Tarltons Newes out of Purgatorie. Onelye such a jest as his Jigge, fit for Gentlemen to laugh at an houre, &c. Published by an old companion of his, Robin Goodfellow. 4to. Without date, but "printed for Edward White," in or before 1590; for in that year appeared an answer to it, under the title of "The Cobler of Caunterbury," which the reader will find more particularly noticed in the Introduction to this work. Another edition was published in 1630, which is merely a reprint, with some unimportant variations, and a few blunders, a whole line being omitted in the address to the "gentlemen readers." This tract was entered at Stationers' Hall on June 26th, 1590, under the following title: "Tarltons newes out of Purgatorye, or a caskett full of pleasaunt conceiptes, stuffed with delightfull devise and quaint myrthe, as his humour maye afoorde, to feede gentlemens fancies." E TO THE GENTLEMEN READERS, HEALTH. Gentlemen, the horse when hee is firste handled to the warres, starteth at the crack of every peece; and every coucht launce is a censure of death to a freshe water souldier. So fareth it with mee; for, never before beeing in print, I start at the sight of the presse, and having not dared to look into the open light, I feared with the owle to flye before it be twy-light : yet I have heard others, whose bookes have past your viewe, account you so favourable, curteous, and affable, shrouding every scape1 with silence, that I presumed the rather to experience with them the hope of your favours; which, if I finde, as they haue doon, though I be blinde Bayard, yet I will in the thickest of the mire plunge up to the saddle for your sakes. Virgill, after he wrot his Aeneidos3 wrote his Culex, and assaied in trifles before he attempted in triumphes. Lucan wrot quædam lirica, before he began with Bella per Emathios plus 2 A piece of negligence. Bayard was originally the name for a bay horse, but usually applied to a horse in general. The proverb of "blind Bayard," here alluded to, is the very reverse of the maxim "look before you leap." So Chaucer:"Ye ben as bold as is Bayard the blind, That blondereth forth, and peril casteth non." 3 That is, the Eneis. Cant. T., 16881. This was a common mistake in early writers. The Culex is printed in Virgilii Appendix, cum Jos. Scaligeri commentt. et castigationibus, 8vo. Lugd., 1573, and elsewhere. 66 * The early edition reads "bellum," which is corrected to "bella” in the impression of 1630. "Quædam lirica" is the same in both copies. The Pharsalia had not at this time been translated into English. quam civilia campos : Roome was not builded on a day,' and men that venture little hazard little. So, gentlemen, I present you with a toy of Tarltons, called his Newes out of Purgatory, which I desire you to accept as curteously as I offer willing to please: thogh they be crepundia, yet reade them, and if you finde any pleasant facetic or quicquid salis, thinke all savorye, and so pleasde without being satirically peremptorye; for Momus will have a mouth full of invectives, and Zoilus should not be Zoilus, if hee were not squint eyde. Therefore leaving their humours to the wordmongers of malice, that like the vipers, curteous censure 2 1 "Builded" for "built" is not uncommon, and the same proverb occurs in The French Alphabet, 12mo., Lond, 1615, p. 18. 2 Opinion. This use of the word is very frequent. See Nares in v. |