I have been in Westminster Hall, Where learned lawyers plead, And shown my bill among them all, Which when they see and read, My action quickly hath been tried, No party there my suit denied, Each one spake bravely on my side, But God a mercy penny. SECOND PART. The famous abbey I have seen, Bear Garden, when I do frequent, The best pastime that they can make, But God a mercy penny. In every place whereas I came, Both tapsters, cooks, and vintners fine, Good fellows company I used, The painted drabs I still refus'd, And wenches that are common; Their luring looks I do despise, They seem so loathsome in my eyes, Yet one a project did devise To gull me of my penny. One evening as I past along, May after chance to catch the scab, No pandar, bawd, nor painted drab Shall gull me of a penny. But curled hair and painted face I ever have refrained, All those that get their living base, In heart I have disdained, My conscience is not stain'd with pitch, Yet will I never niggard be, In friendship, love, and mirth; And eke dispense some of my store, Thus to conclude as I began Draw money for to buy me beer, The price of it is not too dear, "T will cost you but a penny. LXXVII. "A NEW BALLAD, INTITULED, A Warning to Youth, shewing the lewd life of a Marchant's Sonne of London, and the miserie that at the last he sustained by his notoriousnesse." To the tune of Lord Darley. [From a black letter copy printed for the Assigns of Symcocke.] IN London dwelt a merchant man, That left unto his son A thousand pounds in land a year, With coffers cramm'd with golden crowns, Most like a father kind, To have him follow his own steps, And bear the self same mind. Thus every man doth know, doth know, And his beginning see, But none so wise can shew, can shew, What will his ending be. No sooner was his father dead, And closed in his grave, But this his wild and wanton son, And being but of tender years In gluttony and drunkenness And still in strumpet's company Forgetting quite that drunkenness, Of all the sins will soonest bring Within the seas of wanton love, A night he could not quietly |