No More Learning

441.

In 1610 the place had become neglected, whereupon commissioners were
appointed to reduce it 'into such order and state for the archers as
they were in the beginning of the reign of King Henry VIII. ' (_Ibid. _
2. 109). See also Stow, _Survey_, ed. Thoms, p. 159.

Dekker (_Shomaker's Holiday_, _Wks. _ 1. 29) speaks of being
'turnd to a Turk, and set in Finsburie for boyes to shoot at',
and Nash (_Pierce Pennilesse_, _Wks. _ 2. 128) and Jonson (_Bart.
Fair_, _Wks. _ 4. 507) make precisely similar references. Master
Stephen in _Every Man in_ (_Wks. _ 1. 10) objects to keeping
company with the 'archers of Finsbury. ' Cf. also the elaborate
satire in _U. _ 62, (_Wks. _ 8. 409).

=3. 2. 45 to traine the youth=
=Of London, in the military truth. = Cf. _Underwoods_ 62:

Thou seed-plot of the war! that hast not spar'd
Powder or paper to bring up the youth
Of London, in the military truth.

Gifford believes these lines to be taken from a contemporary
posture-book, but there is no evidence of quotation in the case
of _Underwoods_.

=3. 3. 22, 3 This comes of wearing=
=Scarlet, gold lace, and cut-works! = etc. Webster has a passage very
similar to this in the _Devil's Law Case_, _Wks. _ 2. 37 f. :

'_Ari. _ This comes of your numerous wardrobe.
_Rom. _ Ay, and wearing cut-work, a pound a purl.
_Ari. _ Your dainty embroidered stockings, with overblown roses,
to hide your gouty ankles.
_Rom. _ And wearing more taffata for a garter, than would serve
the galley dung-boat for streamers. . . .
_Rom. _ And resorting to your whore in hired velvet with a
spangled copper fringe at her netherlands.
_Ari. _ Whereas if you had stayed at Padua, and fed upon cow-trotters,
and fresh beef to supper. ' etc. , etc.

For 'cut-works' see note 1. 1. 128.

=3. 3. 24 With your blowne roses. = Compare 1. 1. 127,
and B. & Fl. , _Cupid's Revenge_:

No man to warm your shirt, and blow your roses.

and Jonson, _Ep. _ 97, _Wks. _ 8. 201:

His rosy ties and garters so o'erblown.

=3. 3. 25 Godwit. = The godwit was formerly in great repute as a table
delicacy. Thomas Muffett in _Health's Improvement_, p. 99, says:
'A fat godwit is so fine and light meat, that noblemen (yea, and
merchants too, by your leave) stick not to buy them at four nobles a
dozen. '

Cf. also Sir T. Browne, _Norf. Birds_, _Wks. _, 1835, 4. 319: God-wyts
. . . accounted the daintiest dish in England; and, I think, for the
bigness of the biggest price. ' Jonson mentions the godwit in this
connection twice in the _Sil. Wom. _ (_Wks. _ 3. 350 and 388), and
in Horace, _Praises of a Country Life_ (_Wks. _ 9. 121) translates
'attagen Ionicus' by 'Ionian godwit. '

=3. 3. 26 The Globes, and Mermaides! = Theatres and taverns. Mr.
Halliwell-Phillipps has proved that the Globe Theatre on the
Bankside, Southwark, the summer theatre of Shakespeare and his
fellows, was built in 1599. It was erected from materials brought
by Richard Burbage and Peter Street from the theatre in Shoreditch.
On June 29, 1613, it was destroyed by fire, but was rebuilt without
delay in a superior style, and this time with a roof of tile, King
James contributing to the cost. Chamberlaine, writing to Alice
Carleton (June 30, 1614), calls the Globe Playhouse 'the fairest in
England. ' It was pulled down Apr. 15, 1644.

Only the Lord Chamberlain's Company (the King's Men) seems to
have acted here. It was the scene of several of Shakespeare's
plays and two of Jonson's, _Every Man out_ and _Every Man in_
(Halliwell-Phillips, _Illustrations_, p. 43). The term 'summer
theatre' is applicable only to the rebuilt theatre (_ibid. _, p.
44). In _Ev. Man out_ (quarto, _Wks. _ 2. 196) Johnson refers to
'this fair-fitted _Globe_', and in the _Execration upon Vulcan_
(_Wks. _ 8. 404) to the burning of the 'Globe, the glory of the
Bank. ' In _Poetaster_ (_Wks. _ 2. 430) he uses the word again
as a generic term: 'your Globes, and your Triumphs. '

There seem to have been two Mermaid Taverns, one of which stood
in Bread Street with passage entrances from Cheapside and Friday
Street, and the other in Cornhill. They are often referred to
by the dramatists. Cf. the famous lines written by _Francis
Beaumont to Ben Jonson_, B. & Fl. , _Wks. _, ed. 1883, 2. 708;
_City Match_, _O. Pl. _ 9. 334, etc. Jonson often mentions
the Mermaid. Cf. _Inviting a Friend_, _Wks. _ 8. 205:

Is a pure cup of rich Canary Wine,
Which is the Mermaid's now, but shall be mine.

_On the famous Voyage_, _Wks. _ 8. 234:

At Bread-Street's Mermaid having dined, and merry,
Proposed to go to Holborn in a wherry.

_Bart. Fair_, _Wks. _ 4. 356-7: 'your Three Cranes, Mitre,
and Mermaid-men! '

=3. 3. 28 In veluet! = Velvet was introduced into England in the
fifteenth century, and soon became popular as an article of luxury
(see Hill's _Hist. of Eng. Dress_ 1. 145 f. ).

=3. 3. 30 I' the Low-countries. = 'Then went he to the Low Countries;
but returning soone he betook himself to his wonted studies. In his
service in the Low Countries, he had, in the face of both the campes,
killed ane enemie and taken _opima spolia_ from him. '--_Conversations
with William Drummond_, _Wks. _ 9. 388.

In the Epigram _To True Soldiers_ Jonson says:

--I love
Your great profession, which I once did prove.
_Wks. _ 8. 211.

=3. 3. 32 a wench of a stoter! = See variants. The word is
not perfectly legible in the folios, which I have consulted, but
is undoubtedly as printed. Cunningham believes 'stoter' to be a
cheap coin current in the camps. This supplies a satisfactory
sense, corresponding to the '_Sutlers_ wife, . . . of two blanks'
in the following line.

=3. 3. 33 of two blanks! = 'Jonson had Horace in his
thoughts, and has, not without some ingenuity, parodied several
loose passages of one of his satires. '--G. Gifford is apparently
referring to the close of Bk. 2. Sat. 3.

=3. 3. 51 vn-to-be-melted. = Cf. _Every Man in_, _Wks. _ 1.
36: 'and in un-in-one-breath-utterable skill, sir. ' _New Inn_,
_Wks. _ 5. 404: you shewed a neglect Un-to-be-pardon'd. '

=3. 3. 62 Master of the Dependances! = See Introduction.
pp. lvi, lvii.

=3. 3. 69 the roaring manner.
= Gifford defines it as the 'language
of bullies affecting a quarrel' (_Wks. _ 4. 483). The 'Roaring Boy'
continued under various designations to infest the streets of London
from the reign of Elizabeth until the beginning of the eighteenth
century. Spark (Somer's _Tracts_ 2. 266) says that they were persons
prodigall and of great expence, who having runne themselves
into debt, were constrained to run into factions to defend themselves
from danger of the law. ' He adds that divers of the nobility
afforded them maintenance, in return for which 'they entered into
many desperate enterprises. '

Arthur Wilson (_Life of King James I. _, p. 28), writing of the
disorderly state of the city in 1604, says: 'Divers _Sects_ of
_vitious Persons_ going under the Title of _Roaring Boyes_,
_Bravadoes_, _Roysters_, &c. commit many insolences; the Streets
swarm night and day with bloody quarrels, private _Duels_
fomented,' etc.

Kastril, the 'angry boy' in the _Alchemist_, and Val Cutting and
Knockem in _Bartholomew Fair_ are roarers, and we hear of them
under the title of 'terrible boys' in the _Silent Woman_
(_Wks. _ 3. 349). Cf. also Sir Thomas Overbury's _Character of a
Roaring Boy_ (ed. Morley, p. 72): 'He sleeps with a tobacco-pipe
in his mouth; and his first prayer in the morning is he may
remember whom he fell out with over night. '

=3. 3. 71 the vapours. = This ridiculous practise is
satirized in _Bart. Fair_, _Wks. _ 4. 3 (see also stage
directions).

=3. 3. 77 a distast. = The quarrel with Wittipol.

=3. 3. 79 the hand-gout. = Jonson explains the expression in
_Magnetic Lady_, _Wks. _ 6. 61.

You cannot but with trouble put your hand
Into your pocket to discharge a reckoning,
And this we sons of physic do call _chiragra_,
A kind of cramp, or hand-gout.

Cf. also Overbury's _Characters_, ed. Morley, p. 63: 'his liberality
can never be said to be gouty-handed. '

=3. 3. 81 Mint. = Until its removal to the Royal Mint on Tower
Hill in 1810, the work of coinage was carried on in the Tower of
London. Up to 1640, when banking arose, merchants were in the habit
of depositing their bullion and cash in the Tower Mint, under
guardianship of the Crown (see Wh-C. under _Royal Mint_, and _History
of Banking in all the Leading Nations_, London, 1896, 2. 1).

=3. 3. 86-8 let . . . hazard. = Merecraft seems to mean: 'You are in no
hurry. Pray therefore allow me to defer your business until I have
brought opportune aid to this gentleman's distresses at a time when
his fortunes are in a hazardous condition. ' The pregnant use of the
verb _timing_ and the unusual use of the word _terms_ for a period of
time render the meaning peculiarly difficult.

=3. 3. 106 a Businesse. = This was recognized as the technical
expression. Sir Thomas Overbury ridicules it in his _Characters_,
ed. Morley, p. 72: 'If any private quarrel happen among our great
courtiers, he (the Roaring Boy) proclaims the business--that's the
word, the business--as if the united force of the Roman Catholics
were making up for Germany. ' Jonson ridicules the use of the
word in similar fashion in the Masque of _Mercury Vindicated from
the Alchemists_.

=3. 3. 133 hauings. = Jonson uses the expression again in _Ev. Man
in_, _Wks. _ 1. 29, and _Gipsies Met. _, _Wks. _ 7. 364. It
is also used in _Muse's Looking Glasse_, _O. Pl. _ 9. 175.

=3. 3. 147 such sharks! = Shift in _Ev. Man in_ is described as a
'threadbare shark. ' Cf. also Earle, _Microcosmography_, ed. Morley,
p. 173.

=3. 3. 148 an old debt of forty. = See 2. 8. 100.

=3. 3. 149 the Bermudas. = See note 2. 1. 144. Nares thinks that
the real Bermudas are referred to here.

=3. 3. 155 You shall ha' twenty pound on't. = As Commission on
the two hundred. 'Ten in the hundred' was the customary rate at
this period (see _Staple of News_, _Wks. _ 5. 189).

=3. 3. 165 St. Georges-tide? = From a very early period the 23d of
April was dedicated to St. George. From the time of Henry V. The
festival had been observed with great splendor at Windsor and other
towns, and bonfires were built (see Shak, _1 Henry VI. _ 1. 1). The
festival continued to be celebrated until 1567, when Elizabeth
ordered its discontinuance. James I. , however, kept the 23d of April
to some extent, and the revival of the feast in all its glories was
only prevented by the Civil War. So late as 1614 it was the custom
for fashionable gentlemen to wear blue coats on St. George's Day,
probably in imitation of the blue mantle worn by the Knights of the
Garter, an order created at the feast of St. George in 1344 (see
Chambers' _Book of Days_ 1. 540).

The passages relating to this custom are _Ram Alley_, _O. Pl. _, 2d
ed. , 5. 486:

By Dis, I will be knight,
Wear a blue coat on great St. George's day,
And with my fellows drive you all from Paul's
For this attempt.

_Runne and a great Cast_, _Epigr. _ 33:

With's coram nomine keeping greater sway
Than a court blew-coat on St. George's day.

From these passages Nares concludes 'that some festive ceremony was
carried on at St. Paul's on St. George's day annually; that the court
attended; that the _blue-coats_, or attendants, of the courtiers,
were employed and authorised to keep order, and drive out refractory
persons; and that on this occasion it was proper for a knight to
officiate as _blue coat_ to some personage of higher rank'.

In the _Conversations with Drummond_, Jonson's _Wks. _ 9. 393, we
read: 'Northampton was his mortal enimie for beating, on a St.
George's day, one of his attenders. ' Pepys speaks of there being
bonfires in honor of St. George's Day as late as Apr. 23, 1666.

=3. 3. 166 chaines? PLV. Of gold, and pearle. = The gold chain was
formerly a mark of rank and dignity, and a century before this it
had been forbidden for any one under the degree of a gentleman of two
hundred marks a year to wear one (_Statutes of the Realm_, 7 Henry
VIII. c. 6). They were worn by the Lord Mayors (Dekker, _Shomaker's
Holiday_, _Wks. _ 1. 42), rich merchants and aldermen (Glapthorne,
_Wit for a Constable_, _Wks. _, ed. 1874, 1. 201-3), and later
became the distinctive mark of the upper servant in a great family,
especially the steward (see Nares and _Ev. Man out_, _Wks. _ 2. 31).
Massinger (_City Madam_, _Wks. _, p. 334) speaks of wearing a chain
of gold 'on solemn days. ' With the present passage cf. _Underwoods_
62, _Wks. _ 8. 410:

If they stay here but till St. George's day.
All ensigns of a war are not yet dead,
Nor marks of wealth so from a nation fled,
But they may see gold chains and pearl worn then,
Lent by the London dames to the Lords' men.

=3. 3. 170 take in Pimlico. = 'Near Hoxton, a great summer resort in
the early part of the 17th century and famed for its cakes, custards,
and Derby ale. The references to the Hoxton Pimlico are numerous
in our old dramatists. '--Wh--C. It is mentioned among other places
in _Greene's Tu Quoque, The City Match_, fol. 1639, _News from
Hogsdon_, 1598, and Dekker, _Roaring Girle_, _Wks. _ 3. 219, where it
is spoken of as 'that nappy land of spice-cakes. ' In 1609 a tract
was published, called _Pimlyco or Runne Red-Cap, 'tis a Mad World at
Hogsdon_.

Jonson refers to it repeatedly. Cf. _Alch. _, _Wks. _ 4. 155:

--Gallants, men and women.
And of all sorts, tag-rag, been seen to flock here,
In threaves, these ten weeks, as to a second Hogsden,
In days of Pimlico and Eye-bright.

Cf. also _Alch. _, _Wks. _ 4. 151; _Bart. Fair_, _Wks. _ 4. 357; and
this play 4. 4. 164. In _Underwoods_ 62 the same expression is used
as in this passage:

What a strong fort old Pimlico had been!
How it held out! how, last, 'twas taken in! --

_Take in_ in the sense of 'capture' is used again in _Every Man
in_, _Wks.