And also with them the fraternyte
Of vnthryftes, which do our house endewe,

And neuer fayle with brethren alway newe.
Also here is kept, and holden in degre

With in our hous the ordres viii. tyme thre Of knaues;1 only we can them not kepe out, They swarme so thyke as bees in a rout; And chyef of all that dooth vs encombre,

[Is] the ordre of fooles, that be without nombre: For dayly they make suche preas and cry,

That scant our hous can them satysfy.

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1070

1 The writer here speaks of four-and-twenty Orders of Knaves, which corresponds with the number described on a leaf attached to the Heber copy of Harman's Caveat for Common Cursitors, 1567, 4to. But it seems that an additional one was subsequently discovered or invented, for, in Awdeley's Fraternitye of Vacabondes, printed in 1573, 4to, we hear of twenty-five Orders of Knaves. The number was possibly not quite accurately determined, and fluctuated according to the fancy of the writer. From an entry in the Registers of the Stationers' Company (Collier's Extracts, i. 42), there is room to infer that the Fraternitye of Vacabondes, including the twenty-five Orders of Knaves, was in existence as early as 1560-1, although no edition of so early a date is at present known. The author of this production found imitators. In 1562-3, Alexander Lacy paid fourpence for his licence to print "The xx. Orders of Callettes or Drabbys" (Collier's Extracts, i. 71), and in 1569-70, Henry Kyrkham obtained, on similar terms, leave to print "a ballett intituled the xx. orders of fooles (Collier's Extracts, i. 224). Whether "xx." in the last article be an error of the clerk for "xxv." it is difficult to judge; but a ballad is extant with the following title: "The xxv. Orders of fooles." Finis. q. T. G. Imprinted at London by Alexander Lacie for Henry Kyrkham. See An Elizabethan Garland, 1856, p. 22.

2 i. e. press, crowd.

¶ Copland. Yet one thyng I wonder that ye do not tell:

Come there no women this way to dwell?

¶ Porter. Of all the sortes that be spoken of a fore, I warraunt women ynow in store,

That we are wery of them; euery day

They come so thycke, that they stop the way.
The systerhod of drabbes, sluttes and callets,
Do here resorte, with theyr bags and wallets,
And be parteners of the confrary1

Of the maynteners of yll husbandry.

¶ Copland. A lewd sorte is of them of a surety.
Now, mayster Porter, I thank you hertyly
Of your good talkyng; I must take my leue;
The shoure is done, and it is toward eue;
Another tyme, and at more leaser,

I wyll for you do as great a pleaser.

Porter. There be a M. mo than I can tell;
But at this tyme I byd you farwell.

Lenuoy of the Auctour.

Go lytell quayre to euery degre,

And on thy mater desyre them to loke,

1 Fraternity.

1080

1090

2 i. e. quire [of paper], hence a pamphlet, which usually consisted only of a quire, or sheet. Writers formerly spoke of their

Desyryng them for to pardon me,

That am so bolde to put them in my boke;
To eschue vyce I the vndertoke,
Dysdeynyng no maner of creature ;

I were to blame, yf I them forsoke;
None in this world of welth can be sure.

Finis.

quire, or quayre, as we now do of our sheets. Thus, Lyndsay, at the conclusion of the Complaynt of the Papingo, says:—

"And to the quair I geif commandement,

Mak na repair, quhare poetis bene present:
Because thow bene but rethorik sa rude,
Be never sene, besyde nane uther buke."

Upon which passage Mr. Chalmers notes that Chaucer, in the
Envoy to the Knightes Tale, has a similar expression :-

The expression is, however, not particularly rare.

The anony

mous author of Colyn Blowbols Testament employs it in the Envoy

"Thow litelle quayer, how darst thow shew thy face,
Or com yn presence of men of honesté ?"

See vol. i. p. 109.

The Payne and Sorowe of Evyll

Maryage.

HE Payne and Sorowe of Euyll Maryage.

THE

[Beneath this a woodcut of a wedded couple with a priest who joins their hands. Here endeth ye payne and sorowe of euyll maryage. Imprynted at London in fletestrete at the sygne of the Sonne, by me Wynkyn de Worde.

n. d. 4to. four leaves, with Wynkyn de Worde's large tripartite device on the reverse of the last leaf (No. vi. of Dibdin's List).

The present tract enters into the series of those which have been published with the object of exposing and ridiculing the frailties of the female sex. Three other pieces of the same character proceeded from the press of W. de Worde: "A Complaynte of them that ben to late maryed," "A Complaint of them that be to soone maryed," and Henry Fielding's Fyftene Joyes of Maryage, 1509. One of these has been included by Mr. Collier in his "Illustrations of Early English Literature."

AKE hede and lerne, thou lytell chylde,

廳

and se

That tyme passed wyl not agayne retourne,

And in thy youthe unto vertues use the :

Lette in thy brest no maner vyce sojourne,
That in thyne age thou haue no cause to mourne

For tyme lost, nor for defaute of wytte:
Thynke on this lesson, and in thy mynde it shytte.1

Glory unto god, louynge and benyson

To Peter and Johan and also to Laurence,
Which haue me take2 under proteccyon
From the deluge of mortall pestylence,
And from the tempest of deedly vyolence,
And me preserue that I fall not in the rage
Under the bonde and yocke of maryage.

I was in purpose to haue taken a wyfe,
And for to haue wedded without auysednes

A full fayre mayde, with her to lede my lyfe,
Whome that I loued of hasty wylfulnes,

With other fooles to haue lyued in dystresse,

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19

As some gaue me counseyle, and began me to constrayne
To haue be partable of theyr wooful payne.

They laye upon me, and hasted me full sore,
And gaue me counseyle for to haue be bounde,
And began to prayse eche daye more and more
The woofull lyfe in whiche they dyd habounde,
And were besy my gladnes to confounde,
Themselfe rejoysynge, bothe at euen and morowe,
To haue a felowe to lyue with them in sorowe.

But of his grace god hath me preserued
By the wyse counseyle of these aungelles thre:
From hell gates they haue my lyfe conserued
In tyme of warre, whan louers lusty,

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