[Footnote 7: PULSE.--All sorts of leguminous seeds.]
[Footnote 8: See Dedication to _The Scourge of Baseness_.]
[Footnote 9: MASTER DOCTOR HOLLAND.--The once well-known Philemon
Holland, Physician, and "Translator-General of his Age," published
translations of Livy, 1600; Pliny's "Natural History," 1601; Camden's
"Britannica," &c. He is said to have used in translation more paper and
fewer pens than any other writer before or since, and who "would not let
Suetonius be Tranquillus." Born at Chelmsford, 1551; died 1636.]
[Footnote 10: EDMUND BRANTHWAITE.--Robert Branthwaite, William
Branthwaite _Cant._, and "Thy assured friend" R. B., have each written
Commendatory Verses to ALL THE WORKS OF JOHN TAYLOR. London 1630. And
Southey in his "Lives and Works of Uneducated Poets," has the
following:--"One might have hoped in these parts for a happy meeting
between John Taylor and Barnabee, of immortal memory; indeed it is
likely that the Water-Poet and the Anti-Water-Poet were acquainted, and
that the latter may have introduced him to his connections hereabout,
Branthwaite being the same name as Brathwait, and Barnabee's brother
having married a daughter of this Sir John Dalston."]
[Footnote 11: PIERCE PENNILESS, by Thomas Nash. London, 1592.]
[Footnote 12: This "ordnance of iron" still exists there, and is
historically known as "Mons Meg" and popularly as "Long Meg."]
[Footnote 13: RECEITE.--A receptacle.]
[Footnote 14: VAUSTITY.--Emptiness.]
[Footnote 15: _See_ Anderson's The Cold Spring of Kinghorn Craig, Edinb.
1618.]
[Footnote 16: CORYATIZING.--Thomas Coryate, an English traveller, who
called himself the "Odcombian leg-stretcher." He was the son of the
rector of Odcombe, and in 1611 published an account of his travels on
the Continent with the singular title of "Coryates Crudities. Hastily
gobled up in five Moneths travells in France, Savoy, Italy, Rhetia,
commonly called the Grisons country, Helvetia, alias Switzerland, some
parts of high Germany, and the Netherlands; Newly digested in the
hungary aire of Odcombe in the county of Somerset, and now dispersed to
the nourishment of the travelling members of this Kingdome, &c. London,
printed by W. S., Anno Domini 1611." Taylor had an especial grudge
against Coryat, for having had influence enough to procure his "Laugh
and be Fat"--directed against the traveller--to be burned; and that he
never failed to "feed fat the ancient grudge," may be seen in the many
pieces of ridicule levelled at the author of the "Crudities," even after
his death.]
[Footnote 17: TOPHET.--The Hebrew name for _Hell_.]
[Footnote 18: CIMMERIAN.--Pertaining to the Cimmerii, or their country;
extremely and perpetually dark. The Cimmerii were an ancient people of
the land now called the Crimea, and their country being subject to heavy
fogs, was fabled to be involved in deep and continual obscurity. Ancient
poets also mention a people of this name who dwelt in a valley near Lake
Avernus, in Italy, which the sun was said never to visit.]
[Footnote 19: PERTH.]
[Footnote 20: BRAEMAR.]
[Footnote 21: VIRGINAL JACK.--A keyed instrument resembling a spinet.]
[Footnote 22: RED-SHANKS.--A contemptuous appellation for Scottish Highland
clansmen and native Irish, with reference to their naked hirsute limbs, and
"As lively as a _Red-Shank_" is still a proverbial saying:--"And we came into
Ireland, where they would have landed in the north parts. But I would
not, because there the inhabitants were all _Red-shanks_."--_Sir Walter
Raleigh's_ Speech on the Scaffold.]
[Footnote 23: PUT ME INTO THAT SHAPE.--That is, invested him in Highland
attire.]
[Footnote 24: "Probably the district around the skirts of Ben
Muicdui."--_Chambers'_ Domestic Annals of Scotland.]
[Footnote 25: BALLOCH CASTLE.--Now called Castle-Grant.]
[Footnote 26: MORAY.]
[Footnote 27: MORAYLAND.]
[Footnote 28: SUGAR-CANDIAN.--_i.e._, Sugar-candy.]
[Footnote 29: A PIECE OF GOLD OF TWO-AND-TWENTY SHILLINGS.--"This was a
considerable present; but Jonson's hand and heart were ever open to his
acquaintance. All his pleasures were social; and while health and
fortune smiled upon him, he was no niggard either of his time or talents
to those who needed them. There is something striking in Taylor's
concluding sentence, when the result of his (Jonson's) visit to Drummond
is considered:--but there is one _evil that walks_, which keener eyes
than John's have often failed to discover.--I have only to add, in
justice to this honest man (Taylor) that his gratitude outlived the
subject of it. He paid the tribute of a verse to his benefactor's
memory:--the verse indeed, was mean: but poor Taylor had nothing better
to give."--Lt. Col. Francis Cunningham's edition of Gifford's Ben
Jonson's Works, p. xli.
"In the summer of 1618 Scotland received a visit from the famous Ben
Jonson. The burly Laureate walked all the way, among the motives for a
journey then undertaken by few Englishmen, might be curiosity regarding
a country from which he knew that his family was derived, his
grandfather having been one of the Johnsons of Annandale. He had many
friends too, particularly among the connections of the Lennox family,
whom he might be glad to see at their own houses. Among those with whom
he had amicable intercourse, was William Drummond, the poet, then in the
prime of life, and living as a bachelor in his romantic mansion of
Hawthornden, on the Esk, seven miles from Edinburgh. It is probable that
Drummond and Jonson had met before in London, and indulged together in
the "wit-combats" at the Mermaid and similar scenes. Indeed, there is a
prevalent belief in Scotland that it was mainly to see Drummond at
Hawthornden that Jonson came so far from home, and certain it is, from
Drummond's report of his '_Conversations_,' that he designed 'to write a
Fisher or Pastoral (Piscatory?) Play--and make the stage of it on the
Lomond Lake--he also contemplated writing in prose his 'Foot Pilgrimage
to Scotland,' which, with a feeling very natural in one who found so
much to admire where so little had been known, he spoke of entitling 'A
DISCOVERY.' Unfortunately, this work, as well as a poem in which he
called Edinburgh--
'The Heart of Scotland, Britain's other eye,'
has not been preserved to us. We can readily see that the work
contemplated must have been of a general character, from Jonson's
letters to Drummond on the subject of it. How much to be regretted that
we have not the Scotland of that day delineated by so vigorous a pen as
that of the author of _Sejanual_"--_Chambers'_ Domestic
Annals of Scotland, vol. 1.
Whether Taylor's "Penniless Pilgrimage" really did interfere with, and
prevent the publication of Ben Jonson's 'Foot Pilgrimage' would now be
difficult to say. It is very evident from Taylor's remarks in his
Dedication "To all my loving adventurers, &c.," he had been accused by
the critics that he "_did undergo this project, either in malice, or
mockage of Master Benjamin Jonson_." It is quite certain that Taylor
lost no time in getting his "Pilgrimage" printed "at the charges of the
author" immediately on his return to London on the fifteenth of October
1618.]
[Footnote 30: ROUSE.--A full glass, a bumper.]
[Footnote 31: UNFELLOWED.--_i.e._, not matched.]
[Footnote 32: TO ISLINGTON TO THE SIGN OF THE MAINDENHEAD.--This then
roadside Public-house, we are informed from recent enquiries, was
situate at the corner of Maiden Lane, Battle Bridge, now known as King's
Cross, from a statue of George IV.--a most execrable performance taken
down 1842. The "Old Pub" is turned into a gin palace, and named the
Victoria, while Maiden Lane--an ancient way leading from Battle Bridge
to Highgate Hill--is known now as York Road.]
[Footnote 33: GUY OF WARWICK.--There are several versions and editions of
this work. In the book of the Stationers' Company, John Trundle--he at
the sign of NO-BODY--on the 15th of January, 1619, entered "a play,
called the Life and Death of Guy Earl of Warwick, written by John Day
and Thomas Dekker." See Baker's Biog. Dram., page 274, vol. 2.--"Well,
if he read this with patience I'll be gelt, and troll ballads for Master
Trundle yonder, the rest of my mortality."--_Ben Jonson's_ Every Man in
his Humour, act i. sc. 2.]