Page images
PDF
EPUB

Alas! he will not close the weeping eye,
And deaf he is to souls in misery.

Whiles fickle Fortune fann'd me with her wing,
Each hower fear of death with it did bring.

But now that she has chang'd her cozening face,
Death takes delight to come a Tortoise pace,
O friends, why did you oft me happy call?

He ne're was firmly seated that could fall.

He then introduces a description of Philosophy, under the figure of "a woman of bright majesty," which will form as suitable a specimen of the poem as any other that can be selected:

While thus I musing lay alone
Designing how t' express my mone
Above my head appear'd to me
A Woman of bright majesty
With eyes that shined clear and bright
And pierc'd beyond all common sight;
Of lively colour and full strength
Although her years had drawn a length
Beyond what any mortal does.
Her stature too was various,
Sometimes o'th' common size of man;
But to the heavens she would then
Lift up her head and pierce the sky,
Deluding the beholder's eye.
Her Robes were made of finest thred,
And without seam were perfected:
And, as I after came to know,
With her own hands she weav'd them so.
Like as old Pictures do appear

In smoaky rooms, their colour were;
And in the lower bordering
The letter II was weav'd in green:
And in the upper, see you might
The letter weav'd in white.
Between the letters there were set
As 'twere a ladder up to get,

So climbing the degrees, to move

From Earth below to Heaven above.
But some rude hand her Robe did tear,
And every one catcht for a share.
In her Right hand a Book she held,
A Sceptre did her Left hand wield.
When she the Muses had descry'd,
They standing all by my bed's side
As willing for to comfort me,
On them she cast an angry eye
And, Who unto this languishing
Sick man, said she, these whores did bring?
With poisons they his fancy please,
But give no Physick him can ease.
These, these are they that Reason's corn
Destroy, with planting fruitless thorn;
These trouble, not relieve, the mind:
And could you none but this man find?
Had you but only drawn apart
A rude, prophane, or vulgar heart,
I had not car'd; but to insnare
Him who has been my only care,
In Wisdome's School brought up and
nurst?

Go, go, ye Sirens, go accurst

And leave this sick man's cure to me.

The poem is divided into five books, and is interspersed throughout with short lyrical songs in various measures, but none of them of sufficient worth or poetical merit to deserve quotation. The present copy is accompanied with the following autograph letter, signed Harry Coningesbye, addressed

To St Thomas Hyde K and Baronet.

Sr finding my selfe lost as to the splendour of my family, I thought my selfe bound in vindication of my selfe to deriue to posterity the true cause of its fatal ruine, and having for my owne alleuiation pleased my selfe with englishing this Consolatory, I haue prefixed the true, sad, yet glorious and honest deportment of my most deare father, and for that your house was once his, and his forefathers, I ernestly beg that you would please to allow this little booke a little roome in it, that it may there remaine as a record of the honest mind of S

Weild hall, March 30th 1665.

Your harty well-wisher and humble seruant,
HARRY CONINGESBYE.

Weild or Wold Hall, in the parish of Shenley in Hertfordshire, was the place to which the widow of Thomas Coningsby and her son retired after the sale of North Mimms to the Hydes. Harry Coningsby married Hester Cambell, and was knighted by Charles II. The work appears to have been printed for the purpose of distribution among the friends of the translator, the loyalty of whose family brought upon them such heavy calamity. It is rare, and is unnoticed by either Lowndes or Watt. See full particulars of the Coningsby family, with pedigree, in Chauncey's Hist. of Hertfordshire, pp. 462-3, and Clutterbuck's ditto, vol. i. p. 444.

Collation: Sig. A to N 4, in eights.

In Brown Calf, marbled leaves.

CONSCIENCE. Robin Conscience, or Conscionable Robin: His Progresse through Court, City, and Countrey: With his bad Entertainment at each severall place &c.

[Woodcut on the title.]

London. Sm. 8vo, blk. lett. pp. 16. [Imprint cut off.]

One of the numerous small metrical pieces or chapbooks usually ascribed to the prolific pen of Martin Parker, the great ballad writer of the reigns of Charles I. and II. Its continued popularity is shewn by the frequent reprints of it which appeared from time to time, chiefly in black letter, and which by their daily wear and tear will account for its great scarceness. The earliest edition of it at present known is one in the Bodleian, printed by F. Coles, with the initials of the author, “M. P.," 1635, Svo, 11 leaves, unless it may be thought that the present one, of which the imprint is unfortunately cut off, is of an earlier date; but, as Parker did not begin to

publish anything till 1632, this is not very probable. There is a woodcut on the lower half of the title, but as the author was in the habit in his chapbooks of using old worn out woodcuts which had been employed for other works, and as a portion of it has been lost in the present copy, it is difficult to make out its meaning or application.

The tract commences without any prefix on page 3, and is written in the common three-line verse, with a rhyming termination, and is not without a certain merit from its satire and humour, as will be seen from the following short extracts from it:

I first of all went to the Court,
Where Lords and Ladies did resort,
My intertainment there was short,
cold welcome.
As soone as ere my name they heard,
They ran away full sore afraid,
And thought some Goblin had appear'd
from hell come.

Conscience quoth one, be gone with speed,
The Court few of thy name doth breed,
We of thy presence have no need:
be walking.
Thou tel'st us of our pride and lust
Which spite of thee we follow must:
So out of Court was Conscience thrust,
no talking.

Thus banisht from the Court I went
To Westminster incontinent,
Where I (alas) was sorely shent
for comming.
The Lawyers did against me plead,
It was no great matter some there said,
If Conscience quite were knockt i'th' head

then running

From them I fled with winged haste
(They did so threaten me to baste)
Though it was vaine my breath to waste
in Counsell.

For Lawyers cannot me abide,
Because for falshood I them chide,
And he that holds not on their side,
must down still.

Unto the City hyed I then,
To try what welcome there Trads-men
Would give poor Robin Conscience, when
I came there

The shop-keepers that use deceit,
Did come about me and did threat,
Unlesse I would be gone, to beat

me lame there.
And euery one both high and low,
Held Conscience as a mortall foe,
Because he doth ill vices show,
each minute.
Therefore the City in uprore
Against me rose, and me so tore,
That I am resolu'd I'le neuer more
come in it.

Having thus in his progress through the city visited Cheapside, the Exchange, Fish Street, Gracechurch Street, and various other places, Robin, seeing that wherever he goes, as soon as they discover him "they vanish,” says:

I seeing all the City giuen

To use Deceit in spight of Heauen To leaue their company I was driuen perforce then.

So ouer London bridge in haste
I hist and scoft of all men, past,
Then I to Southwark tooke at last
my course then.

When I came there, I hop'd to find
Welcome according to my mind
But they were rather more unkind
than London.

All sorts of men and women there,
Askt how I durst to them appeare,
And swore my presense they would cleare
abandon.

Finding that he did not succeed any better in the borough, he “left them in their wickedness, bewailing his bad success, and goes into the country to try what would befall him there," but visits the yeomen and farmers, and rich men of the world, with no better success:

[blocks in formation]

He that obserues, may somewhat spy
That sauours of diuinity,
For conscionable folks do I
begin it.

And so I'le bring all to an end,
It can no honest man offend;
For those that Conscience doe defend,
it praises.

And if that any gal'd Jade kick,
The Author hath devised a trick

Mongst honest folks that haue no lands,
But get their liuing with their hands':
These are his friends that to him stands, To turn him loose i'th' fields to pick

[blocks in formation]

Mr. Collier has noticed in his Hist. Dram. Poet., vol ii. p. 402, a large fragment of an early Interlude with the title of Robin Conscience, the date of which appears to be somewhat uncertain, but is supposed to be very early in the reign of Elizabeth, or possibly even earlier, and it is not unlikely that the title of Parker's tract may have been taken from this Interlude, whicb, however, has nothing in common with its successor, and its loss is not to be regretted on the score of any literary merit.

This little tract is very scarce, and from its satirical humour, and freedom from anything gross or improper, will merit reprinting. It consists of eight leaves only, including the title, printed very closely, containing nearly eleven verses on each page.

- His CONSCIENCE. Robin Conscience: or, Conscionable Robin.

Progresse through Court, City, and Countrey: With his Entertainment at each severall Place &c.

London, Printed by T. F. for Fr. Coles and are to be sold at the signe of the Lambe in the Old Baily 1662. Sm. 8vo, blk. lett. pp. 24.

Another edition of the same curious and entertaining tract in black letter. It has on Sig A 1 before the title, a worn out woodcut or frontispiece, intended we suppose to represent Robin Conscience, in a robe trimmed with ermine, holding a cap in his right hand, and a long staff in his left. On the next leaf is the title as above, with a well known cut intended as a view of the city, and Robin with his staff in the centre, and a windmill on a hill in the distance. On the reverse is another old familiar and often used cut of the courtier and the countryman resting on his staff. The verse begins on A 3, and does not vary much from that in the former impression. The present copy wants the last leaf B 4, containing one verse only, and probably some small ornament or woodcut, to fill up the page. It is one of the imperfect pieces from the curious Wolferstan collection, and has the usual signature "Frances Wolfrestan her book" on the title, of whose literary tastes we have made mention before, see p. 89.

Parker published another similar tract to this in prose, called Harry White his Humour, 12mo, 163-, which was privately reprinted by Mr. Halliwell in 1851, 4to, but is inferior in merit and humour to Robin Conscience. See Collier's Bibliogr. Cat., vol. ii. p. 102.

The present tract has been reprinted in the first vol. of the Harl. Miscell. This edition is equally scarce with the other, and a copy wanting the last leaf lately sold at Messrs. Sotheby and Co's for 17. 188.

Collation: Title A 2; Sig. A to B. 4 in eights.

Unbound.

« PreviousContinue »