" I did see a fight tother day
         A damsel did begin the fray
        She with her daily friend did meet,
        Then standing in the open street:
        She gave such hard and sturdy blows
        He bled ten gallons at the nose
        Yet neither seemed to faint or fall
            Nor gave her no abuse at all."

Answer: " It is a Pump."

Again—
      " Ralph Trundle was a jovial blade
        Of mighty courage stout and free,
        And many a worthy match he made
        At once to fight with three times three
        A gets himself within a throng
        And kicks and cuffs 'em by the ears
        And fairly lays 'em all along
        Though he be short, and he be tall
        As often fairly throws 'em all."

Answer: " It is a bowl at ninepins." No
doubt, the description is accurate enough;
but there is a hidden meaning in this. The
little stout man kicking and cuffing the big
Goliaths of Gath by the ears and laying them
"all along " is quite Epic. Some doughty
little champion must be sub-understood, the
cock of Newcastle and the terror of the
adjoining pitmen.

The " Poet's Jests " form another section
of my canny book: " a collection of pleasant
and merry conceits; some of which (as is
ingenuously observed) are known to be true,
and the rest may be the like. Newcastle,
printed in this year."

"A poet meeting with some Sergeants of the
Counter whom he knew, they asked him to drink,
which he accepted. Then one of them asked him
whether he would eat? He thankfully said yes.
So they sent for some roast beef for him, which he
ate heartily of, heartily crying that they were the
pillars of the nation; and when he had satisfied
himself, they desired him to explain his meaning.
Truly, said he, I did say you were the pillars of the
nation, but I did mean the catterpillars. At which
they were greatly amazed."

I should say they were.

"II. Another poet having the sole of his shoe flat
loose, went into an house to borrow a knife to cut
it off, where he met with one of his acquaintance,
who asked him how his body did. Truly, said the
poet, my body is in a good condition, but I am
afraid I shall lose my sole. At which his friend was
amazed, and wished him not to despair. With
these words the poet held up his foot and showed
him his sole, at which he laughed heartily, and
made him drink for his gest's sake."

This is all very melancholy. The ragged
poet, and the careless friend who makes him
drink for his jest's sake. How could you
relieve so diverting a vagabond but by making
him drink. Who was the poet I wonder!
Johnson perhaps, Savage very likely.

"XXI. A gentleman was once committed to the
Tower, being again enlarged, was walking along, and
a beggar that knew him followed him and begged
heartily of him, saying, Sir, you know that you and
I have been in all the prisons in London. You are
an impudent lying rogue, says the gentleman, for I
have never been in any but the Tower. O, Sir,
says he, and I have been in all the rest."

It is not stated whether the gentleman
relieved the beggar or not. Perhaps like the
poet's friend he made him drink for his jest.

Here is a very knotty jest:

"A moneyless man, who was almost choked with
thirst, went into a cookshop and called for twelve
penny loaves, which were brought him, but he
wanted drink more than victuals, and called for a
penny pot of drink, and gave the drawer a penny
loaf for it, and so he did fill his thirst with twelve
pennyworth of drink, was fully satisfied, and gave
for every pennyworth of drink a pennyworth of
bread; so being pretty well filled, up he gets, and is
going away. Nay stay, says the cook, who pays for
your drink? Why, says he, did I not give you a
pennyworth of bread for every pennyworth of drink.
Ay! but who pays for the bread then? Why, says
he, have you not your bread again?"

There are many other excellent jests told
of a " crafty fellow over head and ears in
debt," a "gentleman that used to be smart in
repartees," a " drunkard having but one of
his eyes left with drinking," a " soldier whose
chance it was to be travelling through
Cambridgeshire on a dark night," a " certain
country justice," and other facetious characters.
I notice, however that the Editor
rather unhandsomely abandons the poets
at the very outset of the volume—probably
thinking his readers might be disgusted
with the two first samples of the children
of Parnassus. He devotes himself instead
to a record of the waggeries committed by,
or more frequently committed upon, " a
gentleman from Scotland," a "Scots Lord,", an
"honest Highlander walking along Holborn
with a broadsword," or the much saying and
suffering " Teague," or Irishman. There is
also a notable story of a "parson and a
clerk having a mind for a whet before
service," which, inasmuch as it is a very old
Joe indeed, the writer of this has heard
frequently told at decorous dinner tables as
applied to parsons of the present day.

"Cambridge Jests, being Wit's recreation,
printed at Newcastle in this present year,"
unknown,—I wish sincerely I could produce
the marvellous frontispiece, representing the
town of Cambridge—is full of stories about
"merry young Cambridge Gentlemen," who
appear at that time to have far surpassed
their Oxonian brethren in waggishness. The
compilation, however, is not consistent, for
the jests diverge from Alma Mater to a
"young fellow in Flanders," a "priest in
Catalonia," a " rich vintner in London,"
and a "country fellow praying devoutly
before an image of St. Lop " (?)

We must enter our protest, too, against
the introduction into a selection professing
to treat of Cantabrigian jests, of anecdotes
of a " condemned person riding up Holbourn
Hill in a cart," " a gentleman in Burgundy,"
and "that excellent poet Virgil." On
Cambridge jests follow "the puzzle: a short