commended it highly, and saide it was good invention and fine tales: tush, quoth another, most of them are stolne out of Boccace Decameron: for all that, quoth the third, tis pretty and witty. As they were thus commending and discommending, there sate by an auncient man that was a Cobler in Caunterbury: masters, quoth he, I have read the booke, and tis indifferent, like a cup of bottle ale, halfe one and halfe the other: but tis not merry inough for Tarlton's vaine, nor stuffed with his fine conceites, therefore it shall passe for a booke and no more. No, no, what say you to old father Chaucer? how like you of his Caunterburie Tales? are they not pleasant to delight and witty to instruct, and full of conceited learning to shewe the excellencie of his wit ? All men commended Chaucer as the father of English poets, and saide that he shot a shoote which many have aimed at, but never reacht to. Well, quoth the cobler, nowe that wee are going to Graves-end, and so I thinke most of us to Caunterbury, let us tell some tales to passe away the time till wee come off the water, and we will call them Caunterburie Tales. To this motion the whole company willingly consented, and onely they stood upon this, who should begin? If it be no offence, quoth the cobler, to other gentlemen that be here, I myselfe will be ringeleader : to this they all agreed, and the cobler began to settle himselfe : yet before hee beginne, I will as neere as I can, describe you what manner of man he was.

The description of the cobler.

His stature was large and tall,

His lims well set withall.

Of a strong bone, and a broad chest,

He was wilde and wildsome in the brest.

His forehead hie and a bald pate,

Well I wote he was a mate

That had loved well a bonnie lasse,

For the lownes eies were as gray as glasse:

And oft have I heard my mother say,

The wanton eie is ere most gray.

He loved well a cup of strong ale,

For his nose was nothing pale:
But his snout and all his face
Was as red as ruby or topace.

A voice he had cleare and lowde,
And well he gan sing to a crowde.
He was a stout sturdie squire,

And loved week daie good compire.
Drinke he would with everie man,
In cup, cruse, glasse, or can:
And what everie day he got,
He hoorded up in the ale-pot:
That all Caunterburie gan lere,
To talke of this merrie coblere.
Therefore now marke me well,

For thus his tale he gan to tell.

Further extracts from this curious work will be found in the Appendix, taken from the later and unique edition of 1608. It was again republished in 1630, under the title of "The Tincker of Turvey, his merry Pastime in his passing from Billinsgate to Gravesend." In this edition, the " Epistle to the Gentlemen Readers" is nearly re-written, "Robin Goodfellow's epistle" is omitted, two new tales are introduced, the eight orders of cuckolds are different, and the "Old Wives tale" and "The Somner's tale" are omitted. From "Greene's Vision," it appears that the Cobler of Canterbury had been erroneously attributed to him, which rendered him "passing melancholy."

"3

2

1 There is also entry of it on the Stationers' Registers, 12th June, 1600. 2 Called "The tinker's tale" and "The Seaman's tale."

3 "As blinde Baiard will jump soonest into the mire, so have I ventured afore many my betters to put myselfe into the presse, and have set foorth sundrie bookes in print of love and such amorous fancies, which some have favoured and other have misliked. But now of late there came foorth a booke called the Cobler of Canterburie, a merry worke, and made by some madde fellow, conteining plesant tales, a little tainted

The portrait which forms the frontispiece to the present volume has been carefully copied by Mr. Shaw from an early drawing of Tarlton in MS. Harl., 3885, f. 19, reduced from the original. There is another portrait of Tarlton1 in the Pepysian library; and in the seventeenth century he, or rather his ghost, appeared in the character of a drummer to annoy a quiet family in Wiltshire. A ballad in the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford, which has Tarlton's portrait at the top as a drummer, no doubt the same woodcut that was used for the title-page of his "Jests," is thus entitled:

A wonder of wonders; being a true relation of the strange and invisible beating of a drum at the house of John Mompesson Esquire, at Tidcomb in the county of Wiltshire, being about eight of the clock at night, and continuing till four in the morning, several dayes, one after another, to the great admiration of many persons of honour, gentlemen of quality, and many hundreds who have gone from several parts to hear this miraculous wonder, since the first time it began to beat, "Rounheads and cuckolds, come dig, come dig." Also the burning of a drum that was taken from a drummer. Likewise the manner how the stools and chairs danced about the rooms. The drummer is sent to Glocester gaol. Likewise a great conflict betwixt the evill spirit and Anthony a lusty country fellow. To the tune of, Bragandary, "All you that fear the God on high."

with scurrilitie, such, reverend Chawcer, as yourselfe set foorth in your journey to Canterbury." — Greene's Vision: Written at the instant of his death, conteyning a penitent passion for the folly of his pen, 4to., bl. 1., no date. Greene adds that this book was incerti authoris, and had been "fathered upon him" quite erroneously.

1 And another is mentioned in Sir William Musgrave's Catalogue, 8vo., Lond., 1800, p. 252, though this may be merely the modern engraving from that in the Pepysian collection.

66

The flatness of Tarlton's nose is well preserved in the portrait; and it was occasioned, if we may believe the Jests," p. 29, by an accident in parting dogs and bears. His habit of squinting is alluded to at p. 12. His portrait in the Harleian manuscript is accompanied by the following explanatory verses:

The picture here set down

Within this letter T:

1

A-right doth shew the forme and shape

Of Tharlton unto the.

When hee in pleasaunt wise

The counterfet expreste

Of clowne, with cote of russet hew

And sturtups with the reste.

1 These verses have already been printed in the Catalogue of the Harleian Manuscripts, iii., 94, in Ritson's Bibliographia Poetica, in Shaw's Dresses and Decorations of the Middle Ages, and by Mr. Knight in his Illustrations to Twelfth Night, act iii. Mr. Knight observes that the portrait in the Harl. MS. was executed by John Scottowe in the reign of Elizabeth, the MS. having the arms of that sovereign on the title-page, with the inscription, "God save Queene Elizabeth longe to reygne." Mr. Knight is of opinion that this circumstance proves the portrait in the MS. to be an earlier performance than the figure prefixed to the "Jests," 1611; but it is scarcely necessary to observe that the woodcut on the latter was in all probability as old as 1600, and perhaps much older. It is not at all likely that a new woodcut was executed for the edition of 1611, an earlier edition having been published. Mr. Knight's woodcut of Tarlton is not among the best of the embellishments of his edition of Shakespeare; but no better example of the passage "dost thou live by thy tabor?" could have been selected. According to Douce, the tabor is found in the hands of fools long before the time of Shakespeare.

Harvey, in his "Foure Letters and certaine Sonnets," 1592, frequently alludes to Tarlton, and associates his name more than once with Greene. "Tarlton's amplifications A per se A," mentioned at p. 34 of that work, may allude to a work of Tarlton's, or perhaps to his system of extending words for the sake of producing a ridiculous compound, as for instance his answer, "without all paraquestions!" If the Robert Greene mentioned with Tarlton in MS. Sloane, 2530, be really the poet, and Mr. Dyce's memoir of the former does not assist us in verifying the fact, they were probably companions from early youth.

In concluding our collection of these scattered notices of Tarlton, which it is to be regretted are not more explicit and satisfactory, it may be necessary to observe that the grossness of two articles in the original edition

1 Ulysses upon Ajax, 1596, Sig D.