take therto,
Geder hit on acake, thenne hase thou do,
With platere of tre, and frye hit browne,
On brodeleches serve hit thou schalle,
With fraunche-mele* or other metis withalle."

* A dish composed chiefly of eggs and sheeps' fat.

In Halliwell's Dict. is also given a recipe for a dish called Tansie. Cogan, in his Haven of Health, p. 65, says: "It is much vsed among vs in England about Easter, with fried egs, not without good cause, to purge away the fleame engendred of fish in Lent season, whereof wormes are soone bred in them that be thereto disposed, though the common people vnderstand not the cause, why Tansies are more vsed after Lent, than at any other time of the yeare." "To prevent being Bug-bitten. Put a sprig or two of Tansy at the bed head, or as near the pillow as the smell may be agreeable."—T. Cosnett's Footman's Directory, p. 292. "For to dystroy a Wrang Nayle, othewyse callyd a Corne. Take wylde tansey, and grynde yt, and make yt neshe, and ley it therto, and it wyl bryng yt owght."—Lambeth MS. 306, f. 65, quoted in Political, Relig. and Love Poems (E. E. Text Soc. ed. Furnivall), p. 36.

The wild tansey is not Tusser's plant.—Note by Mr. J. Britten, F.L.S.

[E221] "Blessed Thistle." "So worthily named for the singular vertues that it hath.... It sharpneth the wit and memorie, strengthneth all the principall parts of the bodie, quickneth all the senses, comforteth the stomacke, procureth appetite, and hath a speciall vertue against poyson, and preserueth from the Pestilence, and is excellent good against any kinde of Feuer, being vsed in this manner: Take a dramme of the powder, put it into a good draught of ale or wine, warme it and drink it a quarter of an hour before the fit doth come, then goe to bed, couer you well with clothes and procure sweate, which by the force of the herbe will easily come foorth, and so continue vntill the fit be past.... For which notable effects this herbe may worthily be called Benedictus or Omnimorbia, that is a salue for euery sore, not knowen to Physitians of old time, but lately reuealed by the speciall providence of Almighty God."—Cogan's Haven of Health, p. 545.

[E222] "Purslane," in Turner's Herball Purcellaine, in the Grete Herball Porcelayne, in Dodoens Purcelayne. "It is good against St. Antonies fier, called erysipelas."—Lyte's Dodoens, p. 576. "Purslain in Latin is called Portulaca, a portula = a little gate, because they fancied it to be like one."—Lemery's Treatise on Foods, 1704, p. 92.

[E223] "Rampions," Fr. raiponce, "a word mistaken as in the case of cerise and pease, for a plural, and the m inserted for euphony."—Dr. Prior, Popular Names of British Plants.

[E224] "Men say that who so taketh the seede of Rockat before he be beaten or whipt, shalbe so hardened that he shall easily endure the payne, according as Plinie writeth."—Lyte's Dodoens, p. 622. What a pity Tusser did not know of this property of the Rocket! from his own account he had plenty of opportunities of testing it at Eton.

[E225] "Sage causeth wemen to be fertill, wherefore in times past the people of Egypt, after a great mortalite and pestilence, constreyned their wemen to drinke the iuyce therof, to cause them the sooner to conceyue, and to bring foorth store of children."—Lyte's Dodoens, p. 252.

[E226] "Sea holie." Eryngium maritimum, Linn. "The leaves are good to be eaten in sallads."—Langham's Garden of Health. "The young and tender shoots are eaten of divers either raw or pickled."—Parkinson, Theatrum Botanicum, 1640, p. 988.—Note by Mr. J. Britten, F.L.S.

[E227] "Sampere is a weede growing neare the sea-side, and is very plentifull about the Ile of Man, from whence it is brought to diuers parts of England, preserved in Brine, and is no lesse wholesome than Capers."—Cogan's Haven of Health, p. 64. The Eng. Samphire is a corruption of the Fr. Herbe de Saint Pierre, from its growing on the rocks on the sea-shore. The leaves are used in the form of a pickle as an article of diet.

[E228] "The Ionians had so much Veneration for them that they swore by Cabbages, and were therein as superstitious as the Egyptians, who gave divine Honours to Leeks and Onions, for the great Benefits which they said they received from them."—Lemery's "Treatise on Foods," 1704, p. 73.

[E229] "Citrons," according to Lyte, p. 704, will cure "tremblynge of the hart and pensiue heavinesse, wamblynges, vomitinges, and lothsomnesse of the stomache." The citron was probably introduced into Europe with the orange by the Arab conquerors of Spain, and first received in England from that country. By a MS. in the Tower it appears that in 1290, 18 Edw. I., a large Spanish ship came to Portsmouth, and that from her cargo Queen Eleanor purchased Seville figs, dates, pomegranates, 15 Citrons, and 7 poma de orenge.—Way in Prompt. Parv.

[E230] "The garden Basill is called in English Basill Royall or Basill gentle, and the smaller kinde is called Bushse (sic) Basill. The herbe brused with vineger and holden to the nose of suche as are faynt and fallen into a sound bringeth them againe to themselues, and the seede therof giuen to be smelled upon causeth the sternutation or niesing."—Lyte's Dodoens, p. 241. "One thing I read in Hollerius (Lib. i. cap. i.) of Basill, which is wonderfull. 'A certaine Italian, by often smelling to Basill, had a scorpion bred in his braine, and after vehement and long paines he died thereof.'"—Cogan's Haven of Health, p. 50. See also 51. 34.

[E231] "Costmary, L. Costus amarus, Fr. coste amere, misunderstood as Costus MariÆ, an error that has very naturally arisen from this plant having been dedicated to St. Mary Magdalene, and called after her, Maudlin, either in allusion to her box of scented ointment, or to its use in the uterine affections over which she presided. In old authors it occurs as Herba sanctÆ or divÆ MariÆ."—Dr. R. Prior, Popular Names of Brit. Plants. Called also Alecost from its having formerly been esteemed an agreeable aromatic bitter, and much used for flavouring ale: "If you list to make a pleasant drinke, and comfortable to the stomache, put certaine handfuls of this herbe in the bottome of a vesselle, and tunne up new Ale vpon it."—Cogan, Haven of Health, ch. 69.

[E232] "Paggles," spelt also Paigle, Pagle, Pagel, Peagle, Pegyll and Pygil, a name now confined to the Eastern Counties, and generally assigned to the Cowslip, but by Ray and Moor to the Ranunculus bulbosus. The derivation is uncertain. "Blake (yellow) as a paigle."—Ray. In Suffolk the name is applied to the Crowfoot, the Cuckoo-flower.

[E233] "Our common germander or thistle benet is found and knowne to bee so wholesome and of so great power in medicine, as anie other hearbe, if they be vsed accordinglie."—Harrison, Descript. of Eng., ed. Furnivall, pt. i. p. 326. "The iuyce of the leaues mengled with oyle, and straked vpon the eyes, driueth away the white cloude, called the Hawe or Pearle in the eye, and all manner dimness of the same."—Lyte's Dodoens, p. 25.

[E234] "That which is commonly called Sothernewood is the male kinde of this herbe, and that which we doe call Lauender-cotten is the female, named in Latine Cypressus or Santolina. The setting of Lauender-cotten within the house in floure pots must needes be very wholesome, for it driveth away venemous wormes, both by strawing, and by the sauour of it, and being drunke in wine it is a remedie against poyson."—Cogan's Haven of Health, p. 56.

[E235] "Mawdelin," spelt also Maudlin, Mawdeleyn and Maudeline, appears to have derived its name similarly to Costmary, q.v., and to have been applied to the same uses.

[E236] "Baies," Bays, from French baie, which is formed from Lat. bacca = a berry. In old writers bay is used for a berry generally, as "the bayes of ivyne," but in time the term came to be applied to the berries of the sweet bay, called by Virgil lauri baccas, from their being an article of commerce; from the berry the term was extended to the tree itself.

[E237] "Bachelor's Buttons." So called, according to Johnson's Gerarde, p. 472, "from their similitude to the jagged cloathe buttons anciently worne in this kingdom," but according to others from "a habit of country fellows to carry them in their pockets to divine their success with their sweethearts." Called by Lyte (Dodoens, p. 421), Goldcup or Gold knoppe, and described as a double variety of the flower now known so well as the Butterflower, or Buttercup, the Fr. bouton d'or.

[E238] "Columbine," called Colourbine in Lincoln, Aquilegia vulgaris, used for making stuffed chine.

"There are many sorts of Colombines, as well differing in forme as colour of the flowers, and of them both single and double carefully noursed up in our gardens, for the delight both of their forme and colours."—Parkinson, Paradisus, 1629, p. 271.—Note by Mr. J. Britten, F.L.S.

[E239] "Daffadowndilly, Daffodilly, Affodilly, and Daffodil, Lat. asphodelus, from which was formed Affodilly, the name of it in all the older writers, but subsequently confused with that of another flower, the so-called sapharoun or saffron lily:

'The thyrde lylye ?yt there ys,
That ys called felde lylye, y wys,
Hys levys be lyke to sapharoun,
Men know yt therby many one.'
—MS. Sloane, 1571.

With the taste for alliteration that is shown in popular names, the Sapharoun-lily, upon blending with affodilly, became, by a sort of mutual compromise, daffadowndilly, whence our daffodilly and daffodil."—Dr. R. A. Prior, Popular Names of British Plants. "Strew me the ground with daffadowndillies."—Spenser, Shep. Cal. 140.

[E240] "Eglantine," a word of doubtful origin. Chaucer writes it eglatere and eglentere. Fr. aiglantier, Prov. aiglentina = wild rose. Diez derives it from Lat. aculeus = a prickle, through the adj. aculentus.

[E241] Feverfew (Pyrethrum parthenium), a genus of Composite plants, common in our gardens, and deriving its name from having long been employed as a popular remedy in ague and other fevers, and as an emmenagogue. It appears to possess stimulant and tonic properties. It is a perennial plant, and may attain a height of one or two feet. Its leaves are flat and broad, its flowers small. It is nearly allied to Camomile. The variety grown in gardens is well known under the name of "golden feather."

[E242] "Flower armor," evidently the Floramor, Fr. fleur d'amour, from a misconception of its Latin name Amaranthus, as though a compound of Amor, love, and anthus, a flower.

[E243] "Flower de luce," the flos deliciarum of the Middle Ages. Ducange, quoting from the history of the Harcourts, says:—"Thomas, Dux ExoniÆ habet comitatum de Harcourt ... per homagium ac reddendum florem deliciarum apud Castrum de Rouen," etc. (A.D. 1423). Another derivation is as follows:—"Louis VII. dit le Jeune, prit le premier des fleurs de lis, par allusion À son nom de Loys (comme on l'Écrivait alors). On a dit dans ce temps-lÀ Fleur de Loys, puis Fleur de Louis, enfin, Fleur de Lis." (Grandmaison, Dict. Heraldique.) The flower that he chose seems to have been a white one, for Chaucer says:

"His nekke was white as is the flour de lis."

In E. K.'s Glossary to Spenser's Shep. Cal. April, we read "Flower delice, that which they use to misterme Flowre deluce being in the Latine called Flos delitiarum."

[E244] According to Lyte the Flower Gentle is identical with the Floramor (see above). Various species of Amaranthus, including the Flower amor (43. 10), and what we now call Celosia cristata, or Cockscomb, were included under this name. Parkinson (Paradisus, p. 370) says: "We have foure or five sorts of Flower-gentle to trimme up this our Garden withall."—Note by Mr. J. Britten, F.L.S.

[E245] "Gilliflower, formerly spelt gyllofer and gilofre with the o long, from Fr. giroflÉe, ltal. garofalo, in Douglas's Virgil jereflouris, words formed from M. Lat. garoffolum, gariofilum, or, as in Albert Magn. (lib. vi. cap. 22), gariofilus, corrupted from Lat. caryophyllum = a clove, and referring to the spicy odour of the flower, which seems to have been used in flavouring wines to replace the more costly clove of India. The name was originally given in India to plants of the Pink tribe, especially the carnation, but has in England been transferred of late years to several Cruciferous plants. That of Chaucer, Spenser, and Shakspere was, as in Italy, Dianthus caryophyllus, Linn., that of later writers and gardeners Matthiola and Cheiranthus, Linn. Much of the confusion in the names of plants has arisen from the vague use of the French terms GiroflÉe, Oeillet, and Violette, which were, all three of them, applied to flowers of the Pink tribe, but subsequently extended, and finally restricted in English to very different plants. GiroflÉe has become Gilliflower, and passed over to the CruciferÆ, Oeillet has been restricted to the Sweet Williams, and Violette has been appropriated to one of the numerous claimants of its name, the genus to which the pansy belongs."—Dr. R. A. Prior.

[E246] "Holiokes," in Huloet's Dict. Holy Hoke. Wedgwood (Etym. Dict.) derives it from A.S. hoc, Welsh hocys = a mallow, and says that it obtained the title of Holy from its being brought from the Holy Land, where it is indigenous.

[E247] "Indian Eie." This was probably a Dianthus of some kind (French oeillet), the same perhaps which is now grown in our gardens as Indian or Chinese Pink.

[E248] Laus tibi, "a narcissus with white flowers. It groweth plenteously in my Lorde's garden in Syon and it is called of divers White Laus tibi."—Turner's Herball, pt. ii. b. 2. "It is very difficult to ascertain what plant was meant by this name, which is also mentioned by Turner in his 'Names of Herbes' (1548), and in his 'Libellus' (1538), where there is a long disquisition concerning it. It may be Narcissus poeticus, L., as Mr. B. D. Jackson supposes in his reprint of the 'Libellus' or possibly N. biflorus, L."—Note by Mr. J. Britten, F.L.S.

[E249] "Lillium cum vallium," the "Lily of the Valley," in Lyte Lyllie Conuall, and also termed May Blossoms, May Lyllies, and Lyryconfancy.

[E250] "Nigella Romana." The Nigella Damascena, Linn., a favourite old-fashioned garden annual, still to be met with in gardens under the names of "Love-in-a-mist," or "Devil-in-a-bush."

[E251] "Pansy," or Paunce, Fr. pensÉe, thought. According to Dr. Johnson the name is derived from Lat. panacea, but there is no evidence of the plant ever having been so called, or having been regarded as a panacea. It has received more popular names perhaps than any other plant, both in our own and in foreign languages. The following are some of the quaint titles given to it: "Cull me to you," or "Cuddle me to you," "Love and Idle," "Live in Idleness," "Love in Idleness" (originally "Love in idle," i.e. in vain); "Love in idle Pances," "Tittle my fancy," "Kiss me, ere I rise," "Jump up and kiss me," "Kiss me at the garden gate," "Pink of my John," "Herb Trinity," and "Three faces under one hood," from the three colours combined in one flower. It was also called "Hearts-ease," and "Flame flower" (M. Lat. Viola flammea).

Heartsease, a term meaning "a cordial," as in Sir W. Scott's Antiquary, ch. xi., "Buy a dram to be eilding and claise, and a supper and hearts-ease into the bargain," given to certain plants supposed to be cardiac: at present [applied] to the pansy alone, but by Lyte, Bulleyn, and W. Turner, to the Wallflower equally.—Dr. R. A. Prior's Popular Names of British Plants, which see for an account of the origin of the name.

[E252] "Sops-in-Wine," the Clove Gilliflower, Dianthus caryophyllus, L., so called from the flowers being used to flavour wine or ale. Cf. Chaucer's Rime of Sir Thopas, B. 1950:

"Ther springen herbes grete and smale,
The lycorys and cetewale,
And many a clowe gilofre,
And notemuge to putte in ale,
Whether it be moyste or stale."

"Bring Coronations and Sops in wine worne of Paramoures."
—-Spenser, Shep. Cal. April.

"Garlands of Roses and Sopps in Wine."—Ibid. May. E. K., in his Glossary, says: "Sops in Wine, a flowre in colour much like a coronation (carnation), but differing in smel and quantitye."

[E253] "Sweete Williams,"from Fr. oeillet, Lat. ocellus, a little eye, corrupted to Willy, and thence to William, "in reference, perhaps, to a popular ballad, 'Fair Margaret and Sweet William,' [printed in Ritson's Early Songs and Ballads, ed. Hazlitt, 1877] a name assigned by W. Bulleyn (f. 48) to the Wallflower, but by later herbalists and modern gardeners, as here, to a species of pink, Dianthus barbatus, Linn. According to an article in the Quarterly Review (No. 227), it formerly bore the name of 'Sweet Saint William'; but the writer gives no reference, and probably had no authority for saying so."—Dr. R. A. Prior, pp. 228 and 250.

[E254] "Sweete Johns." Apparently a variety of Sweet William. See Parkinson's "Paradisus," pp. 319, 321, for descriptions and figures: "The chiefe differences betweene them are, that [Sweet Williams] have broader, and darker greene leaues, somewhat brownish, especially towards the points, and that the flowers stand thicker and closer, and more in number together, in the head or tuft."—Note by Mr. J. Britten,, F.L.S.

[E255] "Star of Jerusalem." This is usually Tragopogon pratensis, L., as in Gerard, p. 736, but some other plant is likely to be meant here.—Note by Mr. J. Britten, F.L.S.

[E256] "Tuft gilleflowers." Probably some low-growing Dianthus, such as that figured as "Matted Pinkes" by Parkinson (Paradisus, p. 315).—Note by Mr. J. Britten, F.L.S.

[E257] "Veluet flowers," according to Dr. Prior, the "love-lies-bleeding," Amaranthus caudatus, Linn., from its crimson velvety tassels; according to Lyte, the same as the Flower Gentle, or Floramor, Fr. passevelours, A. tricolor, Linn.

[E258] "Eyebright." "Divers Authours write that goldfinches, linnets, and some other Birds make use of this Herb for the repairing of their own and their young ones sight."—Coles, "Adam in Eden," 1657, p. 46. It is the "Euphrasy" of Milton, P. L. xi. 414. A similar story is told of the Hawk-weed. See Pliny (lib. xx. c. 7).

[E259] "Fumetorie," Fr. fume terre, Lat. fumus terrÆ, earth-smoke, it being believed to be produced without seed from vapours arising from the earth, as stated by Platearius: "Dicitur fumus terrÆ, quod generatur a quadam fumositate grossÂ, a terr resolutÂ, et circa superficiem terrÆ adherente." Pliny (lib. xxv. c. 13) says that it takes its name from causing the eyes to water when applied to them, as smoke does;

"Take youre laxatives
Of lauriol, centaure, and fumytere."
—Chaucer, Nonnes Prestes Tale, 143.

See Burton's Anat. of Melancholy, pp. 432-3 and 438, ed. 1845.

[E260] "Woodrofe," spelt according to an old distich thus:

"Double U, double O, double D, E,
R, O, double U, double F, E."

It derives its name originally from the Fr. roue = a wheel, dimin. rouelle, the leaves being set on the stems so as to resemble the large rowels of ancient spurs.

[E262] According to Cogan "Cummin" was extensively used for washing the face, it having the effect, if not used too often, of making the complexion clear; if used to excess, it caused paleness. He continues, "In Matthiolus (lib. 3, cap. 60) I reade a practise to be wrought with Cummine seedes, and (as I thinke) hath been vsed in time past of Monkes and Friers. They that counterfait holinesse and leannesse of bodie, doe often vse Cummine seedes in their meates, and be perfumed therewith."—Haven of Health, p. 47.

[E263] "Detanie." Dittany (Origanum onites, Linn.) was commonly cultivated in gardens at this period. Gerard, p. 795, says it is "a hot and sharpe hearbe," and speaks of it as biting the tongue.

[E264] Gromell, Grummel, or Gray myle, as Turner says it should be written, from granum solis and milium solis together. "That is al one," says the Grete Herbal, "granum solis and milium solis." The common gromwell or gray millet, Lithospermum officinale, Linn., was formerly esteemed as a remedy for the stone and other diseases. In a treatise on the virtues of plants, written in the 15th century, Roy. MS. 18 A. vi. f. 766, the following description is given: "Granum solis ys an herbe Þat me clepyÞ gromel, or lyÞewale: thys herbe haÞ leuys Þat be euelong, and a lytyl white flour, and he haÞ whyte seede ischape as a ston that me clepyÞ margery perl." Cotgrave gives "Gremil, grenil, the hearb gromill, grummell, or graymill, peare-plant, lichewall." The word is derived by Skinner "a granis sc. lapideis, quÆ pro seminibus habet, q.d. granile."—Way, in Prompt. Parv. "Grumelle, milium, gramen solis."—Catholicon Anglicum.

[E265] "Louage," spelt in Prompt. Parv. and in Holland's Trans. of Pliny, love-ache, as though it were love-parsley. French levesche, A.S. lufestice, Levisticum officinale, Koch.

[E266] "Mandrake." Matthioli (lib. iv. c. 61) tells us that Italian ladies in his own time had been known to pay as much as 25 and 30 ducats for one of the artificial mandrakes (common white bryony) of itinerant quacks, and describes the process of their manufacture. They were supposed to remove sterility; hence Rachel's anxiety to obtain them (Genesis xxx. 14). There were numerous other superstitions regarding this plant; amongst others it was said to shriek when torn up. See Gerard's Herbal, 1597, p. 280, and Peacock's Glossary of Manley, etc., E. D. Soc. Lupton (Book of Notable Things, iii. 39) gives instructions for the manufacture of Mandrakes from bryony roots. The true Mandrake is Atropa Mandragora, Linn.

[E267] Mogwort. "Mugwort, a name that corresponds in meaning with its synonym wyrmwyrt, wormwood, from O.E. mough, moghe, or moughte, a maggot or moth.

'And wormes and moghes on Þe same manere
Sal Þat day be in wittenes broght;'
—Hampole, Pricke of Conscience, l. 5572;

and Wycliffe (Matt. vi. 20):

'Where neÞer ruste ne moughte destruyeÞ.'

The name was given to this plant from its having been recommended by Dioscorides to ward off the attacks of these insects. 'Mogwort, al on as seyn some, modirwort: lewed folk Þat in manye wordes conne no rygt sownynge, but ofte shortyn wordys, and changyn lettrys and silablys, Þey corruptyn Þe o into u, and d into g, and syncopyn i, smytyn awey i and r, and seyn mugwort.'—MS. Arundel, 42, f. 35. It is unnecessary to have recourse to this singular process. The plant was known both as a moth-wort and as a mother-wort, but while it was used almost exclusively as a mother-wort, it still retained, at the same time, the name of mugwort, a synonym of moth-wort. In Ælfric's glossary it is called matrum herba—Dr. R. A. Prior. See Brand's Pop. Antiq. for an account of the superstitious custom of seeking under the root of this plant on Midsummer-eve for a coal, to serve as a talisman against many disasters.

[E268] "Rew." Shakspere, Hamlet, iv. 5. 181: "There's rue for you; and here's some for me: we may call it herb-grace o' Sundays." And Winter's Tale, iv. 4. 74:

"For you there's rosemary and rue; these keep
Seeming and savour all the winter long:
Grace and remembrance be to you both."

Some suppose it to have been called "herb of grace" on account of the many excellent properties it was held to possess, being a specific against poison, the bites of venomous creatures, etc.; but probably it was so called because "rue" means "repent." Cf. also Richard II. Act iii. sc. 4. 105:

"Here in this place
I'll set a bank of rue, sour herb of grace."

[E269] "Bots." "Pease an beanes are as danke here as a dog, and this is the next way to give poor jades the bottes."—Shakspere King Henry IV. Act ii. sc. 1. "Begnawne with bots."—Taming of Shrew, Act iii. sc. 2.

"Sauin." "It is often put into horses' drenches, to helpe to cure them of the bots, and other diseases."—Parkinson, Paradisus, p. 607.

[E270] "Stitchwort," spelt Stich-wurt in Mayer and Wright, Nat. Antiquities, 1857, and given from a thirteenth century MS. as the translation of "Valeriane." Supposed to possess the power of curing a pain or stitch in the sides.—See Gerard's Herbal, 1597, p. 43. Stellaria Holostea, Linn.

[E271] "Woodbine," not a bine that grows in woods, but a creeper that binds or entwines trees, the honeysuckle. A.S. wudu-winde and wudu-bind, from wudu = a tree, and windan, bindan = to entwine. In Shakspere (Mids. Night Dr. Act iv. sc. 1) it seems to mean the bittersweet:

"So doth the woodbine the sweet honeysuckle
Gently entwist."

[E272] "Gregorie." "This day (12th March) seems to have been much used as a date for agricultural observances: cf. 37. 3. In connexion with this it is worth while to note the Suabian saying, 'SÄe Erbsen Gregori' (sow cabbage on St. Gregory's Day). See Swainson's Weather Folklore, p. 168."—Note by Mr. J. Britten, F.L.S.

[E273] "Mastiues and Mungrels." Although the influence of a very patriotic sumptuary tax has diminished the number of dogs, we have still 'thousands too manie.' [This may with truth be said even still.] However, as Lent now makes little difference in the mode of living, which it certainly did in the earlier period of the Reformation, our dogs are not driven by our meagre fare to prey on the lambs; and therefore need not be particularly watched on this account.—M. Mastif is derived from O. Fr. mestif = a mongrel (Cotgrave). In the Craven dialect a great dog is still called a masty. See note E35.

[E274] By "hooke or by crooke" occurs in Spenser, Faery Queene, Bk. v. Canto 2, stanza 27; also in Heywood's Works, 1562, reprint 1867, p. 35.

[E275] No trees appear preferable to willows for fencing hop grounds; and none are said to be worse than elms, as they attract mildews.—M.

[E276] "What better to skilfull," etc., that is, what can be more profitable to the experienced farmer than to know when to be bold, that is, to venture the early sowing of barley?

[E277] The Mayweed (Anthemis cotula) is common in corn-fields and hedgerows. "May-weed or stinking camomile."—T.R. "Resembling cammomil but of a stinking savour and odious to bees." Coles' Dict. 1676.

[E278] Cockle or Cokyl was used by Wycliffe and other old writers in the sense of a weed generally, but in later works has been confined to the gith or corn-pink.

[E279] Our author's meaning is, sow barley, oats and pease above furrows and harrow them in; while rye is best ploughed in with a shallow furrow.

[E280] "Without cost," that is, on which no expense has been incurred.

[E281] Watering is necessary in dry seasons for what is fresh set or planted, but not for what is newly sown.

[E282] It is to be lamented, both on account of the health and the finances of the poor, that they are so much attached, either to solid food, or to watery infusions of tea. Herbs, pulse and roots might often supersede more expensive articles of diet. Spoonmeat, in this part of the island at least, is in no high request at this period, though it appears to have been indispensable formerly.—M.

[E283] "There remaineth yet a third kinde of meats, which is neither fish nor flesh, commonly called white meats, as egges, milk, butter, cheese, which notwithstanding proceede and come of flesh, as egges from the henne, and milk from the cowe. Yet because they are not plainely flesh, they are permitted to be eaten upon the fish daies."—Cogan's Haven of Health, ed. 1612, p. 149.

"But how soeuer this case standeth, white meats, as milke, butter and cheese, which were neuer so deere as in my time, and woont to be accounted of as one of the chiefe staies throughout the Iland, are now reputed as foods appertinent onelie to the inferiour sort, whilest such as are more wealthie, doo feed vpon the flesh of all kinds of cattell accustomed to be eaten, all sorts of fish taken vpon our coasts and in our fresh rivers, and such diuersitie of wild and tame foules as are either bred in our Iland or brought ouer vnto vs from other countries of the maine."—Harrison, Descript. of England, ed. Furnivall, Part I. p. 144. White meats in Lincoln now mean the flesh of lamb, veal, rabbits, chickens, pheasants, etc.

[E284] "Count best the best cheape": "For it doth the buyer more credit and service."—Ray. We still say "Cheap and nasty;" and in the Towneley Mysteries, p. 102, there is the same sentiment:

"Men say lyght chepe
letherly for yeeldys,"

equivalent to our English proverb: "Light cheap, litter yield."

[E285] It is always advisable to pay carpenters their fair wages, without any allowance of chips, which is a great temptation for them to waste timber.—M. In hewing timber, if the workman hews square, the seller of the timber loses all the gain of the Wane edges, which gain in short is a cheat, although a very customary one.—T.R.

[E286] "Within these fortie yeeres we shall haue little great timber growing aboue fortie yeeres old; for it is commonlie seene that those yong staddles which we leaue standing at one and twentie yeeres fall, are vsuallie at the next sale cut downe without any danger of the statute, and serue for fire bote, if it please the owner to burne them."—Harrison, Part I. p. 345. "There is a Statute made, 35 Henry the 8, and the 1 Eliz. for the presentation of timber trees, Oake, Ash, Elme, Aspe, and Beech: and that 12 storers and standils should bee left standing at euery fall, vpon an acre."—Norden's Surveyor's Dialogue, 1607, p. 213. On the decrease in woods, etc., in England, see Harrison's Description of England (New Shakspere Soc. edit. F. J. Furnivall, Part I. p. 344) and Norden's Surveyor's Dialogue, 1607, p. 214, in the latter of which one cause is stated to be the large number of hammers and furnaces for the manufacture of iron, and the quantity of charcoal used in the glass-houses; there being, as he says: "now or lately in Sussex, neere 140 hammers and furnaces for iron, and in it, and Surry adjoyning 3,400 glasse houses: the hammers and furnaces spend, each of them, in every 24 houres 2, 3 or foure loades of charrcoale."—p. 215. "There is a Law in Spaine, that he that cuts down one Tree, shall plant three for it."—A Treatise of Fruit Trees, R. A. Austin, Oxford, 1657, p. 128.

[E287] "Leaue oxen abrode," etc. The Author of Tusser Redivivus is supported in his reading of this line by the edition of 1597, which has "leaue not oxe abrode." The sense, however, may possibly be, "keep oxen at a distance, for fear of injuring the young shoots." "Springe or ympe that commeth out of the rote."—Huloet's Abcedarium, 1552. "Keep from biting, treading underfoot, or damage of beasts ... whereby mischief may be done to the Springs, during the time limited by the statute for such kind of wood."—Brumby Lease, 1716, in Peacock's Glossary, E. Dial. Soc.

[E288] "Meet with a bootie," etc., that is, as we say, find something which was never lost.

[E289] Wanteth = is without, does not keep.

[E290] "Waine her to mee." Perhaps = waggon, that is, "drive, carry her to me," but it is a forced expression.

[E291] "Such maister such man." Another form of the proverb is, "Trim, Tram; like master, like man." "Tel maÎtre, tel valet" (Fr.).

[E292] Compare with Tusser's description of the faults to be avoided in the making of cheese the following extracts on the same subject:

"Now what cheese is well made or otherwise may partly be perceiued by this old Latine verse:

Non nix, non Argos, Methusalem, Magdaleneve,
Esaus, non Lazarus, caseus ille bonus.

That is to say, Cheese should not be white as Snowe is, nor full of eyes as Argos was, nor old as Methusalem was, nor full of whey or weeping as Marie Magdalen was, nor rough as Esau was, nor full of spots as Lazarus. Master Tusser in his Booke of husbandrie addeth other properties also of Cheese well made, which who so listeth may read. Of this sort for the most part is that which is made about Banbury in Oxfordshire: for of all cheese (in my judgement) it is the best, though some preferre Cheshire Cheese made about Nantwich: and other also commend the Cheese of other countries: But Banbury Cheese shall goe for my money: for therein (if it be of the best sort) you shall neither tast the renet nor salt, which be two speciall properties of good Cheese. Now who so is desirous to eate Cheese, must eate it after other meat, and in little quantitie. A pennyweight, according to the old saying, is enough."—Cogan's Haven of Health, ed. 1612, pp. 158-9.

Andrew Boorde, in his Dyetary already referred to, p. 266, mentions 5 kinds of cheese, namely: "grene chese, softe chese, harde chese and spermyse. Besyde these iiij natures of chese, there is a chese called a rewene chese, the whiche, yf it be well orderyd, doth passe all other cheses, none excesse taken." ... "Chese that is good oughte not be to harde nor to softe, but betwyxt both; it shuld not be towgh nor brultell; it ought not to be swete, nor tarte, nor to salt, nor to fresshe; it must be of good savour and taledge, nor full of iyes, nor mytes, nor magottes."

"Yf a chees is drie,
Hit is a vyce, and so is many an eye
Yf it see with, that cometh yf sounyng brendde,
Or moche of salt, or lite of presse, it shende."
—-Palladius on Husbondrie, E. E. Text Soc. ed. Lodge, p. 154.

With these extracts showing the essentials of good cheese, compare the following description of Suffolk Cheese, locally termed Bang and Thump, and made of milk several times skimmed:

"Unrivall'd stands thy county cheese, O Giles!
Whose very name alone engenders smiles;
Whose fame abroad by every tongue is spoke,
The well-known butt of many a flinty joke,
Its name derision and reproach pursue,
And strangers tell of 'three times skimm'd skye blue.'"
—Blomfield.

Its toughness has given rise to a number of local illustrations. In one the cheese exclaims:

"Those that made me were uncivil,
For they made me harder than the devil;
Knives won't cut me; fire won't sweat me;
Dogs bark at me, but can't eat me."

"Hunger will break through stone walls, or anything except Suffolk cheese," is a proverb from Ray. Mowbray says "it is only fit to be cut up for gate latches, a use to which it is often applied." Other writers represent it as most suitable for making wheels for wheelbarrows.

[E293] "Argusses eies." The mythical Argus, surnamed Panoptes (the All-seer), had a hundred eyes; he was placed by Juno to guard Io, and at his death his eyes were transplanted to the peacock's tail.

[E294] To fleet or skim the cream is a verb still in use in East Anglia, and the utensil used for the purpose is termed a fleeting-dish. "I flete mylke, take away the creame that lyeth above it whan it hath rested."—Palsgr. "Esburrer, to fleet the creame potte; laict esburrÉ, fleeted milk; maigne, fleeted milke or whaye."—Hollyband's Treasurie. "Ye floted too nie" = you skimmed off too much of the cream.

[E295] If cheeses are full of eyes, it is a proof that the curd was not properly worked.

[E296] Hoven cheese is occasioned by negligence in breaking the curd; and therefore Cisley deserves to be driven to creeks, or holes and corners, for her idleness and inattention.—M.

[E297] Tough or leathery cheese may arise from its being set too hot, or not worked up, and the curd broken in proper time.—M.

[E298] Various causes may bring on corruption in cheese, such as the use of beastings, or milk immediately after calving, moisture, bruises and such like.

[E299] Hairs in cheese can only arise from inexcusable carelessness, or from Cisley's combing and decking her hair in the dairy.

[E300] Magget the py = the magpie, a pun on the word magget, in its two meanings of 1. a maggot, 2. a magpie, commonly called in Prov. Eng. magot-pie, maggoty-pie, from mag, maggot = Meg, Maggie = Margery, Margaret, and pie; Fr. margot, old dimin. of Marguerite, and common name of the magpie. The line, therefore, reads, "If maggots be crawling in the cheese, fetch magget the py." "Pie, meggatapie."—Cotgrave. Cf. Shakspere, Macbeth, Act iii. sc. 4, 125.

[E301] "Cisley, in running after the Bishop in passing, as was the practice in former times, in order to obtain his blessing, might accidentally leave her milk on the fire; and on her return, finding it burnt to the pan, might probably curse the prelate for her mishap, which conduct deserved correction, or a left-handed blessing from her mistress." So Dr. Mavor. Mr. Skeat remarks in reference to it: "That stupid story makes me cross; it is such an evident invention, and no soul has ever adduced the faintest proof of any such practice. The allusion is far less circuitous, viz. to the bishops who burnt people for heresy. That they did so is too notorious." The following extract appears strongly to bear out Mr. Skeat's view: "When a thynge speadeth not well we borowe speach and say 'the byshope hath blessed it,' because that nothynge speadeth well that they medyll withall. If the podech be burned to, or the meate over rosted, we say 'the byshope has put his fote in the potte,' or 'the byshope hath played the coke,' because the byshopes burn who they lust, and whosoever displeaseth them."—Quotation from Tyndale's Obedyence of a Chrystene Man, 1528, p. 166, in Brockett, North Country Glossary, 1825, page 16. If we consider that these verses were written while the memory of the numbers who had suffered death at the stake for their religion was still fresh in the minds of the people, Mr. Skeat's view, borne out, as it is, by the foregoing extract, certainly appears the more reasonable and probable.

[E302] "Here reede": we may take this as meaning either "here read," or, adopting the older meaning of the word reede (A.S. rÆd = advice, warning), as "hear my advice or warning."

[E303] "Take nothing to halues," that is, do nothing by halves.

[E304] "Tell fagot and billet," etc.; count your faggots and fire-wood, to prevent the boys and girls from pilfering it, so that when you come to fetch it you find "a quarter be gone." So also in the next stanza, watch the coal men filling the sacks, lest you should get short weight; and, when the coals are delivered, see the sacks opened, for fear the coal dealer and the carman should be 'two in a pack,' or 'harp on one string,' and between them you be defrauded.

[E305] "Philip and Jacob," that is, St. Philip and St. James' Day, May 1st. "When flocks were more uniform as to breed and management, lambs used to be separated from their dams on this day, for the purpose of tithing as well as milking."—M. "Requiem Æternam," a portion of the Roman Catholic Service for the dead, hence "least requiem Æternam in winter they sing" = lest they die in the winter from not having been allowed to become sufficiently strong before being taken from their dams, and thus being incapable of enduring the severity of the weather.

[E306] "Barberlie handled," that is, "secundum artem, as a barber surgeon would do, by first cutting away extraneous substances, and then rubbing the part with dust."—M. Tusser Redivivus calls the lumps of dirt and worms which gather on the wool under a sheep's tail "treddles."

[E307] During the summer season, hollow and decayed pollards in particular, or woodsere, cannot be lopped without danger. Ivy, however, is to be removed; or it will, by the closeness of its embraces, prevent trees from addling, that is, growing or increasing in size.—M.

[E308] The Thrasher serves the Cattle with fresh Straw, the Hogs with Risk (offal, corn and weeds, and short knotty straw).—T.R. (May).

[E309] "A weede hooke, a crotch, and a gloue." Fitzherbert (Boke of Husbandry, 1586) enumerates, as "y^e chyef instrumentes for weeding, a paier of tonges made of wood and in the farther end it is nicked to hold ye wede faster ... yf it be drye wether then must ye have a wedying hoke with a socket set upon a lytle staffe a yard longe. And this hoke wolde be wel steled and grounde sharpe bothe behynde and before. And in his other hande he hath a forked stycke a yarde long." The whole account of weeding in the "Boke" is very quaint. In former days thistles were gathered from the corn for the feeding of cattle, and the left hand of the reaper was guarded with a leathern glove: there is an entry among the expenses of the Priory of Holy Island for 1344-5 of "gloves for 14 servants when they gathered the tythe corn, 2s. 8d." See Johnston's "Botany of the Eastern Borders."—Note by Mr. J. Britten, F.L.S.

[E310] "The May weed doth burn" (Anthemis cotula, L.). The juice of this plant is possessed of an acrid blistering property which renders it extremely noxious to reapers. The irritating effects are produced in a still greater degree by the seed when ripe, and are mostly manifested in the lower extremities, from the close adhesion of the seeds by their rough surface, aided by the friction of the shoe, causing first abrasion, then active inflammation, and even ulceration. Dr. Bromfield (Flora Vectensis) says: "I have been repeatedly assured by the peasantry that they have known men incapacitated for work, and laid up, from the injurious operation of this noxious weed, for days together in harvest time."

[E311] "The thistle doth fret." Fitzherbert (Boke of Husbandry) says: "The thystell is an yll wede rough and sharpe to handle, and freateth away the cornes nyghe it."

[E312] "The fitches pul downward." The hairy tare, Vicia hirsuta, L. Fitch = vetch.

[E313] "The cockle," Lychnis Githago, L. "Cockole hath a large smal [sic] leafe and wyll beare v or vi floures purple colloure as brode as a grote, and the sede is rounde and blacke."—Fitzherbert, Boke of Husbandry.

[E314] "Boddle." The corn marigold, Chrysanthemum segetum, L., more usually called boodle or buddle in the East of England; in Kent, yellow bottle; in Scotland, gools, gules, or goolds, in allusion to the colour of the flower. This is a very noxious weed, the non-extirpation of which in Scotland was formerly a punishable offence: certain persons (hence called "gool-riders") were appointed to ride through the fields on a certain day, and impose a fine of three shillings and fourpence, or a wether sheep, for every stalk of the plant found growing in the corn. The custom is of great antiquity, and exists in a modified form at the present day, the fine being reduced to a penny. LinnÆus states that a similar law exists in Denmark.—Note by Mr. J. Britten, F.L.S.

[E315] Buckwheat, Dutch boekweit, Ger. buckwaitzen, from the resemblance of its triangular seeds to beech-nuts, a name adopted with its culture from the Dutch.—It is a tender plant, and must be sown late.—M. It is also very proper to sow it (bucke) before wheat, the ground is made clean and fine by it, and it sufficing itself with a Froth leaves the solid Strength for the Wheat.—T.R. (May). Polygonum Fagopyrum, Linn.

[E316] "Brank" = buckwheat, from a Latin word, brance, that occurs in Pliny lib. xviii. cap. 7, where it seems rather to mean a barley. "GalliÆ quoque suum genus farris dedere, quod illic brance vocant, apud nos sandalam, nitidissimi grani." The word will be identical with blanc, white, Port. branco, and equivalent to wheat, which properly means "white."—Popular Names of British Plants, Dr. R. A. Prior, 1870, p. 28. Pancakes are made of it in Holland.—T.R.

[E317] Pidgeons, Rooks, and other Vermine, about that time begin to be scanted, and will certainly find them [peas] out, be they in never so by a Corner.—T.R. (May).

[E318] Fimble, or Female Hemp, so called, I suppose, because it falls to the Female's share to tew-taw it, that is, to dress it and to spin it, etc. The Fimble Hemp is that which is ripe soonest and fittest for spinning, and is not worth above half as much as the Carle with its seed.—T.R. "The male is called Charle Hempe, and Winter Hempe; the Female Barren Hempe and Sommer Hempe."—Gerard's Herball, p. 572. "Hemp was much cultivated here until the end of the great war with France. The Carl or male hemp was used for ropes, sackcloth, and other coarse manufactures: the fimble, or female hemp, was applied to making sheets and other domestic purposes."—Peacock's Gloss. of Manley, etc., E. D. Soc.

It is curious that the Karl or male hemp should be in reality the female plant, but other authors use the names in the same way. "The femell hempe ... beareth no sede."—Fitzherbert, "Boke of Husbandry." See also 55. 8. Gerard says the female hemp is "barren and without seede, contrarie to the nature of that sexe."—Note by Mr. J. Britten, F.L.S.

[E319] The fact of the Hop being one of the plants which twine from left to right had thus been observed as early as Tusser's time.—Note by Mr. J. Britten, F.L.S.

[E320] The tine tare ["a tare that tines or encloses and imprisons other plants, Vicia hirsuta."—Prior] is now seldom attempted to be raked out, for fear of greater mischief from the practice than from its neglect. The safest way is certainly to cut the tine near the root, but the operation is extremely tedious.—M.

[E321] "The Fawy riseth in Fawy moore in a verie quaue mire, on the side of an hill."—Harrison, ed. 1587, Bk. i. c. 12.

Cf. "The wal wagged and clef, and al the worlde quaved."
—Piers Plowman, ed. Skeat, B Text, Passus xviii. 61.

"Quave of a myre (quaue as of a myre), Labina. Quavyn, as myre, Tremo."—Prompt. Parv. Horman, in his chapter de re edificatoriÂ, observes that "a quauery or a maris and unstable foundation must be holpe with great pylys of alder rammed downe, and with a frame of tymbre called a crossaundre (fistucÂ)." In Caxton's Mirrour of the World, Part II. c. 22, it is said, "understande ye how the erthe quaueth and shaketh, that somme peple calle an erthe quaue, by cause they fele the erthe meue and quaue vnder their feet." "Quaue myre, foundriere crouliere."—Palsgrave. Forby gives Quavery-mavery = undecided, hesitating.—Way, Note in Prompt. Parv., s.v. Quave.

[E322] The meaning is, make your dunghill on the headland, especially where shaded with trees and bushes, as they will prevent the moisture from exhaling.—M.

"I see in some meddowes gaully places where little or no grasse at al groweth, by reason (as I take it) of the too long standing of the water, for such places are commonly low, where the water standeth, not hauing vent to passe away, and therefore meanes must be first made for the evacuation of the water: for the continual standing of the water consumeth the grasse, and makes the place bare, and sinketh it. In such a place, therefore, sow in the Spring-time some hay-seed, especially the seed of the claver grasse [clover], or the grasse hony-suckle [trefoil], and other seeds that fall out of the finest and purest hay: and in the sowing of it, mingle with it some good earth; but sow not the hony-suckle grasse in too moist a ground, for it liketh it not."—Norden's Surveyor's Dialogue, 1607, pp. 201-2. Gauls are void spaces in Coppices which serve for nothing but to entice the Cattel into it, to its great Damage.—T.R.

[E323] If the land is overstocked in summer, you may, perhaps, be obliged to assist your cattle to rise in winter; or, in other words, "to lift at their tails."—M. Cf. 21. 14.

[E324] It appears to have been the custom formerly to allow, in warm weather, sleep for an hour or two. In Norfolk we are told the practice is not quite obsolete on churning days when the mistress and maids get up early; and likewise among the ploughmen, where two journies a day are performed with their teams, and an interval allowed for rest.—M. Compare the expression in the Paston Letters, i. 390, "Writan in my slepyng tyme at after none, on Wytsonday."

[E325] "Patch." Cf. Shakspere, Mid. Night's Dr., Act iii. sc. 2; and Merchant of Venice, Act ii. sc. 5.

[E326] "Growthed" = grout-hed = thick head, fat head. Cf. growtnoul = a blockhead. "Growte nowle come to the King."—Promos and Cassandra, p. 81.

[E327] Stilling, or distilling, may be a "pretty feat," but we doubt if it is very profitable, and if it does not furnish a temptation to dram-drinking, under the mask of simple and medicinal waters.—M.

[E328] See note E69.

[E329] "Swinge brembles and brakes," this is, cut down with a sweeping instrument somewhat resembling a scythe.

[E330] "Sheep-shearing takes place only once, viz. in the month of June; the heaviest wethers weigh sixty pounds, others from forty to fifty pounds: they bear at the most not more than six, others four or five pounds of wool; one of the best wethers (notwithstanding that they are very abundant) sells for about twenty shillings, that is, ten French francs or five thalers; the inferior sort about ten shillings, or five francs; and the worst about six or eight English shillings. The skin of the best wether and sheep is worth about twelve pence, that is, four and a half German batzen; the worst about eight pence or three batzen; a pound of wool about twelve pence, or four and a half batzen."—Rathgeb, 1602, Rye, p. 51 (quoted in Harrison's Description of England, ed. Furnivall, Part I. p. lxxxiii). "Running Water is best, ... but then it is oft-times very sheer and cold."—T.R. (June).

[E332] "The Pie will discharge thee," etc., that is, the magpie will save you the trouble, etc., alluding to birds eating vermin on sheep's backs.

[E333] "Ouercome" = overtake, or keep up with; don't mow more than you can easily make, not too much at once, lest part of it be spoiled for want of hands.

[E334] "Cock apace." Cf. Piers Plowman, C. Text, Passus vi. 12, 13 (ed. Skeat).

"Canstow seruen, he seide, oÞer syngen in a churche,
OÞer coke for my cokers, oÞer to Þe cart picche?"

i.e. put hay into cocks for my harvest men. Mr. Skeat quotes in his note to this passage: "Bee it also prouided, that this act, nor anything therein contained, doe in any wise extende to any cockers or haruest folkes that trauaile into anie countrie of this realme for haruest worke, either corne haruest, or hay haruest, if they doe worke and labour accordingly."—Rastall, Statutes; Vagabonds, etc., p. 474.

[E335] To employ your labourers in ploughing, or in performing other parts of husbandry, till the dew is off the grass, is unquestionably a saving of time, and essentially forwards the business of the farm.—M.

[E336] He who is constantly borrowing tools and other things which he ought to have of his own, lays himself under obligation to the lender, who expects twice as much in return.

[E337] "Woodsere" here means the proper season for felling wood.

[E338] "Fieing." "Feigh, Fey, vb. to clean out a drain, gutter or cesspool. 'Paid to John Lavghton in haruest for feighinge the milne becke.'—Kirton in Lindsey Ch. Acc. 1582. George Todd's feyin' out the sink hole."—Peacock's Glossary, E. Dial. Soc. 1877. To fey a ditch or pond is to empty and clean it; and the mud taken from such places, if mixed with lime or chalk, forms an excellent compost for pasture grounds.—M. Cf. Icel. fÆgja, to cleanse, whence our word is derived.

[E339] "Of late yeares also we haue found and taken vp a great trade in planting of hops, whereof our moorie hitherto and vnprofitable grounds doo yeeld such plentie and increase that there are few farmers or occupiers in the countrie, which haue not gardens and hops growing of their owne, and those farre better than doo come from Flanders vnto vs. Certes the corruptions vsed by the Flemings, and forgerie dailie practised in this kind of ware, gaue vs occasion to plant them here at home; so that now we may spare and send manie ouer vnto them. And this I know by experience that some one man by conuersion of his moorie grounds into hopyards, wherof before he had no commoditie, dooth raise yearelie by so little as twelue acres in compasse two hundred markes; all charges borne toward the maintenance of his familie. Which Industrie God continue! Though some secret freends of Flemings let not to exclaime against this commoditie, as a spoile of wood, by reason of the poles, which neuerthelesse after three yeares doo also come to the fire, and spare their other fewell."—Harrison, Descript. of Eng., 1587, p. 206. "Lowe and spungie grounds trenched is good for hopps, as Suffolke, Essex, and Surrie, and other places doe find to their profit."—Norden, p. 206. Evelyn, Sylva, pp. 201, 469, ed. Hunter, asserts that there was a petition against them temp. Henry VI., but no record of it appears on the rolls of Parliament. Brewing with hops was not introduced here till the reign of King Henry VIII. (Stow, Hist. p. 1038.) Bere, however, is mentioned in 1504. (Leland, Coll. vi. p. 30, and see Dr. Percy on Northumberland Book, p. 414.)—Pegge's Forme of Cury, ed. 1780, p. xxiii. See a long note in Prompt. Parv., s.v. Hoppe; and also "Pharmacographia," p. 496.

[E340] For wanting at will = for fear of having none when you really want it.

[E341] Hay for neat cattle may be made with less labour, and more expeditiously than for horses; because, if it is a little mow burnt, it will not be the less acceptable to them; and besides, the fermentation it undergoes, if not carried too far, has a natural tendency to mellow coarse grass.—M.

[E342] Avise auouse is French jargon for take precautions. Ill-made hay is apt to take fire; if much wetted with rain, to become mouldy. Hard and fine hay is best for horses; soft and coarse hay will be more acceptable to cattle; while short hay is coveted by sheep.—M.

[E343] Thry fallowing, or the third plowing, should be performed pretty early in the summer, in order that the ground may acquire sufficient hardness to resist the seeds of thistles and other weeds, even at the risk of requiring another stirring.—M.

[E344] This can only refer to garden beans, but the practice is now obsolete.

[E345] See note E318.

[E346] "Wormwood, a word corrupted from A.S. wermod, Ger. wermuth, O.S. weremede, words which seem to be compounded with Ger. wehren, A.S. werian = to keep off, and mod or made = maggot, but which, by an accidental coincidence of sound, have been understood as though the first syllable were worm. L. Diefenbach would prefer to derive it from a Celtic root that means "bitter," Welsh chwerw, Cornish wherow. Be its origin what it may, it was understood in the Middle Ages as meaning a herb obnoxious to maggots, and used to preserve things from them, and was also given as an anthelmintic or worm medicine. Artemisia Absinthium, L."—Dr. R. A. Prior, Pop. Names of Brit. Plants. "Two sorts of Wormewood are well knowen of many, that is, our common Wormewood, and that which is called Ponticum, now sowen in many gardens, and commonly called French-wormewood. And while it is yong, it is eaten in Salats with other herbes, to the great commoditie of the stomacke and Liuer. For it strengthneth a weake stomacke, and openeth the Liuer and Splene. For which purpose there is to be had in the Stilliard at London a kind of wine named Worme-wood wine, which I would wish to be much used of all such Students as be weake of stomacke. They may easily haue a rundlet of three or foure gallons or lesse, which they may draw within their owne chambers as need requireth. I was woont when appetite failed to steepe a branch or two of common Wormewood in halfe a pint of good white wine, close couered in some pot all night, and in the morning to straine it through a clean linnen cloth, and put in a little sugar and warme it, and so drinke it. Or sometime to burne a little quantitie of wine with sugar, and a branch or two of Wormewood put into it. Wherein I have found many times marvellous commoditie, and who so shall vse it now and then, shal be sure of a good stomacke to meat, and be free from wormes."—Cogan's Haven of Health, p. 55. "Wormwood, centaury, pennyroyal, are likewise magnified and much prescribed, especially in hypochondrian melancholy, daily to be used, sod in whey."—Burton, Anat. of Melancholy, p. 432.

[E347] "As many doo more," i.e. as many others do. Cf. 63. 18.

[E348] There is a proverb: "One scabb'd sheep's enough to spoil a flock."

[E349] In Lincolnshire corn affected by the smut is called Parson corn, the reason assigned being that when tithes were paid in kind, the sheaves that had the most smuts in them were always given to the parson, if he could be seduced into taking them.—See Peacock's Gloss. of Manley, etc., E. Dial. Soc. 1877.

[E350] Mow-burn is occasioned by the Hay being stack'd too soon, before its own juice is thoroughly dried, and by Norfolk people is called the Red Raw; not such as is occasioned by stacking it when wet with Rain, which is a nasty musty and stinks.—T.R.

[E351] Hentzner, p. 79 (quoted in Harrison's Description of England, ed. F. J. Furnivall, p. lxxxiv), says: "As we were returning to our inn (at Windsor, Sept. 14), we happened to meet some country people celebrating their Harvest-home; their last load of corn they crown with flowers, having besides an image richly dressed, by which, perhaps, they would signify Ceres; this they keep moving about, while men and women, men and maid servants, riding through the streets in the cart, shout as loud as they can till they arrive at the barn."

[E352]

"Tis merie in hall,
When beards wag all."

This proverb is of great antiquity. It occurs in the Life of Alexander (formerly, but erroneously, attributed to Adam Davie), written in 1312, where the words are:

"Swithe mury hit is in halle,
When burdes wawen alle."
—Weber's Met. Rom.

It occurs also in Shakspere, 2 Henry IV. Act v. sc. 3, and is quoted in the Merie Tales of Skelton, 1567. See also Ray's Proverbs.

[E353] "For Mihelmas spring," that is, "for fear of injuring the young plants, etc., at Michaelmas."

[E354] In Harrison's Descript. of England, Part II. p. 50 et seq., there is a long chapter on the cultivation and uses of Saffron in England, from which I extract the following: "As the Saffron of England, which Platina reckneth among spices, is the most excellent of all other; for it giueth place neither to that of Cilicia, whereof Solinus speaketh, neither to anie that commeth from Cilicia, where it groweth upon the mount Taurus, Tmolus, Italie, Ætolia, Sicilia or Licia, in sweetnesse, tincture and continuance; so of that which is to be had amongst us, the same that grows about Saffron Walden, somtime called Waldenburg, in the edge of Essex, first of all planted there in the time of Edward the Third, and that of Glocestershire and those westerlie parts, which some thinke to be better than those of Walden, surmounteth all the rest, and therefore beareth worthilie the higher price, by sixpence or twelue pence most commonlie in the pound.... The heads of saffron are raised in Julie, either with plough, raising or tined hooke; and being scowred from their rosse or filth, and seuered from such heads as are ingendred of them since the last setting, they are interred againe in Julie and August by ranks or rowes, and being couered with moulds, they rest in the earth, where they cast forth little fillets and small roots like vnto a scallion, until September, in the beginning of which moneth the ground is pared and all weeds and grasse that groweth vpon the same remooved, to the intent that nothing may annoie the floure when as his time dooth come to rise. These things being thus ordered in the latter end of the aforesaid moneth [of September], the floure beginneth to appeere of a whitish blew, fesse, or skie colour, and in the end shewing itselfe in the owne kind, it resembleth almost the Leucotion of Theophrast, sauing that it is longer, and hath in the middest thereof three chines verie red and pleasant to behold. These floures are gathered in the morning before the rising of the sunne, which otherwise would cause them to welke or flitter. And the chines being picked from the floures, these are throwne into the doong-hill; the other dried vpon little kelles couered with streined canuasses vpon a soft fire; wherby and by the weight that is laied vpon them, they are dried and pressed into cakes, and then bagged vp for the benefit of their owners. In good yeeres we gather foure score or an hundred pounds of wet saffron of an acre, which being dried dooth yeeld twentie pounds of drie and more. Whereby, and sith the price of saffron is commonlie about twentie shillings in monie, or not so little, it is easie to see what benefit is reaped by an acre of this commoditie.... For admit that the triple tillage of an acre dooth cost 13 shillings foure pence before the saffron be set, the clodding sixteene pence, the taking of euerie load of stones from the same foure pence, the raising of euerie quarter of heads six pence, and so much for cleansing of them, besides the doong which is woorth six pence the load to be laid on the first yeere, for the setting three and twentie shillings and foure pence, for the paring fiue shillings, six pence for the picking of a pound wet, etc.; yea though he hire it readie set, and paie ten pounds for the same, yet shall he susteine no damage, if warme weather and open season doo happen at the gathering." Harrison then describes fully the culture of saffron, and the adulterations and tricks practised by the dealers, and afterwards describes the virtues of it: "Our saffron (beside the manifold vse that it hath in the kitchin and pastrie, also in our cakes at bridals, and thanksgivings of women) is verie profitably mingled with those medicines which we take for the diseases of the breast, of the lungs, of the liuer, and of the bladder; it is good also for the stomach if you take it in meat, for it comforteth the same, and maketh good digestion: being sodden also in wine, it not onelie keepeth a man from dronkennesse, but incorageth also unto procreation of issue. If you drinke it in sweet wine, it inlargeth the breath, and is good for those that are troubled with the tisike and shortnesse of the wind: mingled with the milke of a woman, and laied vpon the eies, it staieth such humors as descend into the same, and taketh away the red wheales and pearles that oft grow about them: it killeth moths if it be sowed in paper bags verie thin, and laid vp in presses among tapistrie or apparrell: also it is verie profitable laid vnto all inflammations, painefull aposthumes, and the shingles, and doth no small ease vnto deafnes.... Three drams thereof taken at once, which is about the weight of one shilling nine pence halfe penie, is deadlie poison."

[E355] "The two S. Maries daies," i.e. July 22nd, St. Mary Magdalene's Day, and August 15th, the feast of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary.—M. Mr. Skeat suggests that the days meant are August 15th and September 8th, the Nativity of the Virgin Mary.

There is no doubt Mr. Skeat is right; compare "Centory must be gotten betweene our Lady dayes."—Langham's Garden of Health. The date is not uncommon in Herbals.—Note by Mr. J. Britten, F.L.S.

[E356] Mustard-seed is very apt to shed, and therefore should be gathered before it becomes too ripe. After dressing it is to be laid in a soller or garret. "Soller, a lofte, garnier."—Palsgrave. "Garytte, hay solere."—Prompt. Parv.

[E357] Though all the editions which I have seen read as printed in the text, it is evident that Tusser meant exactly the opposite, viz.:

"By day will deceiue thee, etc.
By great will dispatch, etc."

Men who take work by the great, that is, by the job or contract, are, as experience tells us, naturally anxious to get the work done as soon as possible, while those who are engaged by the day as naturally try to spin out the work as long as they can. According to Carr's Craven Glossary, a Day-work is three roods of land. "Four perches make a day-worke; ten daysworks make a roode or quarter." (Twysden MS. quoted by Halliwell.) The latter agrees with Norden's statement: "You must know (says he), that there goe 160 perches to one acre; 80 perches to halfe an acre; 40 perches to one roode, which is ¼ of an acre; ten daies worke to a roode, foure perches to a daies worke; 16 foote and a halfe to a perche." (Surveior's Dialogue, 1610.) In Cowel's Interpreter we read "Day-werc of Land, as much arable ground as could be ploughed up in one day's work, or one journey, as the farmers still call it."

[E358] "Harvest lord," the principal reaper who goes first and regulates the movements of the rest; Harvest-Lady, the second reaper in the row, called in Cambridgeshire the Harvest-Queen. The rate at which the Harvest-lord reaped of course regulated that of the others, and therefore Tusser recommends that he should have a penny or two extra in order to encourage him to have an eye to the loiterers, and to keep all up to the mark. Cf.:

"At heighe pryme Peres lete the plowe stonde,
To ouersen hem hymself, and who-so best wrou?te
He shulde be huyred therafter whan heruest tyme come."
—Piers Plowman, ed. Skeat, E. E. Text Soc. B Text, Passus vi. 114.

The following particulars as to the farmer's expenses at harvest time are quoted by Mr. Skeat in his notes to Piers Plowman, C. Text, Passus ix. 104, from Sir J. Cullum's Hist. of Hawsted, Suffolk, 2nd ed.: "The outgoings [in harvest] were called the costs of autumn, and are thus stated. In 1388, [we find] the expences of a ploughman, head reaper, baker, cook, brewer, deye, 244½ reapers (sic) hired for 1 day; 30 bedrepes (days of work performed in harvest-time by the customary tenants, at the bidding of their lord), the men [being] fed, according to custom, with bread and herring; 3 qrs. 3 bu. of wheat from the stock; 5 qrs. 3 bu. of malt from the stock; meat bought, 10s. 10d.; 5 sheep from the stock; fish and herrings bought, 5s.; herrings bought for the customary tenants, 7d.; cheese, milk, and butter bought (the dairy being let), 9s. 6d.; salt, 3d.; candles, 5d.; pepper, 3d.; spoons, dishes, and faucets, 5d. 30 bedrepes, as before; 19 reapers, hired for 1 day, at their own board, 4d. each; 80 men, for 1 day, and kept at the lady's board, 4d. each: 40½ men (sic) hired for 1 day, at 3d. each; the wages of the head reaper, 6s. 8d.; of the brewer, 3s. 4d.; of the cook, 3s. 4d. 30 acres of oats tied up by the job (per taskam), 1s. 8d.; 6 acres of bolymong cut and tied up by the job, 3s. 4d.; 16 acres of pease, cut by the job, 8s.; 5 acres of pease and bolymong, cut and tied up by the job, 2s. 6d.; 3 acres of wheat, cut and tied up by the job, 1s. 11d." [Here follow similar details for 1389, including a mention of 5 pairs of harvest-gloves, 10d.] "What a scene of bustling industry was this! for, exclusive of the baker, cook, and brewer, who, we may presume, were fully engaged in their own offices, here were 553 persons employed in the first year; in the second, 520; and in a third, 538; yet the annual number of acres, of all sorts of corn, did not much exceed 200. From this prodigious number of hands, the whole business must have been soon finished. There were probably 2 principal days; for two large parties were hired, every year, for 1 day each.... These ancient harvest-days must have exhibited one of the most cheerful spectacles in the world. One can hardly imagine a more animated scene than that of between 200 and 300 harvest-people all busily employed at once, and enlivened with the expectation of a festivity, which perhaps they experienced but this one season in the year. All the inhabitants of the village, of both sexes, and all ages, that could work, must have been assembled on the occasion; a muster that, in the present state of things, would be impossible. The success of thus compressing so much business into so short a time must have depended on the weather. But dispatch seems to have been the plan of agriculture at this time, at least in this village. We have seen before, that 60 persons were hired for 1 day, to weed the corn. These throngs of harvest-people were superintended by a person who was called the head-reaper (supermessor or prÆpositus), who was annually elected, and presented to the lord, by the inhabitants; and it should seem that, in this village at least, he was always one of the customary tenants. The year he was in office, he was exempt from all or half of his usual rents and services, according to his tenure; he was to have his victuals and drink at the lord's table, if the lord kept house (si dominus hospitium tenuerit); if he did not, he was to have a livery of corn, as other domestics had; and his horse was to be kept in the manor-stable. He was next in dignity to the steward and bailiff. The hay-harvest was an affair of no great importance. There were but 30 acres of grass annually mown at this period. This was done or paid for by the customary tenants. The price of mowing an acre was 6d."

By an "Assessment of the Corporation of Canterbury," made in 1594, the following were the rates of wages declared payable:—"Every labourer from Easter to Michaelmas, with meat and drink, 4d. per day; finding himself, 10d.; and from Michaelmas to Easter, with meat and drink, 4d.; without, 8d. Mowers per day, with meat and drink, 8d.; finding themselves, 14d. By the acre, with meat and drink, 4d.; without, 8d. Reapers per day, with meat and drink, 6d.; finding themselves, 12d.; by the acre, with meat and drink, 14d.; without, 28d. Plashing and teeming of a quick hedge, 2d. per rod. Laying upon the band and binding and copping of oats, 8d., barley, 10d. Threshers by the quarter with meat and drink, for the quarter and making clean of wheat and rye, 5d., oats and barley, 3d.; without meat and drink, for the quarter and making clean of wheat and rye, 12d., oats and barley, 6d. Making talewood, the load, 4d.; billets, per 1000, 12d. A bailiff, with livery, £3 per annum; without livery, £3 6s. 8d."—Hasted's Antiquities of Canterbury, 1801, vol. ii. Appendix.

[E359] "Larges," "usually a shilling" (says Major Moor in his Suffolk Glossary). "For this the reapers will ask you if you 'chuse to have it hallered.' If answered, yes, they assemble in a ring, holding each other's hands, and inclining their heads to the centre. One of them, detached a few yards apart, calls loudly, thrice, 'Holla Lar!—Holla Lar!—Holla Lar!—j e e s.' Those in the ring lengthen out o-o-o-o with a low sonorous note and inclined heads, and then throwing the head up, vociferate 'a-a-a-ah.' This thrice repeated for a shilling is the established exchange in Suffolk." "Largesse bounty, handfuls of money cast among the people."—Cotgrave. "Crye a larges when a rewarde is geven to workemen, stipem vociferare."—Huloet's Dict. 1552. The phrase "crie a largesse" occurs in Piers Plowman, B Text, xiii. 449. As to the gloves given to harvest-men see above and note E309.

[E360] Though barley is generally mown, it is a slovenly practice, unless when performed with a cradle scythe.—M. See note E87.

[E361] "Dallops," patches of barley which have run to straw.—M.

[E362] Tidie means neat, proper, and in season.—M.

[E363] "There finding a smack," i.e. finding a pleasant repast.

[E364] "Doo perish," i.e. cause to perish, ruin: the use of "do" in this sense is very common in Early English.

[E365] "Lengthen" here is equivalent to increase the extent or produce of.

[E366] "Fill out the black boule," etc. I am quite unable to explain this line; the "boule of bleith" is evidently the "merry bowl," but the epithet black I do not understand.

[E367] "Thrifts ladder may clime," i.e. may prosper. Cf. ch. 9.

[E368] "That many doo hate," in edd. of 1573, 1580, 1585, etc., the reading is "as many do hate."

[E369] "Ling perhaps looks for great extolling, being counted the beefe of the sea, and standing every fish-day (as a cold supporter) at my Lord Maior's table: yet it is nothing but a long cod: whereof the greater sised is called Organe Ling, and the other Codling, because it is no longer then a Cod, and yet hath the taste of Ling: whilst it is new it is called green-fish: when it is salted it is called Ling, perhaps of lying, because the longer it lyeth ... the better it is, waxing in the end as yellow as a gold noble, at which time they are worth a noble a piece."—Muffett, pp. 154-5, quoted in the Babees Book, ed. Furnivall.

[E370] The following prices of various articles in Suffolk will be interesting:—1566. A lode of straw IIIIs.—1582. A capon VId.; a calfe Vs.; a firkin of butter VIIs. VIId.; a capon and a pullet VId.; a cocke (to fight) IIIId. (5 cockes bought to fight); a pullett IIId. 5 pullets, 5 capons, 5 cockes, 1 calfe, were provided on the reckninge day and "these are allowed in the Churchwardens' accompte to be paide by them."—1590. To Coke for IIII combes of w otes whh he served to the Quene VIs. VIIId.; 14 rod of ditching cost Vs. IIIId.—1596. Makinge a surplis for the church was IId.; a payer of hoose was XIId. another XIIId.; makyng this boke of accts (a single sheet written on two sides) VId.—1599. Three days work ditchynge 2s.; a hard day's work was therefore 8d. per day, and a usual day's 4d. or 6d.; three days thatchinge (Thos. Garrarde) IIs. IIIId.; wode was IIs. the lode.—1587 or 8. A capon vid.; a calfe vs.; a firkin of butter viis. viiid.; two capons and one pullett vid.; a cocke iiiid.; one cocke and one pullett vid.; one pullett iiid.—1583 No. 5. One short spurred cocke iid.; one chycken iid.; one hene iid.—1583 No. 4. Fower combes and too bushell of ottes at ivs. ivd. the combe; thre henes att thre pence a pece; bowes and arrowes IIIId.; ten milch kine 30s. each; seven bullocks 7s. each; six calves 5s. each; six horses together £7; one acre of wheat, xxs.; one acre of Bullimong land 33s. 4d.; a new carte £11; a porkling 28d.

Increased facilities of communication, and the numerous means that farmers now possess, through the press, of obtaining information as to prices of produce, etc., render riding about almost unnecessary.

[E371] Tusser again sets out the advantages of ready money transactions, and of keeping touch, that is, punctuality and faithful regard to engagements. He buys at first hand who pays ready money from his own pocket; at second hand who pays ready money, but who, in order to enable him to do so, has to borrow a portion of the amount, because he has not so much money as he requires with him; at third hand who buys on credit.

[E372] "Stourbridge or Sturbich, the name of a common field extending between Chesterton and Cambridge, near the little brook Sture, for about half a mile square, is noted for its fair which is kept annually on September 19th, and continues a fortnight. It is surpassed by few fairs in Great Britain, or even in Europe, for traffic, though of late it is much lessened. The booths are placed in rows like streets, by the name[s] of which they are called, as Cheapside, etc., and are filled with all sorts of trades. The Duddery, an area of 80 or 100 yards square, resembles Blackwell Hall. Large commissions are negotiated here for all parts of England in cheese, woolen goods, wool, leather, hops, upholsterers' and ironmongers' ware, etc., etc. Sometimes 50 hackney coaches from London, ply morning and night, to and from Cambridge, as well as all the towns around, and the very barns and stables are turned into inns for the accommodation of the poorer people. After the wholesale business is over, the country gentry generally flock in, laying out their money in stage-plays, taverns, music-houses, toys, puppet-shows, etc., and the whole concludes with a day for the sale of horses. This fair is under the jurisdiction of the University of Cambridge."—Walker's Gazetteer, ed. 1801. See also index to Brand's Antiquities.

Camden says it was anciently called Steresbrigg, from the little river Stere or Sture that runs by it (in his Britannia, under Cambridgeshire). There have been many guesses at the name and origin of this fair, e.g. that of Fuller in his History of the University, p. 66, concerning the clothier of Kendal. The truth of the matter is this: King John granted Sturbridge fair for the benefit of the hospital of lepers which stood there (v. decretum Hubert. Arch. Cantuar. in Concil. Londinen. An. 1200. Regn. Johann.; Spelman, ii. 127): in the certificatorium we are told that the keeper of the hospital holds twenty-four and a half acres of land in the county of Cambridgeshire to maintain these lepers. The Vice Chancellor has the same power in this fair that he has in the town of Cambridge. The University is always to have ground assigned for a booth by the mayor. Midsummer Fair was granted to the Prior and Convent of Barnwell, for much the same reason that Sturbridge was to the Lepers,—ad eorum sustentationem. In the reign of Henry the Sixth the Nuns of St. Radegund had the grant of Garlick Fair for the same reason.

"Sturbridge Fair was formerly proclaimed by both the Corporation and the University authorities. Originally lasting six weeks, in 1785 it lasted only three weeks, and now it lasts but one week. A very amusing account of its proclamation by the Vice Chancellor will be found in Gunning's 'Reminiscences of Cambridge.'"—S. N. in Notes and Queries, Aug. 25, 1877.

"When th' fair is done, I to the Colledg come,
Or else I drinke with them at Trompington,
Craving their more acquaintance with my heart,
Till our next Sturbridg Fair; and so wee part."
—Brathwaite's Honest Ghost, 1658, p. 189.

[E373] "When it [the malt] hath gone, or beene turned, so long [21 days] vpon the floore, they carrie it to a kill, couered with haire cloth, where they giue it gentle heats (after they haue spread it there verie thin abroad) till it be drie, and in the meane while they turne it often, that it may be vniformelie dried."—Harrison, Description of England, ed. F. J. Furnivall, Part I. p. 156.

[E374] Cf. September's Husbandry, ch. 16 st. 1.

[E375] One part in ten is far below the present average value of land. If the whole produce will clear four rents, the industrious farmer would have no reason to complain, though he is now subject to heavy taxes, which, it is to be remarked are not included in the list of outgoings.—M.

[E376] "Well fare the plough." On a flyleaf of a MS. of Piers Plowman (MS. R. 3, 14, in Trinity Coll. Camb.) is written,

"God spede the plou?
& sende vs korne I-now."

See print in beginning of Wright's ed. of Piers Plowman.

[E377] The advice given in this short piece, the most difficult, perhaps, that Tusser had written, is very good, but he has strained alliteration to an extravagant pitch.

[E378] In the reign of Elizabeth an Act was passed, requiring a seven years' apprenticeship to enable a person to set up in business or trade; and hence the idea arose of dividing human life into periods of seven years.—M. The idea is much older; for, in Arnold's Chronicle (edition 1811), page 157, we find:—"The vij Ages of Ma liuing i the World. The furst age is infance and lastith from y^e byrth vnto vij yere of age. The ij is childhod and endurith vnto xv yere age. The iij age is adholocencye and endurith vnto xxv yere age. The iiij age is youth and endurith vnto xxxv yere age. The v age is manhod and endurith vnto l yere age. The vj age is [elde] and lasteth vnto lxx yere age. The vij age of ma is crepill and endurith vnto dethe."

See Prompt. Parv. p. 7, for another version of the above, the limits assigned to the several stages being different, and the seventh stage beginning at the resurrection.

[E379] "Foxe, Ape with his toieng," etc. Dr. Mavor's edition reads, "For Ape with his toieng," etc.

[E380] "The tone from the tother;" the tone = that one, the tother = that other; where the t is the sign of the neuter gender, as in tha-t, i-t; compare the Latin d in i-d, quo-d, illu-d.—In ch. 110, p. 201, we have the curious forms "thon" and "thother."

[E381] "To him and to hur," that is, to every one, or to any one. Cf. 94. 3, and

"The white lambe Þat hurte was with the spere
Flemere of feendes out of hym and here."
—Chaucer, Man of Law's Tale, l. 460, Six-Text ed.

[E382] "Daieth" = dayeth, that is, appoints a day on which he promises to pay.

Gervase Markham, in the First Part of the English Husbandman, ch. 6, remarks:—"You may by these usuall observations, and the helpe of a better judgement, imploy the fruits of your labours to the best profit, and sell everything at the highest price, except you take upon you to give day and sell upon trust, which if you doe, you may then sell at what unconscionable reckoning you will." Cf.

"When drapers draw no gaines by giving day."
—Gascoigne, The Steel Glass, 1094.

[E383] "By that and by this;" that is, by anything, or by chance. Compare stanza 6, and chap. 67, stanza 5, p. 153.

[E384] "A tode with an R" is an elegant euphemism for torde; the meaning being that a bad husbandman is more likely to receive insults and refusals, than compliance with his requests. Compare Wycliffe's translation of Luke xiii. 8, as given at p. 365 of Dr. Bosworth's edit. of the Gothic and Anglo-Saxon Gospels, with the Versions of Wycliffe and Tyndale, London, 1865.

[E385] "Experience should seeme to proue playnely, that Inclosures should be profitable and not hurtfull to the common weale; for we see the countryes where most Inclosiers be, are most wealthy, as Essex, Kent, Northamptonshyre, etc. And I have hearde a Ciuilian once say, that it was taken for a Maxime in his lawe (this saying), 'that which is possessed of many in common, is neglected of all;' and experience sheweth that Tenaunts in common be not so good husbandes, as when euery man hath his parte in seueralty; also, I have heard say, that in the most countreyes beyonde the Sea, they knowe not what a common grounde meaneth."—Stafford's Examination of Complaints, New Shakspere Soc., ed. Furnivall, p. 40.

[E386] Fitzherbert shows how a township that is worth twenty marks a-year may be made worth £20, and the ground-work of his plan is to enclose the land. "By enclosing," he says, "a farmer shall save meat, drink, and wages of a shepherd; the wages of the swineherd, the which may fortune to be as chargeable as his whole rent; and also his corn shall be better saved from eating or destroying by cattle."

[E388] Courts for presenting nuisances are generally the greatest nuisances themselves. Under the semblance of justice, they often retard its execution. The members, or jury who compose them, do not want the power, but they want the independence to act right.—M.

[E389] "In Bridewell a number be stript," etc. Although all the editions I have been able to examine read "lesse worthie than theefe to be whipt," I suspect the correct reading to be "lesse worthie than theese to be whipt." The mistake might easily occur through the similarity of the old s and f. The meaning, as the lines read at present, is not very clear, but if we adopt the suggested reading, the sense becomes at once apparent:—"In Bridewell many are stripped for flogging who do not deserve it so much as these."

[E390] "Take them" = arrest them.

[E391] "Mo," lit. = more; but also used in the sense of others. "This use of mo is not common, but there are a few examples of it. Thus in Specimens of English, ed. Morris and Skeat, we have at p. 47, l. 51,

"Y sike for vnsete
Ant mourne ase men doÞ mo."

i.e. 'I sigh for unrest, and mourn as other men do.' And on the next page (48, l. 22) we have

'Mody meneÞ so doÞ mo,
Ichot ycham on of Þo,'

i.e. 'The moody moan as others do; I wot I am one of them.' Somewhat similar is the expression oÞer mo, where we should now say others as well, Piers Plowman, C. Text, Passus v. 10."—Rev. W. Skeat, in note to l. 1039 of Chaucer, Clerke's Tale, Clarendon Press Series. Mo is also used in the same sense in 67, 11, p. 154.

[E392] "Verlets," originally a servant to a knight, below page or squire, though often used in French Romance as equivalent to a squire. "Pages, varlets, ou damoiseaux: noms quelquefois communs aux ecuyers."—Cotgrave. Ducange (Gloss. M. et I. Lat.) has: "Valeti valecti appellati vulgo magnatum filii, qui necdum militare cingulum consecuti erant: vassallorum filii vassaleti dicti." Levins (Manip. Vocab.) says: "Varlett, verna." See Wedgwood, Dict. Eng. Etymology, s.v. Valet.

[E393] "Ruleth the roste;" to rule the roast is to preside at the board, to assign what share one pleases to the guests; hence it came to mean to domineer, in which sense it is commonly used in our old authors. See Nares, s.v.

[E394] With this description of an envious neighbour compare Langland's picture of Invidia (Envy) in Piers Plowman, B. Text, E. E. Text Soc., ed. Skeat, Passus v. l. 76.

[E395] "His hatred procureth," etc., his hatred takes pains to bring bad to worse, his friendship is like that of Judas who, etc., i.e. is selfish.

[E396] "His lips out of frame," i.e. are out of order, are not kept in order. Cf. the expression "loose in the haft."

[E397] "Spials;" so Spenser, Faery Queene, i. 4:

"And privie spials plast in all his way,"

Levins (Manip. Vocab.) has "Spyall, arbiter."

[E398] "Would'st thou not be glad to have the niggardly rascally sheepbiter come by some notable shame."—Shakspere, Twelfth Night, Act ii. sc. 5.

"Who is in this closet? let me see (breaks it open). Oh, sheepbiter, are you here?"—Shadwell, Bury Fair, 1689.

[E399] "Coxcombe:" see Cotgrave, s.v. EffeminÉ, Enfourner, Fol, Lambui.

[E400] Davus is the common name in Terence for the cunning, plotting servant.

[E401] Thersites, the ugliest and most scurrilous of the Greeks before Troy. He spared in his revilings neither prince nor chief, but directed his abuse especially against Achilles and Ulysses. The name is often used to denote a calumniator. Cf.

"When rank Thersites opes his mastiff jaws,
We shall hear music, wit, and oracle."
—Shakspere, Troilus and Cressida, Act i. sc. 3.

[E402] "Shall swell like a tode." Cf. 65, 6.

[E403] "To hold a candle to the devil is to assist in a bad cause or an evil matter."—Ray. Hazlitt (English Proverbs, p. 407) gives "'Tis good sometimes to hold a candle to the devil." Thus we find an anonymous correspondent writing to John Paston: "for howr Lords love, goo tharow with Wyll Weseter, and also plese Chrewys as ye thynke in yow hert best for to do; for it is a comon proverbe, 'A man must sumtyme set a candel befor the Devyle;' and therfor thow it be not alder most mede and profytabyl, yet of ij harmys the leste is to be take."—Paston Letters, ed. Gairdner, ii. 73.

[E404] At Canterbury is a representation of Master Shorne holding up his hand in a threatening attitude at the Devil, who is in a boot.

[E405] "False birds can fetch the wind;" an expression taken from hawking. To fetch the wind, to take the wind (Bacon), and to have the wind are various forms of the same expression, the meaning of which is to gain or take an advantage. We still use the expression "to get to windward of another," meaning to get the better or advantage of him. Mavor reads, "false words can fetch the wind," i.e. slander will spread as though borne on the wind. I do not, however, know on what authority he has adopted this reading, as the text of 1577 gives "birds."

[E406] The following poem on Evil Tongues is from a MS. of the 15th century, edited for the Percy Soc. by the late Mr. T. Wright, 1847:

"A man that con his tong stere,
He ther not rek wer that he go."

"Ittes knowyn in every schyre,
Wekyd tongges have no pere;
I wold thei wer brent in the fer,
That warke men soo mykyll wo.

Ittes knowyn in every lond,
Wekyd tongges don gret wrong,
Thei make me to lyyn long,
And also in myche car.

?yf a man go in clothes gay,
Or elles in gud aray,
Wekyd tongges yet wyl say,
Wer cam the by therto?

?yf a man go in cloys ill,
And have not the world at wyl,
Wekyd tongges thei wyll hym spyll,
And seyd he ys a stake, lat hym goo.

Now us to amend God yeve us grace,
Of repentens and of gud grace,
That we mut se hys glorius face.
Amen, Amen, for charyte."

[E407] There is a smoothness in the versification of this sonnet, and a succession of imagery, though drawn from common sources, which we do not often find in Tusser. He has made a good use of the figure erotesis.—M. Compare Milton, Lycidas, 45:

"As killing as the canker to the rose,
Or taint-worm to the weanling herds that graze."

[E408] Janus, an old Italian deity, the god of the sun and the year, to whom the month of January was dedicated.

[E409] Ver = Spring, Æstas = Summer, Hyems = Winter.

[E410] "Delaide;" so in Spenser, Faery Queene, ix. 30. "But to delay the heat," and in Prothalamium 3:

"Zephyrus did softly play
A gentle spirit, that lightly did delay
Hot Titan's beames."

[E411] Alluding to the thirteen revolutions of the moon in the year.

[E412] It appears from the Books of the Stationers' Company, on the authority of Warton (Hist. of Eng. Poetry, vol. iii. p. 428) that a licence was granted to T. Hackett, in the year 1562, to print "A Dialogue of Wyvynge and Thryvynge of Tusshers with ij lessons for olde and yonge."

[E413] "Bolted out," a term taken from the language and usage of millers, who use the word "to bolt" of the separation of the bran from the flour. Cf. Chaucer, Nonnes Prior's Tale, 415:

"But yit I can not bult it to the bren."

And Spenser, Faery Queene, iv. 24:

"He now had boulted all the floure."

"Time and nature will bolt out the truth of things."—D'Estrange. "To boulte out the truth in reasoning, limare veritatem in disceptatione."—Baret's Alvearie. A "Bolting Cloth" is the name in Lincolnshire for a cloth used for sifting meal in mills. See Peacock's Glossary, s.v. There was a term "boultings" or "boltings," used of private arguings of cases in some of the Inns of Court. "Boulter, a sifter."—Coles' Dict. 1676.

[E414] "Could the way to thriue." Could is here used in its old sense of knew, or understood. A.S. cunnan, to know; ic can, I know; ic cuÐe, I knew.

[E415] "To stay himselfe in some good plot," etc.; compare 10. 8.

[E416] "Of this and that;" cf. 62. 10.

[E417] "The blacke oxe neare trod on thy fut:" a proverbial expression, meaning, you have experienced misfortune close at home.

In Peacock's Glossary of Manley, etc. (E. D. Soc. 1877), we have: "The Black Bull's trodden on him;" that is, he is in a very bad temper. And the following passage from Bernard's Terence is quoted: "Prosperitie hangs on his sleeue; the black oxe cannot tread on his foot."

"Venus waxeth old; and then she was a pretie wench, when Juno was a young wife; now crowes foote is on her eye, and the black oxe hath trod on her foot."—Lyly's Sapho and Phao, 1584, ed. 1858, i. 199.

Mr. George Vere Irving (Notes and Queries, 3rd Ser. xii. 488) remarks that this expression is at this day frequently used in Scotland in reference to a person who has experienced misfortune. See Hazlitt's Eng. Proverbs, p. 359.

[E418] "It is too much we dailie heare," etc. This proverbial expression occurs in the Townley Mysteries, p. 86, as—

"A man may not wive,
And also thrive,
And all in one year."

[E419] "As mo have bin;" compare note E391.

[E420] "The good wiues husband weares no breech." So in a song in the MS. of the 15th cent. quoted above, the heading of which is

"Nova, Nova, sawe yow ever such,
The moste mayster of the hows weryth no brych."

The burden of the song being

"Lest the most mayster wer no brych."

[E421] The same reply is attributed to Thales. See his life in Diogenes Laertius, Bk. i. 26.

[E422] "Yyng men, I red that ye be war,
That ye cum not in the snar;
For he is browt in meche car,
That have a shrow onto his wyfe.

In a panter I am caute,
My fot his pennyd, I may not owt;
In sorow and car he his put,
That have, etc.

With a qwene yif that thou run,
Anon it is told into the town;
Sorow he hath both up and down,
That have, etc."
—Song in MS. of 15th century quoted above.

"Feareth me," that is, it frightens me, I fear, as in "me liketh" = it pleases me, I like.

[E423] "As good a shrew is as a sheepe," etc. This proverb appears in EpistolÆ HoelianÆ, ed. 1754, p. 177, in a letter dated 5th February, 1625-6, as "It is better to marry a shrew than a sheep." In Taylor's Pastorall, 1624, we have "A shrew is better than a sheep."

[E424] William, the first Lord Paget, and the patron of Tusser, married Anne, daughter of Mr. Prestin, of the County of Lancaster; and to her it is most probable the Book of Huswifery was dedicated, and not to Margaret, the daughter of Sir H. Newton, and lady of Thomas, Lord Paget.

[E425] "By their fruits ye shall know them, do men gather grapes of thorns or figs of thistles?"

[E426] The rime in the last two lines is most remarkable; apparently thriue is pronounced threev, as Mr. Ellis contends.

[E427] From the last two lines of this stanza it would appear that Tusser was a widower at the time when he wrote this Address to the Reader, or at least when he first wrote on the subject of Huswifery.

[E428] "A description of Huswife," etc. This antithetical description seems to have been introduced, in order that it might correspond with the description of Husbandry, chapter 8, p. 16.—M.

[E429] According to Fitzherbert, the farmers' wives must have been patterns of diligence and industry, and a variety of duties devolved upon them which have since ceased to be required, or have fallen with more propriety upon the other sex. They had to measure out the quantity of corn to be ground, and see that it was sent to the miller. The poultry, swine, and cows were under their charge; and they superintended the brewing and baking. The garden was peculiarly the care of the farmer's wife. She had to depend upon it for various herbs which are no longer in use, but which could not be dispensed with when spices were rare and costly. Besides pot-herbs, strewing-herbs were required for the chambers, and herbs possessing medical virtues. The list of fruits at this date was confined to a few of indigenous growth, which were but little improved by skill and management. Tusser directs his housewife to transplant into her garden wild strawberries from the woods. All the writers on rural economy during this period recommend the farmer's wife carefully to attend to her crop of flax and hemp. When, however, Fitzherbert asserts that it is a wife's duty "to winnow all manner of corn, to make malt, to wash, and to make hay, shear corn, and, in time of need, help her husband to fill the muck-wain or dung-cart, drive the plough, to load hay, corn, and such other, to go to market and sell butter or pigs, fowls or corn," it is to be presumed that he had in his view the smallest class of yeomen, who had no hired servants.

[E430] "Reason their cace," that is, gossip and argue over their circumstances.

[E431] "Home is home, be it never so ill." Ballad licensed in 1569-70. Clarke (ParÆm. 1639, p. 101) has with us, "home is home, be it never so homely." On the other hand, Heywood, in his Epigrams, 1562, says:

"Home is homely, yea, and to homely sometyme,
Where wives' footestooles to their husbandes' heads clime."

[E432] "Familie" = household. Compare chap. 9, st. 12.

[E433] "Maides, three a clock," etc. Compare Romeo and Juliet, Act iv. sc. 4, 3—

"The second cock hath crow'd,
The curfew bell hath rung, 'tis three o'clock."

[E434] "Lay your bucks," i.e. get ready the washing tubs. Compare: "Throw foul linen upon him as if it were going to bucking."—Shakspere, Merry Wives of Wind., Act iii. sc. 3. Buck-basket, the basket in which linen is carried to the wash. "Bouck-fatt, a washing tub."—Upton Inventories, p. 28. Cf. "And for I can so wele wasche and so wele bowke, Godde has made me his chaumberere."—The Pilgrimage of the Life of the Manhode, f. 21b., MS. in Libr. of St. John's Coll. Camb. 'I bucke lynen clothes to scoure of their fylthe and make them whyte, Ie bue. Bucke these shyrtes, for they be to foule to be wasshed by hande, buez ces chemises, car elles sont trop sallies de les lauer a sauon.'—Palsgrave. 'BuÉe, lie wherwith clothes are scowred; also a buck of clothes; Buer, to wash a buck, to scowre with lie; Buandiere f., a laundresse, or buck-washer.'—Cotgrave. To buck is to cleanse clothes by steeping them in lye: see Buck in Webster, Nares, Wedgwood, etc."—Rev. W. W. Skeat, note to P. Plowman, B. Text, xiv. 19.

[E435] The hours of meals varied at different dates. In the Myrour of Our Lady, ed. Blunt, p. 15, we read: "At houre of tyerse [9 a.m.] labourers desyre to haue theyr dyner."

In Chambers's Book of Days, i. 96, we read that Gervase Markham, in 1653, makes the ploughman have three meals, viz. breakfast at 6 a.m., dinner at half-past 3 p.m., and supper at 6 p.m. See also note E444.

[E436] In the Library of Caius Coll. Camb. is a volume of Tracts, No. 286, one of which, published in 1555, An Account of the Cruelties of the King of Spain, has as its motto: "Beware of Had I wiste." This is also the title of a poem in the Paradyce of Daynty Deuyses, 1578. It is quoted by Sir Simon D'Ewes (Diary, etc., ii. 366):

"Telle neuere the more thoug thou myche heere,
And euere be waare of had-y-wist."
—Babees Book, ed. Furnivall, p. 264, l. 72.

[E437] See note E52.

[E438]

"Beware that ye geue no persone palled drynke, for feere
Hit mygtt brynge many a man in disese durynge many a yere."
—John Russell's Boke of Norture, in Babees Book, p. 13.

"Sowre ale, and dead ale, and ale the whiche doth stande a tylte is good for no man."—Andrew Boorde, Regimen of Health.

"Of ale and beer, as well as of wine, we find various kinds mentioned. There were single beer, or small ale, which could do little more than quench thirst,—and double beer, which was recommended as containing a double quantity of malt and hops,—and double-double beer, which was twice as strong as that,—and dagger-ale, which, as the name implies, was reckoned particularly sharp and dangerous,—and bracket, a kind of ale which we are unable distinctly to describe. But the favourite drink, as well as the chief article of vulgar debauch, was a kind of ale commonly called huffcap, but which was also termed 'mad dog,' 'angel's food,' 'dragon's milk,' and other such ridiculous names, by the frequenters of ale-houses: 'and never,' says Harrison, 'did Romulus and Remus suck their she-wolf with such eager and sharp devotion as these men hale at huffcap, till they be as red as cocks, and little wiser than their combs.' The higher classes, who were able to afford such a luxury, brewed a generous liquor for their own consumption, which they did not bring to the table till it was two years old. This was called March ale, from the month in which it was brewed. But the servants had to content themselves with a more simple beverage that was seldom more than a month old. A cup of choice ale was often as richly compounded with dainties as the finest wines. Sometimes it was warmed, and qualified with sugar and spices; sometimes with a toast; often with a roasted crab or apple, making the beverage still known under the name of Lambs'-wool; while to stir the whole composition with a sprig of rosemary, was supposed to give it an additional flavour. The drinks made from fruit were chiefly cider, perry, and mum. Those that had formerly been made from honey seem to have fallen into disuse in consequence of the general taste for stronger potations; metheglin being now chiefly confined to the Welsh. A simple liquor, however, was still used in Essex, called by Harrison, somewhat contemptuously, 'a swish-swash,' made of water with a little honey and spice, but 'as differing,' he says, 'from true metheglin as chalk doth from cheese.' He informs us, moreover, that already the tapsters of England had learned to adulterate their ale and beer with pernicious compounds."—Pict. Hist. of England, ii. 883.

"In the parish of Hawsted, Suffolk, the allowance of food to the labourer in harvest was, two herrings per day, milk from the manor dairy to make cheese, and a loaf of bread, of which fifteen were made from a bushel of wheat. Messes of potage made their frequent appearance at the rustic board."—Knight, Pict. Hist. of England, i. 839.

[E439] Harrison gives an account (pp. 153-4) of the following kinds of bread made in England: 1. Mainchet, "commonlie called white bread, in Latine Primarius panis." 2. Cheat "or wheaton bread, so named bicause the colour therof resembleth the graie [or yellowish] wheat [being cleane and well dressed,] and out of this is the coursest of the bran (vsuallie called gurgeons or pollard) taken. The raueled is a kind of cheat bread also, but it reteineth more of the grosse, and lesse of the pure substance of the wheat." 3. Brown bread, of which there were two kinds, viz. (a) of whole meal unsifted, (b) pollard bread, with a little rye meal, and called Miscelin or Meslin. "In champeigne countries much rie and barleie bread is eaten, but especiallie where wheat is scant and geson."

[E440] "Baies." Halliwell prints this word as baics in his Dictionary, defining it as "chidings, reproofs," and giving as his authority Hunter's Additions to Boucher.

[E441] "Droie." See Note in Prompt. Parv., s.v. Dryvylle and Deye. Probably a corruption of droile; a scullion, kitchen-boy, or servant of all-work.—M. Droie also occurs in Stubbes' Anatomie of Abuses, 1583.

[E442] "In some places it [the malt] is dried at leisure with wood alone, or strawe alone, in other with wood and strawe togither; but of all, the strawe dried is the most excellent. For the wood dried malt when it is brued, beside that the drinke is higher of colour, it dooth hurt and annoie the head of him that is not vsed thereto, bicause of the smoake. Such also as vse both indifferentlie, doo barke, cleaue and drie their wrood in an ouen, thereby to remooue all moisture that shuld procure the fume, and this malt is in the second place, and with the same likewise, that which is made with dried firze, broome, etc.; whereas, if they also be occupied greene, they are in maner so preiudiciall to the corne, as is the moist wood."—Harrison, Description of England, ed. F. J. Furnivall, Part I. p. 157.

[E443] See Note E116.

[E444] "The husbandmen dine at high noone as they call it, and sup at seuen or eight."—Harrison, Part I. p. 166.

[E445] Though all the standard editions read "chaps walking," may it not be a misprint for "chaps wagging," that is, mouths craving?—M.

[E446] "Enough is a plentie." Cf. "Mesure is medcyne Þou? Þow moche ?erne."—Piers Plowman, Passus i. 35. "But mesure is a meri mene, Þou? men moche ?erne."—Richard the Redeles, E.E. Text Soc., ed. Skeat, ii. 139. "Measure is treasure."—Dyce's Skelton, ii. 238, 241. "Enough is as good as a feast."—Gascoigne's Posies, 1575.

[E447] "Chippings." The "Chippings of Trencher-brede" in Lord Percy's household were used "for the fedynge of my lords houndis."—Percy Household Book, p. 353. "Other ij pages ... them oweth to chippe bredde, but too nye the crumme."—Household Ordin. pp. 71-2. In the Regimen Sanitatis Salerni, ed. 1634, p. 71, we are warned against eating crusts, because "they ingender a dust cholor, or melancholly humours, by reason that they bee burned and dry."

[E448] "Call quarterly seruants to court and to leete," that is, call to account.

[E449] "Lurching," cf. footnote 1, p. 64.

[E450] "Bandog," cf. note E35.

[E451] "Guise."

"For he was laid in white Sheep's wool
New pulled from tanned Fells;
And o'er his Head hang'd Spiders webs
As they had been Bells.
Is this the Country Guise, thought he?
Then here I will not stay."
—Ballad, K. Alfred and the Shepherd.

"'Tis thy Country Guise, I see,
To be thus bluntish still."
—Ibid.

"The Norman guise was to walke and jet up and downe the streets."—Lambert's Peramb. of Kent, 1826, p. 320.

[E452] "Plough Monday." "The Monday next after Twelfth-day, when our Northern plow-men beg plow-money to drink; and in some places if the plowman (after that day's work) come with his whip to the kitchin hatch, and cry 'cock in pot' before the maid says 'cock on the dung-hill,' he gains a cock on Shrove-Tuesday."—Coles' Dict. 1708. "Among the rural customs connected with the anniversary of Christmas were those of Plough-Monday, which fell on the first Monday after Twelfth-day. This was the holiday of the ploughmen, who used to go about from house to house begging for plough-money to drink. In the northern counties, where this practice was called the fool-plough (a corruption perhaps of yule-plough), a number of sword-dancers dragged about a plough, while one of the party, called the Bessey, was dressed for the occasion like an old woman; and another, who was the fool of the pageant, was almost covered with skins, and wore the tail of some animal dangling down his back. While the rest danced, one of these odd personages went among the spectators, rattling a box, and collecting small donations; and it is said that whosoever refused to pay had the plough dragged to his door and the soil of his threshold ploughed up."—Pict. Hist. of England, ii. 894.

[E453] The Skreene was a wooden settee or settle, with a high back sufficient to screen the sitters from the outward air, and was in the time of our ancestors an invariable article of furniture near all kitchen fires, and is still seen in the kitchens of many of our old farm-houses in Cheshire. The meaning of the two lines:

"If ploughman get hatchet or whip to the skreene,
maides loseth their cock if no water be seene,"

is, "if the ploughman can get his whip, ploughstaff, hatchet, or anything he wants in the field to the fireside (screen being here equivalent to fireside) before the maid has got her kettle on, then she loses her Shrove-tide cock, which belongs wholly to the men."

[E454] "Shroftide." The Hen is hung at a Fellow's back who has also some Horse Bells about him, the rest of the Fellows are blinded, and have Boughs in their Hands, with which they chase this Fellow and his Hen about some large Court or small Enclosure. The Fellow with his Hen and Bells shifting as well as he can, they follow the sound, and sometimes hit him and his Hen, other times, if he can get behind one of them, they thresh one another well favour'dly; but the Jest is, the Maids are to blind the Fellows, which they do with their Aprons, and the cunning Baggages will endear their Sweet Hearts with a peeping hole, while the others look out as sharp to hinder it. After this the Hen is boil'd with Bacon, and store of Pancakes and Fritters are made. She that is noted for lying a Bed long or any other Miscarriage, hath the first Pancake presented to her, which most commonly falls to the Dog's share at last, for no one will own it their due.—T.R.

"Let glad Shrove Tuesday bring the pancake thin
Or fritters rich with apples stored within."
—Oxford Sausage.

[E455] "Wake Day." The Wake-day is the day on which the Parish Church was dedicated, called So, because the Night before it, they were used to watch till Morning in the Church and feasted all the next day. Waking in the Church was left off because of some abuses, and we see here it was converted to wakeing at the Oven.—T.R. "Similar to the church-ales, though of a still more ancient origin, were the Wakes. It had been the custom, on the dedication of a church, or the birth-day of a saint, for the people to assemble on the night previous, to hold a religious vigil in the open air; and, as they remained all night occupied in devotional exercises, this practice was called a wake. Such a method of spending the night, however, soon gave place to very different employments; and feasting, riot, and licentiousness became the prevailing characteristics of these vigils. These concourses, also, from every neighbouring town and parish, naturally suggested the expediency of improving such opportunities for the purposes of traffic; and hence the wakes gradually became fairs, which in some places they still continue to be."—Pict. Hist. of England, ii. 897.

[E456] "Flawnes;" a kind of pancake was also so called. Nettleham feast at Easter is called the Flown, possibly from flauns having been formerly eaten at that period of the year: but see Babees Book, p. 173, where Flawnes are stated to be "Cheesecakes made of ground cheese beaten up with eggs and sugar, coloured with saffron, and baked in 'cofyns' or crusts."

"Bread an chese, butere and milk,
Pastees and flaunes."
—Havelok, ed. Skeat, 644.

For flaunes.
"Take new chese and grynde hit fayre,
In morter with egges, without dysware;
Put powder Þerto of sugur, I say,
Coloure hit with safrone ful wele Þou may;
Put hit in cofyns Þat ben fayre,
And bake hit forthe, I Þe pray."
—Liber Cure Cocorum, ed. Morris, p. 39.

[E457] A goose used formerly to be given at harvest-home, to those who had not overturned a load of corn in carrying during harvest.—M.

[E458] "Fyrmente is made of whete and mylke, in the whiche, yf flesshe be soden, to eate it is not commendable, for it is harde of dygestyon; but whan it is dygested it doth nowrysshe, and it doth strength a man."—Andrew Boorde's Dyetary, E.E. Text Soc. ed. F. J. Furnivall, p. 263. The following recipe for making Furmenty is from the Liber Cure Cocorum, ed. Morris, p. 7:

Furmente.
Take wete, and pyke [pick] hit fayre (and clene)
And do hit in a morter shene;
Bray hit a lytelle, with water hit spryng [sprinkle]
Tyl hit hulle, with-oute lesyng.
Þen wyndo [winnow] hit wele, nede Þou mot;
Wasshe hit fayre, put hit in pot;
Boyle hit tylle hit brest, Þen
Let hit doun, as I Þe kenne.
Take now mylke, and play hit up
To hit be thykkerede to sup.
Lye hit up with yolkes of eyren [eggs],
And kepe hit wele, lest hit berne [burn].
Coloure hit with safron and salt hit wele,
And servys hit forthe, Syr, at Þe mele;
With sugur candy Þou may hit dowce,
If hit be served in grete lordys howce.
Take black sugur for mener menne;
Be ware Þerwith, for hit wylle brenne [burn].

The following recipes for the manufacture of Furmenty are given in Pegge's Forme of Cury, pp. 91 and 121: 1. For to make Furmenty, "Nym [Take] clene wete, and bray it in a morter wel that the holys [hulls] gon al of and seyt [seethe] yt til it breste and nym yt up, and lat it kele [cool] and nym fay re fresch broth and swete mylk of Almandys or swete mylk of kyne and temper yt al, and nym the yolkys of eyryn [eggs], boyl it a lityl and set yt adoun and messe yt forthe wyth fast venyson and fresch moton." 2. For to make Formenty on a Fische-day, "Tak the mylk of the Hasel Notis, boyl the wete wyth the aftermelk til it be dryyd, and tak and colour yt wyth Saffroun, and the ferst mylk cast therto and boyle wel and serve yt forth." In Mr. Peacock's Glossary of Manley, etc., we have: "Frumerty, a preparation of creed-wheat [wheat simmered until tender] with milk, currants, raisins and spices in it."

[E460] A Cockney, the derivation of which word has been much disputed, appears to me clearly to come from the verb to cocker, to cock, by contraction, as in this passage. A cockney, therefore, is one who has been brought up effeminately, and spoilt by indulgence, whether a native of the city or of the country.—M.

"The original meaning of cockney is a child too tenderly or delicately nurtured, one kept in the house and not hardened by out-of-doors life; hence applied to citizens, as opposed to the hardier inhabitants of the country, and in modern times confined to the inhabitants of London. The Promptorium Parvulorum, and the authorities cited in Mr. Way's note, give 'Coknay, carifotus, delicius, mammotrophus'; 'To bring up like a cocknaye, mignoter.' 'Delicias facere, to play the cockney.' Cf. 'Puer in deliciis matris nutritus, Anglice, a cokenay.'—Halliwell. 'Cockney, niais, mignot.'—Sherwood. The Fr. coqueliner, to dandle, cocker, fedle, pamper, make a wanton of a child, leads us in the right direction."—Wedgwood, Etymol. Dict. "A cockney, a childe tenderly brought up; a dearling. Cockering, mollis ilia educatio quam indulgentiam vocamus."—Baret's Alvearie, 1580.

[E461] In chapter 62 of the First Part of this work, p. 139, we had a comparison between good and bad husbandry, and we are here presented with a contrast between good and bad huswifery.

[E462] Compare Taming of the Shrew, Act iv. sc. 3, 57:

"With scarfs and fans and double change of bravery."

[E463] "Good huswiferie canteth." The ed. of 1573 reads "franteth" the meaning of which is "to be careful, economical."

[E464] For boys the practice of music would be degrading, except as a profession; and even for girls, however fashionable it may be, it is generally worse than useless, as it occupies that time which ought to be devoted to much more important purposes.—M.

[E465] "Least homelie breaker," etc., that is, lest an inexperienced teacher ruin the mind of the pupil, as an unpractised horse-breaker will spoil a promising colt.

[E466] "Well a fine," a phrase meaning to a good purpose, a good result.

[E467] "Cocking Mams," that is, over-indulgent mothers. "A father to much cockering, Pater nimis indulgens."—Baret's Alvearie, 1580. See Note E460.

[E468] "Shifting Dads," that is, fathers who are constantly shifting their children from one school to another.

[E469] "Assone as a passenger comes to an Inne the Host or Hostesse visit him; and if he will eate with the Host or at a common table with others, his meale will cost him sixe pence, or in some places but foure pence (yet this course is lesse honourable and not used by gentlemen); but if he will eate in his chamber he commands what meate he will, according to his appetite, and as much as he thinkes fit for him and his company."—Fynes Moryson's Itinerary, 1617, Part III. p. 151.

[E470] "To purchase linne." To purchase Lynn, by petty savings, seems to have been a proverbial mode of expression, used in ridicule of stinginess.

[E471] "You are on the high way to Needham."—Ray.

[E472] The braggadocios and coxcombs of the day would use their daggers to carve with, which were perfectly harmless for any other purpose. Forks were yet strangers to an English dinner-table. Knives were first made in England, according to Anderson, in 1563. A meat-knife of Queen Elizabeth's, mentioned in Nichols's "Progresses," had "a handle of white bone and a conceyte in it." In the same work we read of "a dozen of horn spoons in a bunch," as the instruments "meetest to eat furmenty porage with all;" also of "a folding spoon of gold," and "a pair of small snuffers, silver-gilt."—Pictorial History of England, ii. 856.

[E473] "Go toie with his nodie." The edition of 1573 reads "go toy with his noddy, with ape in the street," and more recent editions read "go toy with his noddy-like ape in the street." This reading has been adopted by Dr. Mavor. Peacock's Gloss. gives "Noddipol a sillie person. 'Whorson nodipol that I am!'—Bernard's Terence, 43. 'A verye nodypoll nydyote myght be ashamed to say it.'—The Workes of Sir Thomas More, 1557, p. 209."

[E474] "Fisging." The Rev. W. Skeat, in his note to Piers Plowman, C. Text, Passus x. l. 153, "And what frek of Þys folde fiskeÞ Þus a-boute," remarks: "Fisketh, wanders, roams. As this word is scarce, I give all the instances of it that I can find. In Sir Gawayne and the Grene Knight, ed. Morris, l. 1704, there is a description of a foxhunt, where the fox and the hounds are thus mentioned:—

'& he fyskez hem by-fore · Þay founden hym sone'—

i.e. and he (the fox) runs on before them (the hounds); but they soon found him. 'Fyscare abowte ydylly; Discursor, discursatrix, vagulus vel vagator, vagatrix.'—Prompt. Parv. p. 162. 'Fiskin abowte yn ydilnesse; Vago, giro, girovago.'—Ibid.

'Such serviture also deserveth a check,
That runneth out fisking, with meat in his beck [mouth].'
—Tusser, Five Hundred Points, etc., ed. Mavor, p. 286.

'Then had every flock his shepherd, or else shepherds; now they do not only run fisking about from place to place, ... but covetously join living to living.'—Whitgift's Works, i. 528. 'I fyske, ie fretille. I praye you se howe she fysketh about.'—Palsgrave. 'TrotiÈre, a raumpe, fisgig, fisking huswife, raunging damsell.'—Cotgrave.

'Then in cave, then in a field of corn,
Creeps to and fro, and fisketh in and out.'
—Dubartas (in Nares).

'His roving eyes rolde to and fro,
He fiskyng fine, did mincyng go.'
—Kendalls's Flower of Epigrammes, 1577 (Nares).

'Tom Tankard's cow....
Flinging about his halfe aker, fisking with her tail.'
—Gammer Gurton's Needle, i. 2.

'Fieska, to fisk the tail about; to fisk up and down.'—Swedish Dictionary, by J. Serenius. 'Fjeska, v.n. to fidge, to fidget, to fisk.'—Swed. Dict. (Tauchnitz)."

[E475] In the Rolls of Parliament, at the opening of the Parliament of 2 Rich. II. in the year 1378, we find—"Qui sont appellez Bacbyters sont auxi come chiens qi mangeont les chars crues," etc. In the Ancren Riwle (Camden Soc. ed. Morton), p. 86, are described two kinds of backbiters, who are defined generally as "Bacbitares, Þe biteÐ oÐre men bihinden"; the two kinds are 1. those who openly speak evil of others, and 2. those who under the cloak of friendship slander others. The latter is stated to be far the worse. In an Old Eng. Miscellany (E. E. Text Soc. ed. Morris), p. 187, we are told that "Alle bacbytares heo wendeÞ to helle."—Rev. W. W. Skeat, note to P. Plowman, B. v. 89.

[E476] "The friend doth hate." The edition of 1585 reads, evidently by a misprint, fiends.

[E477] "Roinish," lit. scurvy, hence coarse, rough. "Rongneux, scabbie, mangie, scurvie."—Cotgrave. It occurs twice in the "Romaunt of the Rose," ll. 988 and 6190. In the form rinish, signifying "wild, jolly, unruly, rude," it is found among the Yorkshire words in Thoresby's Letter to Ray, reprinted by the Eng. Dial. Soc. "Rennish," in the sense of "furious, passionate," which is in Ray's collection of North-country words, is, perhaps, another form of the word.

[E478] "Still presently," i.e. always as close at hand.

[E479] "In vsing there his will," that is, in doing so he acted of his own free will.

[E480] "Seene" = appeared, showed himself.

[E481] "Do show" (to who thou wouldst to know). The meaning is perfectly clear, but the manner in which it is expressed is very curious. We may paraphrase it thus: "doth show to him whom thou wishest to teach."

[E482] Compare Psalm ciii. 15, 6.

[E483] "Let gift no glorie looke," that is, in giving alms look for (expect) no praise or earthly reward for so doing.

[E484] "Provoke" = urge.

[E485] In the edition of 1577 the arrangement of this chapter is somewhat different. The Latin verses are first printed by themselves, and headed "Sancti Barnardi dicta," and after comes the English version, with the following title: "Eight of Saint Barnardes verses, translated out of Latin " into english by this Aucthor for one kind " of note to serue both ditties." The translation in the "Paradise of Dainty Devices," mentioned by Mason, is by Barnaby Rich, under the signature of "My Luck is Loss." The following is the first verse, transcribed for comparison with Tusser's version:

"Why doth each state apply itself to worldly praise?
And undertake such toil, to heap up honour's gain,
Whose seat, though seeming sure, on fickle fortune stays,
Whose gifts are never prov'd perpetual to remain?
But even as earthen pots, with every fillip fails:
So fortune's favour flits, and fame with honour quails."

[E486] "Carle." M. Licinius Crassus, surnamed Dives, or the Rich, one of the first Roman Triumvirate, and celebrated for his avarice and love of the table.

[E487] "O thou fit bait for wormes!" In the Treatise of Vincentio Saviolo, printed in 1595 with the title "Vincentio Saviolo his Practise. In two Bookes. The first intreating of the use of the Rapier and Dagger. The second of Honor and Honorable Quarrels," the printer's device has the motto: "O wormes meate: O froath: O vanitie: why art thou so insolent." Compare "As you Like it," Act iii. sc. 2, 59, "Most shallow man! thou worm's meat!"

[E488] "For fortunes looke." In editions of 1573 and 1585 the reading is "For fortune, look." It is evident that these verses were written at the time when our author first retired from court, and that they were appended to this work long after. They allude to recent events, to "fatal chance," and to other circumstances, which would have been obliterated from the mind after the lapse of so many years.—M. See Tusser's Autobiography, ch. 114, stanza 14, p. 208.

[E489] "Too daintie fed;" that is, to one who has been accustomed to luxury, and high living.

[E490] "If court with cart, etc." If one, who has been a courtier, must put up with the life of the country.

[E491] "What toesed eares." Toese, or touze, to worry (as a dog does a bear), properly used of the dressing of wool, and thence metaphorically, as in Spenser, Faerie Queene, xi. 33,

"And as a beare, whom angry curres have touz'd:"

to the dog who pulls the fell off the bear's back. Cf. the old name for a dog, Towzer. Coles renders tose or toze by "carpo, vellico." Baret, Alvearie, 1580, gives, "to Tosse wooll, carpere lanam." Compare chap. 99. 4, p. 189, "so tossed with comorants," which is spelt toesed in the ed. of 1577, and teazed in those of 1580 and 1585.

[E492] "What robes." The livery or vestis liberata, often called robe, allowed annually by the college.—Warton, Hist. of Eng. Poetry.

[E493] Penny-ale is common, thin ale. It is spoken of in Piers Plowman, ed. Skeat, Passus xv. l. 310, as a most meagre drink, only fitted for strict-living friars. It was sold at a penny a gallon, while the best ale was four pence.

"Peny ale and podyng ale she poured togideres
For labourers and for lowe folke, Þat lay by hym-selue."
—Piers Plowman, B. Text, Passus v. 220.

[E494] "Sundrie men had plagards then." See remarks in Biographical Sketch, p. xii.

[E495] "The better brest," etc. On these words Hawkins, in his Hist. of Music, ed. 1853, ii. 537, remarks: "In singing, the sound is originally produced by the action of the lungs, which are so essential an organ in this respect, that to have a good breast was formerly a common periphrasis to denote a good singer." Cf. Shakspere, Twelfth Night, Act ii. sc. 3, "By my troth, the fool hath an excellent breast." Halliwell quotes:

"I syng not musycall
For my brest is decayd."
—Armonye of Byrdes, p. 5.

Ascham, in his Toxophilus, says, when speaking of the expediency of educating youths in singing: "Trulye two degrees of men, which have the highest offices under the king in all this realme, shall greatly lacke the vse of singinge, preachers and lawyers, because they shall not, without this, be able to rule theyr brestes for euerye purpose."—Lond. 1571, fo. 86; and in Strype's Life of Arch. Parker it is stated that "In the Statutes of Stoke College, Suffolk, founded by Parker, is a provision in these words: 'of which said queristers, after their breasts are changed, will the most apt of wit and capacity be holpen with exhibitions of forty shillings.'"

[E496] Nicholas Udall was the author of our oldest known comedy "Roister Doister." He was born 1505, and was Master first at Eton and afterwards at Westminster, at both of which places he became notorious for the severity of his punishments. He wrote several dramas, now lost, one of which, "Ezekias," was acted before Queen Elizabeth at Cambridge, and, in all probability, "Roister Doister" was intended to be performed by his pupils.

[E497] As to Tusser's pedigree see letter from the Windsor Herald, in the Biographical Sketch, p. xii.

[E498] "Tiburne play." Tyburn appears from authentic records to have been used as a place of execution in the time of Edward III. and probably before. See also stanza 35 post. There was another place of execution, in the parish of St. Thomas-a-Waterings, in Southwark, called for distinction Tyburn of Kent. See Pegge's Kenticisms, ed. Skeat, Proverb 11, and Dr. Johnson's Poem of London, l. 238, and the note on it in Hales's Longer Eng. Poems, 1872, p. 313.

[E499] "A towne of price." A common expression in old English, meaning of high estimation, noble. See Halliwell, s.v.

[E500] "Norfolk wiles," etc. The East Anglians were noted for their litigious propensities. Fuller, in his Worthies, says, "Whereas pedibus ambulando is accounted but a vexatious suit in other counties, here (where men are said to study law as following the plough-tail) some would persuade us that they will enter an action for their neighbour's horse but looking over their hedge." An Act was passed in 1455 (33 Henry VI. cap. 7) to check the litigiousness of the district: "Whereas, of time not long past, within the city of Norwich, and the counties of Norfolk and Suffolk, there were no more but 6 or 8 attornies at the most that resorted to the King's Courts, in which time great tranquillity reigned in the said city and counties, and little trouble or vexation was made by untrue and foreign suits. And now so it is, that in the said city and counties, there be fourscore attornies or more, the more part of them having no other thing to live upon but only his gain by the practice of attorneyship, and also the more part of them not being of sufficient knowledge to be an attorney, which come to every fair, market, and other places, where is any assembly of people, exhorting, procuring, moving and inciting the people to attempt untrue foreign suits for small trespasses, little offences and small sums of debt, whose actions be triable and determinable in Court Barons; whereby proceed many suits, more of evil will and malice than of the truth of the thing, to the manifold vexation and no little damage of the inhabitants of the said city and counties, and also to the perpetual destruction of all the Courts Baron in the said counties, unless convenient remedy be provided in this behalf; the foresaid Lord the King considering the premises, by the advice, assent and authority aforesaid, hath ordained and established, that at all times from henceforth there shall be but six common attornies in the said County of Norfolk, and six common attornies in the said County of Suffolk, and two common attornies in the said City of Norwich, to be attornies in the Courts of Record; and that all the said fourteen attornies shall be elected and admitted by the two Chief Justices of our Lord the King for the time being, of the most sufficient and best instructed, by their discretions." East Anglians were frequently called "Barrators," that is, incitors to lawsuits (O. Fr. bareter, to deceive, cheat).

[E501] "Diram sell." West Dereham Abbey, near Downham, Norfolk, founded by Hubert Walter, Archbishop of Canterbury, for PrÆmonstratensian canons.

[E502] Faiersted, a parish about four miles from Witham, and near our author's birthplace.

[E503] The plague, to which Tusser evidently alludes, according to Maitland, raged in London in 1574 and 1575. It must have been subsequent to 1573, as the edition of that date does not contain this or the following stanza.

[E504] This and the preceding stanzas were first introduced in the edition of 1580.

[E505] Cf.

"The rank is but the guinea stamp,
A man's a man for a' that."
—Burns.

[E506] "Cocking Dads." Cf. ch. 95, stanza 5, p. 186.

[E507] "Of hir or him." See note E381.

[E508] "L'homme propose, Dieu dispose."

[E509] "Or for to iet," etc. "The Normane guise was, to walke and jet up and downe the streetes, with great traines of idle serving men following them."—Lambarde's Peramb. of Kent, Reprint of 1826, p. 320. "Jetting along with a giant-like gate."—Tom Tel-Troth's Message, New Shak. Soc. ed. Furnivall, p. 125. "Rogue, why winkest thou? Jenny, why jettest thou?"—R. Holme, Names of Slates, Bk. iii. ch. v. p. 265. "Item, That no scholler be out of his college in the night season, or goe a Jetting, and walke the streetes in the night season, unlesse he goe with the Proctors, uppon the payne appointed in the ould Statutes of the University, which is not meate. And they declare that it is the auncient custome, that the Proctors shall not goe a Jetting, without the licence of the Vice Chancellor, unlesse it be in Time of some suddayne danger or occasion."—Cole's MSS. vol. 42, in the British Museum.