and carried to the Lieutenant of the Tower, by the said Prisoner's Keeper. He was now a close prisoner in the Tower, and addressed these verses to the Lieutenant to whom he says, he had been in prison six times.

15. Hearing it reported that the Diurnal-women* cryed the news of his Impeachment for Treason, he composed this Epigram.†

77. "Verses intended to the King's Majesty. By Major George Wither, whilst he was prisoner in Newgate: which being found written with his own hand, among his loose papers, since his commitment close prisoner to the Tower, are now published, as pertinent both to his Majesty and to him." 8vo. 1662.

There is rather more poetical address in this short tract, than Wither usually condescended to employ, though the same professions of honest independence pervade and characterise it. He thus, with some art, forms a loyal apology, even for his disobedience to the King's. command.

"Whatsoever I can say or do,

(Although you give a countermand thereto)

I'll say and do it, when I shall be sure

Your life, or peace, or honour, 'twill secure :

• Or Women who cried the daily papers about the streets. + Which begins, with his usual nonchalance as to personal results:

"I am preferr'd from Newgate to the Tow'r ;

And as the summer's heat mends all that's sour,
So here my state is mended; and what follows
May be (for ought I yet perceive) the Gallows!
The Commons do intend to vindicate

Their honour: and I am not griev'd thereat,
For it concerns them; and the reputation

Of their House is the honour of the nation."

At the conclusion he thus laments his auctorial deprivations. "My black lead's took away; and worn out quite

My oker pencil is therefore, good-night.

:

All I can now do is, to sit and think

What might be writ with paper, pen, and ink!"

FF3

And

And if this be a fault, I do intend

To be thus faulty till my life shall end."

If the following passage was not debased by the technical phrascology of a china-shop, it would be beautiful.

-no gem

So beautifies a royal diadem,

As Mercy, when it is enamelled

With Justice, and with Prudence rivetted."

In a subsequent page he imparts his admonition to the royal ear with more dignified coherency.

"Let Justice be your scepter, let your crown
Be Mercy; and, if you would keep your own,
Give that to others which to them belongs,
And free the poor and fatherless from wrongs:
Especially, your main endeavour bend

To make and keep your Sovereign Lord your friend;
And if you would be settled on your throne,

Take care that His usurped be by none.”*

He professes allegiance to Charles, and at the same time says, "he obeyed the late preceding powers compulsively;" an assertion that cannot easily be credited, when the tenor of his writings and of his life are adverted to.

78. "Parallellogrammaton. Ar Epistle to the three Nations of England, Scotland, and Ireland. Whereby their sins being parallel'd with those of Judah and Israel, they are forewarned and exhorted to a timely repentance, lest they incur the like condemnation. To render it the more effectual, some considerable notions are therein expressed, touching ceremo

At the close of these verses he seems to have anticipated the political application of scriptural names in Dryden's celebrated Satire; when he desires to possess

"So much worth, at least, as did commend

His loyalty, whom David call'd his friend;
And wit enough to make a parallel

Of ev'ry traytor with Achitophel :

Or show to you the diff 'rence 'twixt the faiths

Of all your Zibas and Mephibosheths.

nies and things indifferent: the Lord's Supper; the Civil Government; the taking of Oaths; the mark of the Beast; the liberty of Conscience; the great Sabbath; and the two Witnesses: with other particulars of concernment interwoven. Written by George Wither. Imprinted 1662 years after the birth of. Christ, to prepare for the year 1666 after his passion." pr. 8vo. (1662 May 3.)

This date is supplied by the printer, in a short address` to the reader, and by him we are farther told, that the Author whilst a prisoner in Newgate, was willing to commit this Epistle to any one who would honestly and conscientiously undertake the publication of it: but finding it not authorised to be imprinted, he was for some time fearful to undertake an impression thereof, till the pertinency of the performance induced him to run this risk, conceiving that the public benefit he was likely to effect, would more than recompense the offence, if it should seem offensive to any. This announcement of the printer, is followed by a metrical address from Wither, dated "Newgate, March 8. 1662," inscribed to the Pastors, Elders, and other members, of the French and Dutch Congregations, inhabiting within the Islands of Great Britain. In this he tells them that "Piedmont's late case and Germany's sad lot," have made him become an Empiric, whence

"This Catholicon, as it befalls,

Was pressed from between the prison walls;
Which is not only at this time a den

Of thieves, but also cram'd with honest men."

The Epistle," or tract itself, is premonitory and exhortatory; being much of it deduced from the books of the prophets, from Isaiah to Malachi, and therefore theological rather than political. His application of those prophetic writings, to events passing in his own time, constitutes the parallel he labours to draw, and leads to much extraneous disquisition. At p. 68. he cites a favourite passage from Prosopopoeia Britannica," 1648, with his later commentary upon it.

"A King shall willingly himself un-king, And thereby grow far greater than before:

'Cause her fortune seems too low,
Shall I therefore let her go?
He that bears an humble mind
And with riches can be kind;
Think how kind a heart he'd have,
If he were some servile slave:
And if that same mind I see,
What care I how poore she be?
Poore or bad, or curst, or black,
I will ne'er the more be slack:
If she hate me, then believe
She shall die ere I will grieve.
If she like me when I woo,
I can like and love her too :
If that she be fit for me,

What care I what others be?

The "Cries of Ludgate" issue from the Debtors formerly confined there, and the "Song of the Beggar" is a cant ditty that could only become the classical Dictionary of Captain Grose.

T. P.

ག "The House of Correction," or certayne satyricall Epigrams, &c. written by I. H. Gent. 1619." 12mo.

It is possible that John Heath was the Author, who published "Two Centuries of Epigrammes" in 1610. The following specimens are selected as the best.

"In Ducum.

"Ducus keeps house: and it with reason stands
That he keep house who sold away his lands."
"M. Priscus' commendation of his Mistris.
"Priscus commends his Mistris for a girl

Whose lips are rubies, and whose teeth are pearl.
They need prove so-or else it will be found
He pays too dear; they cost him many a pound."
"In Rufum.

"As Rufus prais'd his beaver-hat of late

One that stood by (striking him o'er the pate)

Said it was felt. Rufus would not believe it;
He strook again-till Rufus did conceive it.
So dark was the conceit, that out of doubt,
He ne'er had found, had he not felt it out."
"Richard's Mourning.

"When his old master buried was with cost,

Dick had a mourning-cloke :-but it was lost.
The corse to churchyard goes, each takes his turn;
But Dick took none: for Richard could not mourn.
Yes, that he did-the company he forsook,

And mourn'd not in, but mourned for his cloke."
"Spinus his choyce.

"Spinus would wed; but he would have a wench
That hath all tongues-Italian, Spanish, French!
But I dissuade him: for if she hath any

She hath enough; if two, she' as two too many."

T. P.

¶ pierce Plawman,

It

The following specimens of the several manuscript copies of this well-known and excellent old poem, preserved in the Bodleian Library, will, it is presumed, not be unacceptable to the readers of the Bibliographer. would be superfluous to offer any remarks upon the poem itself, after what has been already said on the subject by Warton, Ritson, Tyrwhitt, and Ellis, and it is only in the hope that these collations may assist some future editor of the work, by pointing out what MSS. do exist * and are worthy of inspection, that such an article is transmitted for insertion. It may not be amiss to notice

Warton, in his Observations on Spenser, sect. xi. speaks of only two MSS. in the Library, and states one to be Digby, 108, which is on a very different subject, and in prose. Besides the seven here noticed, other MSS. of this poem occur in the collection; these are however imperfect at the beginning: Digby 192. and 171. Rawl. Poet. 38.-MS. James 2, also, contains some selections from the work.

that