Bayly. Kepe ye content a while, se that your tonges ye holde;

Methinkes you shuld remembre, this is no place to scolde.

How knowest thou, gammer Gurton, dame Chat thy nedle had?

Gammer. To name you, sir, the party, chould not be very glad.

Bayly. Yea, but we muste nedes heare it, and therfore say it boldly.

Gammer. Such one as told the tale, full soberly and coldly,

Even he that loked on, wil sweare on a booke,

What time this drunken gossip my faire long neele up

tooke:

Diccon (master) the bedlam, cham very sure ye know him.

Bayly. A false knave, by God's pitie! ye were but a foole to trow him.

I durst aventure wel the price of my best cap,

91 That when the end is knowen, all wil turne to a jape. Tolde he not you that besides, she stole your cocke that tyde?

Gammer. No master, no indeede, for then he shuld

have lyed;

91 That when the end is knowen, all wil turne to a jape.] Jape is generally used in an obscene sense, as in the Prologue to Grim the Collier of Croydon, vol. XI. and Skelton's Song in Sir John Hawkin's History of Musick, vol. III. p. 6. It here signifies a jest or joke. So, in the Prologue to Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, 1.705 : Upon a day he gat him more moneie

66

"Than that the persone gat in monethes tweie.
"And thus with fained flattering and japes,

"He made the persone, and the peple, his apes."

And, in Batman upon Bartholeme, 1535, as quoted by Sir John Hawkins, in his History of Musick, vol. II. p. 125: “ They kepe no counseyll, but they telle all that they here: sodeinly they laugh, "and sodenly they wepe: alwaye they crye, jangle, and jape, "uneth they ben stylle whyle they slepe."

Skelton's Works, 1736, p. 236:

Nay jape not hym, he is no smal fole.

It is a solempne syre and solayne."

My cocke is, I thanke Christ, safe and wel a fine.
Chat. Yea, but that rogged colt, that whore, that
Tyb of thine,

Said plainly thy cock was stolne, and in my house was eaten;

That lying cut is lost, that she is not swinged and beaten.

And yet for al my good name, it were a small amendes ; I picke not this geare (hear'st thou) out of my fingers endes.

But he that hard it told me, who thou of. late didst name,

Diccon, whom al men knowes, it was the very same. Bayly. This is the case; you lost your nedle about the dores;

And she answeres againe, she hase no cocke of yours;
Thus in your talķe and action, from that you do intend,
She is whole five mile wide from that she doth defend.
Will you saie she hath your cocke?

Gammer. No, mary sir, that chil not.
Bayly. Will you confesse hir neele?
Chat. Will I? no, sir, will I not.
Bayly. Then there lieth all the matter.
Gammer. Soft master, by the way,

Ye know she could do litle, and she cold not say nay. Bayly. Yea, but he that made one lie about your cocke stealing,

Wil not sticke to make another, what time lies be in

dealing.

weene, the ende wil prove this brawle did first arise Upon no other ground, but only Diccon's lyes.

Chat. Though some be lyes, as you belike have espyed them;

Yet other some be true, by proofe I have wel tryed them.

Bayly. What other thing beside this, dame chat? Chat. Mary syr, even this,

The tale I told before, the selfe same tale it was his ; He gave me, like a frende, warning against my losse, Els had my hens be stolne eche one, by God's crosse.

He tolde me Hodge wold come, and in he came indeede; But as the matter chaunsed, with greater hast then speede.

This truth was said, and true was found, as truly I report.

Bayly. If doctor Rat be not deceived, it was o another sort.

Doctor Rat. By God's mother, thou and he be a cople of suttle foxes;

Betweene you and Hodge, I beare awaie the boxes. Did not Diccon appoynt the place, wher thou shuld'st stand to mete him?

Chat. Yes, by the masse; and if he came, bad me not sticke to speet hym.

Doctor Rat. God's sacrament! the villain knave hath drest us round about;

He is the cause of all this brawle, that dyrty shitten loute, When gammer Gurton here complained, and made a ruful mone,

I heard him sweare that you had gotten hir nedle that was gone.

And this to try he furder said, he was ful loth; how be it He was content with small adoe to bring me where to

see it.

And where he sat, he said ful certain, if I wold folow his read,

Into your house a privy waie he wold me guide and leade, And where ye had it in your hands, sewing about a

clowte,

And set me in the backe hole, thereby to finde you

out:

And whiles I sought a quietnes, creping upon my knees, I found the weight of your door-bar, for my reward and

fees.

Such is the lucke that some men gets, while they begin to mel,*

In setting at one such as were out, minding to make al well.

mel] i. e. to meddle. S.

Hodge. Was not wel blest, gammer, to scape that scoure? and chad ben there,

Then chad ben drest, belike, as ill (by the masse) as gaffer vicar.

Bayly. Mary, sir, here is a sport alone; I loked for such an end;

If Diccon had not play'd the knave, this had ben sone amend.

My gammer here he made a foole, and drest hir as she

was;

And goodwife Chat he set to scold, 92 till both partes cried, alas!

And doctor Rat was not behind, whiles Chat his crown did pare;

I wold the knave had ben starke blind, if Hodg had not his share.

Hodge. Cham meetly wel sped alredy among's, cham drest like a coult;

And chad not had the better wit, chad been made a doult.

Bayly. Sir knave, make hast Diccon were here; fetch him where ever he be.

Chat. Fie on the villain, fie, fie, that makes us thus agree!

Gammer. Fie on him, knave, with al my hart, now fie, and fie againe !

Doctor Rat. Now fie on him, may I best say, whom he hath almost slaine.

Bayly. Lo where he commeth at hand, belike he was not fare.

Diccon, heare be two or three thy company cannot spare. Diccon. God blesse you, and you may be blest so manie al at once.

Chat. Come knave, it were a good deed to geld the, by cockes bones.

Seest not thy handiwarke ? sir Rat, can ye forbeare him? Diccon. A vengeance on those hands life, for my hands cam not nere hym.

92 scole.

The horsen priest hath lift the pot in some of these alewyves chayres,

That his head wold not serve him, belyke, to come downe the stayres.

Bayly. Nay, soft, thou maist not play the knave, and have this language to;

If thou thy tong bridle a while, the better mist thou do. Confesse the truth as I shall aske, and cease a while to

fable,

And for thy fault, I promise the, thy handling shal be reasonable.

Hast thou not made a lie or two, to set these two by the eares?

Diccon. What if I have? five hundred such have I

seene within these seven yeares :

I am sory for nothing else, but that I see not the sport

Which was betwene them when they met, as they themselves report.

Bayly. The greatest thing, master Rat, ye se how he is drest.

Diccon. What devil nede he be groping so depe in goodwife Chat's hen's nest?

Bayly. Yea, but it was thy drif to bring him into the briars.

Diccon. God's bread! hath not such an old foole wit to save his eares?

He showeth himselfe herein, ye see, so very 9a coxe,
* The cat was not so madly alured by the foxe,
To run in the snares was set for him doubtlesse ;
For he leapt in for myce, and this sir John for madnes.

93 -a coxe,] Minshieu, in his Dictionary, 1627 (as quoted by Mr. Tollet, in his Notes on Shakspeare, vol. V. p. 433.) says: "Na"tural ideots and fools have and still do accustome themselves to weare in their cappes, cockes feathers, or a hat with a necke " and head of a cock on the top, &c." From this circumstance, Diccon, probably calls Dr. Rat a coxe; that is, a coxcomb, an ideot. the cat was not, &c.] See the History of Reynard the Fox, chap. 7, edit 1701. S.