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Title: Fables of John Gay (Somewhat Altered)

Author: John Benson Rose

John Gay

Release date: August 6, 2008 [eBook #26199]
Most recently updated: January 3, 2021

Language: English

Credits: Produced by Marilynda Fraser-Cunliffe, Sarah Gutierrez, and the
Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This
file was made using scans of public domain works in the International
Children's Digital Library.)

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FABLES OF JOHN GAY (SOMEWHAT ALTERED) ***

FABLES OF JOHN GAY
(SOMEWHAT ALTERED).

FABLES OF JOHN GAY

(SOMEWHAT ALTERED).


AFFECTIONATELY PRESENTED TO

MARGARET ROSE,

BY HER UNCLE

JOHN BENSON ROSE.

[FOR PRIVATE CIRCULATION.]

LONDON:
PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES & SONS, STAMFORD STREET,
AND CHARING CROSS.

1871.

DEDICATION.

Si doulce la Margarite.

When I first saw you—never mind the year—you could speak no English, and when next I saw you, after a lapse of two years, you would prattle no French; when again we met, you were the nymph with bright and flowing hair, which frightened his Highness Prince James out of his feline senses, when, as you came in by the door, he made his bolt by the window. It was then that you entreated me, with "most petitionary vehemence," to write you a book—a big book—thick, and all for yourself—

"Apollo heard, and granting half the prayer,
 Shuffled to winds the rest and tossed in air."

I have not written the book, nor is it thick: but I have printed you a book, and it is thin. And I take the occasion to note that old Geoffry Chaucer, our father poet, must have had you in his mind's eye, by prescience or precognition, or he could hardly else have written two poems, one on the daisy and one on the rose. They are poems too long for modern days, nor are we equal in patience to our fore-fathers, who read 'The Faërie Queen,' 'Gondibert,' and the 'Polyolbion,' annually, as they cheeringly averred, through and out. Photography, steam, and electricity make us otherwise, and Patience has fled to the spheres; therefore, if feasible, shall "brevity be the soul of wit," and we will eschew "tediousness and outward flourishes" in compressing 'The Flower and the Leaf' into little:—

The Flower and the Leaf.

A maiden in greenwood in month of sweet May,
 Arose and awoke at the dawn of the day:
 As she wended along,
 She heard fairie song—
 "Si doulce est la Margarite."
 There the Ladye the Flower and Ladye the Leaf,
 With knights and squires of fairie chief,
 Were met upon mead,
 For devoir and deed—
 Homage unto "La doulce Margarite."
There the ladye in white and the ladye in green
 Sat on their thrones by the Fairie Queen,
 Whilst knights did their duty,
 And bowed down to beauty—
 "Si doulce est la Margarite,"—
 When the skies grew hot and the ladies pale,
 And the storm descended in lightning and hail,
 As they danced and sung,
 And the burden rung—
 "Sous la feuille, sous la feuille, meet."
Our Ladye of Leaf asked her of the Flower
 And fairie Nymphs to shelter in bower:
 And they danced and sung,
 And the refrain rung—
 "Si doulce est la Margarite."
 All woe begone shivered the Ladye Flower,
 The Ladye Leaf glittered in gems from the shower:
 As they danced and sung,
 And the refrain rung—
 "Si doulce est la Margarite."
And knights and squires then wended forth,
 East and west, and south, and north:
 To free forests and shores
 From giants and boars,
 And shelter in night and in storm;
 And every knight bore in chief on his shield
 The foyle en verte on an argent field:
 And they rode and they sung
 The huge oaks among:—
 "Sous la feuille, sous la feuille, dorme."
The maiden then asked of the Fairie Queen
 To tell her the moral of what she had seen:
 Who answered and sung
 In her fairie tongue—
 "Si doulce est la Margarite."
 The knight that is wise will lead from bower
 The lasting Leaf—not the fading Flower:
 And when storms arise
 To turmoil life's skies—
 "Sous la feuille, sous la feuille, meet."

Romaunt of the Rose.

Within my twentie yeares of age,
 When Love asserteth most his courage,
 I dreamed a dream, now fain to tell—
 A dream that pleased me wondrous well.
 Now this dream will I rime aright,
 To make your heartes gaye and light;
 For Love desireth it—also
 Commandeth me that it be so.
 It is the Romaunt of the Rose,
 And tale of love I must disclose.
 Fair is the matter for to make,
 But fairer—if she will to take
 For whom the romaunt is begonne
 For that I wis she is the fair one
 Of mokle prise; and therefore she
 So worthier is beloved to be;
 And well she ought of prise and right
 Be clepened Rose of every wight.
 But it was May, thus dreamed me,—
 A time of love and jollitie:
 A time there is no husks or straw,
 But new grene leaves on everie shaw;
 The woods were grene, the earth was proud,
 Beastès and birdès snug aloud;
 And earth her poore estate forgote,
 In which the winter her had fraught.
 Ah! ben in May the sunne is bright,
 And everie thing does take delight:
 The nightingale then singeth blithe;
 Then is blissful many a scithe;
 The goldfinch and the popinjay,
 They then have many things to say.
 Hard is his heart that loveth nought
 In May, when all such love is wrought.
Right from my bed full readilie,
 That it was by the morrow earlie;
 And up I rose, and gan me clothe
 Anon I with my handès bothe:
 A silver needle forth I drew
 Out of an aguiler quainte inew,
 And gan this needle threade anone,
 For out of town me list to gone,
 Jollife and gaye, full of gladnesse,
 Towards a river gan I me dresse,
 For from a hill that stood there neere
 Came down the stream of that rivere—
 My face, I wis, there saw I wele,
 The bottom ypaved everie dele
 With gravel, which was shining shene,
 In meadows soft and soote and greene.
 And full attempre out of drede
 Then gan I walken throw the mede
 Downward ever in my playing
 As the river's waters straying;
 And when I had awhile igone
 I saw a garden right anone,
 Of walls with many portraitures,
 And bothe of images and peintures—
But you may read it as it flows
 In Chaucer's Romaunt of the Rose.

Chaucer to his Booke.

Now go, my booke, and be courageous,
 For now I send you forthe into the worlde.
 And though ye may find some outrageous,
 And in a pette be in some cornere hurl'd;
 Yet you by little fingeres will be greasèd
 And known hereafter by the marke of thumbe;
 At which, my little booke, be ye well pleasèd,
 For booke, like mouthe, unopenèd is dumbe.
 And there be some, perchance, will bidde you off
 To Conventrè, or Yorke, or Jericho;
 But be not you, my booke, abashed by scoff,
 For I will teach you where you boun to go,—
 Which is in Gloucestershire, there unto Bisley,
 Where the church spire is spièd long afarre;
 It is not either uncouth, square, or grisly,
 But soareth high, as if to catch a starre;
 Where shall the brother of the Christian Yeare,
 Keble, hereafter tend the seven springs,
 Above whose fountains doth The Grove uproar,
 Like to Mount Helicon, where Clio sings,
 Where rookès build, and peacocke spreadeth tail.
 And there the wood-pigeon doth sobbe Coo coo;
 Neither do sparrow, merle or mavis fail,
 And there the owl at midnight singeth Whoo.
 And where there are a Laurel and a Rose,
 Beneath whose branches wide a broode doth haunt;
 The whom high walls and fretted gates enclose,
 Where goode may enter, badde are bidde avaunt.
 And there is one yclepen Margarete,
 Who alsoe for the nonce is clepen Rose,
 For she must on some other hille be sette
 When Hymenæos shall her lotte dispose.
 And, little booke, it is to her you runne.
 And sisters eight, for they, in soothe, are nine;
 And in their bowere baske as in the suunne,
 And beare Maid Marion's love to Catherine,
 Who is her gossipe, and she is her pette;
 And nought mote save us from a wrath condign,
 If you, my booke, should haplessly forgette,
 Nor bended knees, I trow, nor teares of Margarete.

CONTENTS.

PAGE
Dedication v
Introduction 1
Lion, Tiger, and Traveller 4
Spaniel and Chameleon 6
Mother, Nurse, and Fairy 7
Jove's Eagle, and Murmuring Beasts 9
Wild Boar and Ram 10
Miser and Plutus 11
Lion, Fox, and Gander 12
Lady and Wasp 14
Bull and Mastiff 15
Elephant and Bookseller 16
Turkey, Peacock, and Goose 18
Cupid, Hymen, and Plutus 20
The Tamed Fawn 21
Monkey who had seen the World 22
Philosopher and Pheasant 24
Pin and Needle 25
Shepherd's Dog and Wolf 26
The Unsatisfactory Painter 27
Lion and Cub 29
Old Hen and Young Cock 30
Ratcatcher and Cats 31
Goat without a Beard 33
Old Woman and her Cats 34
Butterfly and Snail 36
Scold and Parrot 37
Cur and Mastiff 38
Sick Man and the Angel 39
Persian, Sun, and Cloud 41
Fox at the point of Death 42
Setting Dog and Partridge 43
Universal Apparition 44
Owls and Sparrow 46
Courtier and Proteus 47
Mastiff 49
Barley Mow and Dunghill 50
Pythagoras and Countryman 51
Farmer's Dame and Raven 52
Turkey and Ant 54
Father and Jupiter 55
Two Monkeys 56
Owl and Farmer 58
Juggler and Vice 59
Council of Horses 61
Hound and Huntsman 63
Poet and the Rose 64
Cur, Horse, and Shepherd's Dog 66
Court of Death 67
Florist and Pig 68
Man and Flea 69
Hare and many Friends 71
Dog and Fox 72
Vulture, Sparrow, and Birds 75
Ape and Poultry 78
Ant in Office 81
Bear in a Boat 85
Squire and Cur 88
Countryman and Jupiter 91
Man, Cat, Dog, and Fly 95
Jackall, Leopard, and Beasts 98
Degenerate Bees 101
Packhorse and Carrier 104
Pan and Fortune 107
Plutus, Cupid, and Time 109
Owl, Swan, Cock, Spider, Ass, and Farmer 113
Cookmaid, Turnspit, and Ox 117
Raven, Sexton, and Earthworm 120
Town Mouse and Country Mouse 124
Magpie and Brood 126
The Three Warnings 129
Postscript 131