as if their Persons were Sacred Moreover they take no thought for to morrow but setting a just value on their hours they are good Husbands of the present considering that what is past is as good as Dead and what 's to come Vncertain But they say when the Devil preaches the world 's neer an End The divine Hand is in this said the Holy Man that perform'd the Exorcism Thou art the Father of Lyes and yet deliver'st truths able to mollify and convert a Heart of stone But do not you mistake your selves quoth the Devil to suppose that your Conversion is my Business for I speak these Truths to aggravate your Guilt and that you may not plead ignorance another day when you shall be call'd to answer for your Transgressions 'T is true most of you shed tears at parting but 't is the Apprehension of Death and no true Repentance for your sins that works upon you For ye are all a pack of Hypocrites Or if at any time you entertain those Reflections your trouble is That your Body will not hold out and then forsooth ye pretend to pick aquarrel with the Sin it self Thou art an Impostor said the Religious for there are many Righteous Souls that draw their sorrow from another Fountain But I perceive you have a mind to amuse us and make us lose Time and perchance your own hour is not yet come to quit the Body of this miserable Creature however I conjure thee in the name of the most High to leave tormenting him and to hold thy Peace The Devil obey'd and the Good Father applying himself to us My Masters says he though I am absolutely of Opinion that it is the Devil that has talkt to us all this while through the Organ of this unhappy wretch yet he that well weighs what has bin said may doubtless reap some benefit by the Discourse Wherefore without considering whence it came Remember that Saul although a wicked Prince Prophesied and that Honey has been drawn out of the Mouth of a Lyon Withdraw then and I shall make it my Prayer as 't is my hope that this sad and prodigious spectacle may lead you to a true sight of your Errours and in the end to amendment of Life The end of the first Vision THE SECOND VISION OF DEATH and her EMPIRE MEan Souls do naturally breed sad Thoughts and in Solitude they gather together in Troops to assault the Unfortunate which is the Tryal according to my Observation wherein the Coward does most betray himself and yet cannot I for my life when I am alone avoid those Accidents and Surprizes in my self which I condemn in others I have sometime upon Reading the Grave and Severe Lucretius been seized with a strange Damp whether from the striking of his Counsels upon my Passions or some tacite reflection of shame upon my self I know not However to render this Confession of my weakness the more excusable I 'l begin my Discourse with somewhat out of that elegant and excellent Poet Put the Case sayes he that a Voice from Heaven should speak to any of us after this manner What do'st thou ail O Mortal Man or to what purpose is it to spend thy life in Groans and Complaints under the apprehension of Death where are thy past Years and Pleasures Are they not vanish't and lost in theFlux of Time as if thou hadst put Water into a Sieve Bethink thy self then of a Retreat leave the World with the same content satisfaction as thou wouldst do a plentiful Table and a jolly Company upon a full stomach Poor Fool that thou art thus to Macerate and Torment thy self when thou may'st enjoy thy Heart at Ease and Possess thy Soul with Repose and Comfort c. This passage brought into my mind the words of Iob. Cap. 14. and I was carried on from one Meditation to another till at length I fell fast asleep over my Book which I ascribed rather to a favourable providence then to my natural Disposition So soon as my Soul felt her self at Liberty she gave me the entertainment of this following Comedy my Phansy supplying both the Stage and the Company In the first Scene enter'd a Troop of Physicians upon their Mules with deep Foot-cloths marching in no very good Order sometime fast sometime slow and to say the Truth most commonly in a huddle They were all wrinkled and wither'd about the Eyes I suppose with casting so many sowre looks upon the Piss-pots and Close-stools of their Patients bearded like Goats and their Faces so overgrown with Hair that their Fingers could hardly find the way to their Mouths In their left hand they held their Reins and their Gloves roul'd up together and in the right a Staffe à la mode which they carryed rather for Countenance then Correction for they understood no other Manege than the Heel and all along Head and Body went too like a Baker upon his Panniers Divers of them I observ'd had huge Gold Rings upon their Fingers and set with Stones of so large a size that they could hardly feel a Patients Pulse without minding him of his Monument There were more thaâ— a good many of them and a world of Puny Practisers at their heels that came out Graduates by conversing rather with the Mules than the Doctors Well! said I to my self if there goes no more than This to the making a Physitian it is no marvel we pay so dear for their Experience After These follow'd a long Train of Mountebank Apothecaries laden with Pestles and Mortars Suppositories Spatulas Glister-Pipes and Siringes ready charg'd and as mortal as Gun-shot and several Titled Boxes with Râ—medies without and Poysons within Ye may observe that when a Patient comes to die the Apothecaries Moâ—tar rings the Passing-Bell as the Priests Râ—quiem finishes the business An Apothecâ—ries Shop is in effect no other than the Physitians Armory that supplies him with Weapons and to say the truth the Instruments of the Apothecary and the Souldier are much of a quality What are their Boxes but Petards their Syringes Pistols and their Pills but Bullets And after all considering their Purgative Medicines we may properly enough call their Shops Purgatory and why not their Persons Hell their Patients the Damn'd and their Masters the Devils These Apothecaries were in Iacquets wrought all over with Rs struck through like wounded hearts and in the form of the first Character of their Prescriptions which as they tell us signifies Recipe Tâ—ke thou but we find it to stand for Recipio I take Next to this Figure they write Ana Ana which is as much as â—o say An Ass An Ass and after this march the Ounces and the Scruples an incomparable Cordial to a dying man the former to dispatch the Body and the latteâ— to put the Soul into the high-way to the Dâ—vil To hear them call over their Simples would make you swear they were raising so many Devils Therâ—â—s your Opopanax Buphthalmus Astâ—pâ—ylinos Alectorolophos
I Dye then said I No no quoth Death but I 'l take thee Quick along with me For since so many of the Dead have been to visit the Living It is but equal for once that one of the Living should Return a Visit to the Dead Get up then and come along and never hang an Arse for the matter for what you will not do willingly you shall do in spight of your Teeth This put me in a Cold Fit but without more delay up I started and desired leave only to put on my Breeches No no said she no matter for Clothes no body wears them upon this Road wherefore come away naked as you are and you 'l Travel the better So up I got without a word more and follow'd her in such a Terrour and Amazement that I was but in an ill Condition to take a strict account of my Passage yet I remember that upon the way I told her Madam under Correction you are no more like the Deaths that I have seen then an Apple's like an Oyster Our Death is pictur'd with a Scyth in her hand and a Carkass of bones as clean as if the Crows had pick'd it Yes yes said she turning short upon me I know that very well but in the mean time your Designers and Painters are but a Company of Buzzards The Bones you talk of are the Dead or otherwise the miserable Remainders of the Living but let me tell you that you your selves are your own Death and that which you call Death is but the Period of your Life as the first moment of your Birth is the beginning of your Death And effectually ye Dye Living and your Bones are no more then what Death has left and committed to the Grave If this were rightly understood every man would find a Memento Mori or a Death's Head in his own Looking-glass and consider every house with a Family in 't but as a Sepulchre fill'd with Dead Bodies a Truth which you little dream of though within your daily View and Experience Can you imagine a Death elsewhere and not in your selves Believe 't y' are in a shameful mistake for you your selves are Skeletons before ye are aware But Madam under Favour what may all these People be that keep your Ladishâ—p Company and since you are Death as you say how comes it that the Bablers and Make-bates are neerer your Person and more in your Good Graces than the Physicians Why sayes she there are more People Talk'd to Death and dispatcht by Bablers then by all the Pestilential Diseases in the World And then your Make-bates and Medlers kill more then your Physicians though to give the Gentlemen of the Faculty their due they labour night and day for the enlargement of our Empire For you must understand that though distemper'd humours make a man sick 't is the Physician Kills him and looks to be well paid for 't too and 't is fit that every man should live by his Trade so that when a man is askt what such or such a one dy'd of He is not presently to make answer that he dy'd of a Fever Pleurisie the Plague Purples or the like but that He dy'd of the Doctor In one point however I must needs acquit the Physician Ye know that the stile of right Honourable and right Worshipful which waâ— heretofore appropriate onely to Persons of Eminent degree and Quality is now in our days used by all sorts of little people Nay the very Bare-foot Friers that live under Vows of Humility and Mortification are stung with this Itch of Title and Vain-Glory And your ordinary Trades-men as Vintners Taylors Masons and the like must be all drest up forsooth in the Right Worshipful whereas your Physician does not so much Court Honour of Appellation though if it should rain Dignities he might be perswaded happily to venture the wetting but sits down contentedly with the Honour of disposing of your Lives and Moneys without troubling himself about any other sort of Reputation The Entertainment of these Lectures and discourses made the way seem short and Pleasant and we were just now entring into a Place betwixt Light and Dark and of Horrour enough if Death and I had not by this time been very well acquainted Upon one side of the Passage I saw three moving Figures Arm'd and of Humane shape and so alike that I could not say which was which Just Opposite on the other side a Hideous Monster and these Three to One and One to Three in a Fierce and Obstinate Combate Here Death made a stop and facing about askt me if I knew these People Alas No quoth I Heaven be praised I do not and I shall put it in my Litany that I never may Now to see thy Ignorance cry'd Death These are thy old Acquaintance and thou hast hardly kept any other Company since thou wert born Those Three are the World the Flesh and the Devil the Capital Enemies of thy Soul and they are so like one another as well in Quality as Appearance that Effectually whoever has One has All. The Proud and Ambitious man thinks he has got the World but it proves the Devil The Lecher and the Epicure perswade themselves that they have gotten the Flesh and that 's the Devil too and in fine thus it fares with all other kinds of Extravagants But what 's He there said I that appears in so many several shapes and fights against the other three That quoth Death is the Devil of Money who maintains that He himself Alone is Equivalent to them Three and that wherever He comes there 's no need of Them Against the World He argues from their own Confession and Experience for it passes for an Oracle that There 's no World but Money He that 's out of Money 's out of the World Take away a man's Money and take away his Life Money answers All things Against the second Enemy he pleads that Money is the Flesh too witness the Girles and the Ganimedes it procures and maintains And against the Third He urges that there 's nothing to be done without this Devil of Money Love does much but Money does All And Money will make the Pot boyl though the Devil piss in the Fire So that for ought I see quoth I the Devil of Money has the better end of the staffe After this advancing a little further I saw on One hand Iudgment and Hell on the other for so Death called them Upon the sight of Hell making a stop to take a stricter Survey of it Death askt me what it was I look't at I told her it was Hell and I was the more intent upon it because I thought I had seen it somewhere else before She question'd me where I told her that I had seen it in the Corruption and Avarice of Wicked Magistrates In the Pride and Haughtiness of Grandees In the Appetites of the Voluptuous In the lewd Designs of Ruine and Revenge In the Souls of Oppressours and
a Scare-Crow as you are do with a Bed-fellow Give over your Bawdy Haunts for shame and do n't make a man Glory of a Sin when you 're past the Pleasure of it and your self upon all Accompts contemptible into the Bargain This Fellow sayes He would make a man break his heart with Laughing Come come say your Prayers and bethink your self of Eternity you have one Foot in the Grave already and 't is high time to fit your self for the other World Thou wilt absolutely kill me with Laughing I tell thee I 'm as sound as a Roche and I do not Remember that ever I was better in my Life Others there are that let a man advise them upon their Death Beds and even at the last Gasp to send for a Divine or to make some handsome settlement of their Estates Alas Alas they 'l cry I have been as bad as this many a time before and with Falstaffe's Hostess I hope in the Lord there 's no need to think of him yet These men are lost for ever before they can be brought to understand their Danger This Vision wrought strangely upon me and gave me all the Pains and Marques Imaginable of a true Repentance Well said I since so it is that man has but one life allotted him and so many Deaths but one way into the World and so many Millions out of it I will certainly at my Return make it more my Care than it has been to Live with a Good Conscience that I may dye with Comfort These last words were scarce out of my Mouth when the Cryer of the Court with a loud Voice Called out The Dead The Dead Appear the Dead And so immediately I saw the Earth begin to Move and gently opening it self to make way first for Heads and Arms and then by Degrees for the whole Bodies of Men and Women that came out half muffled in their Night-Caps and ranged themselves in excellent Order and with a profound silence Now says Death let every one speak in his Turn And in the instant up comes One of the Dead to my very Beard with so much Fury and Menace in his Face and Action that I would have given him half the Teeth in my Head for a Composition These Devils of the World quoth he what would they be at my Masters cannot a poor Wretch be quiet in his Grave for ye but ye must be Casting your Scorns upon him and charging him with things that upon my Soul he 's as Innocent of as the Child that 's Unborn What hurt has he done any of you ye Scoundrels you to be thus Abused And I beseech you Sir said I under your Favourable Correction who may you be for I confess I have not the Honour either to Know or to understand ye I am quoth he the Unfortunate Tony that has been in his Grave now this many a fair year and yet your wise Worships forsooth have not wit enough to make your Selves and your Company merry but Tony must still be one half of your Entertainment and Discourse When any man plays the Fool or the Extravagant presently He 's a Tony. Who drew this or that Ridiculous Piece Tony. Such or such a one was never well taught No he had a Tony to his Master But let me tell ye He that shall call your Wisdoms to shrift and take a strict accompt of your words and actions will upon the Upshot find you all a Company of Tonys and in Effect the Greater Impertinents As for Instance Did I ever make Ridiculous Wills as you do to oblige others to pray for a man in his Grave that never pray'd for Himself in his Life Did I ever rebell against my Superiors Or was I ever so arrant a Coxcomb as by colouring my Cheeks and Hair to imagine that I could reform Nature and make my Self young again Can ye say that I ever put an Oath to a Lye or broke a solemn Promise as you do every day that goes over your Heads Did I ever enslave my self to money Or on the other side make Ducks and Drakes with it and squander it away in Gaming Revelling and Whoring Did my Wife â—ver wear the Breeches Or did I ever marry at all to be reveng'd of a false Mistress Was I ever so very a fool as to believe any man would be True to me who had betray'd his Friend Or to venture all my Hopes upon the Wheel of Fortune Did I ever envy the Felicity of a Court-life that sells and spends all for a Glance What pleasure did I ever take in the lewd Discourses of Hereticks and Libertines Or did I ever List my self in the party to get the name of a Gifted-Brother Who ever saw me Insolent to my Inferiors or Basely Servile to my betters Did I ever go to a Conjurer or to your Dealers in Nativities and Horoscopes upon any Occasion of Loss or Death Now if you your selves be guilty of all these Fopperies and I innocent I beseech ye where 's the Tony So that you see Tony is not the Tony you take him for But to Crown his other Vertues he is also endued with so large a stock of Patience that whoever needed it had it for the asking Unless it were such as came to borrow money or in Cases of Women that claim'd Marriage of him or Laquais that would be making sport with his Bauble and to These He was as Resolute as Iohn Florio While we were upon this Discourse another of the Dead came marching up to me with a Spanish pace and gravity and giving me a Touch o' the Elbow Look me in the Face quoth he with a stern Countenance and know Sir that you are not now to have to do with a Tony. I beseech your Lordship said I saving your Reverence let me know your Honour that I may pay my Respects accordingly for I must confess I thought all people here had been Hail fellow well met I am call'd quoth he by mortals Queen Dick and whether you know me or not I 'm sure you 'l think of me often enough and if the Devil did not possess ye you would let the Dead alone and content your selves to persecute One Another Ye can't see a High-crown'd Hat a Thred-bare Cloak a Basket-hilt Sword or a Dudgeon Dagger nay not so much as a Reverend Matron well striken in years but presently ye cry This or That 's of the Mode or Date of Queen Dick. If ye were not every Mother's Child of ye stark mad ye would confess that Queen Dick's were Golden-daies to those ye have had since and 't is an easie matter to prove what I say Will ye see a Mother now teaching her Daughter a Lesson of good Government Child says she you know that modesty is the great Ornament of your Sex wherefore be sure when ye come in Company that you don't stand staring the men in the Face as if ye were looking Babies in their Eyes but rather look a little Downward
such as had ever in their Mouths God is Merciful and will pardon me How can this be said I that these people should be Damn'd When Condemnation is an Act of Iustice not of Mercy I perceive you are simple quoth the Devil for half these you see here are condemn'd with the Mercy of God in their Mouths And to Explain my self Consider I pray'e how many Sinners are there that go on in their Wayes in spight of Reproof and Good Counsel and still this is their Answer God is Merciful and will not damn a Soul for so small a Matter But let them talk of Mercy as they please so long as they persist in a Wicked Life we are like to have their Company at last By your Argument said I there 's no trusting to Divine Mercy You mistake me quoth the Devil for every good Thought and Work flows from that Mercy But This I say He that perseveres in his Wickedness and makes use of the Name of Mercy only for a Countenance to his Impieties does but Mock the Almighty and has no Title to that Mercy For 't is vain to expect Mercy from above without doing any thing in order to it It properly belongs to the Righteous and the Penitent and they that have the most of it upon the Tongue have commonly the least thought of it in their Hearts And 't is a great Aggravation of Guilt to Sin the more in Confidence of an Abounding Mercy It is True that many are receiv'd to Mercy that are utterly Unworthy of it which is no wonder since No man of himself can deserve it But men are so Negligent of seeking it betimes that they put that off to the last which should have been the first part of their bus'ness and many times their Life is at End before they begin their Repentance I did not think so Damn'd a Doctor could have made so good a Sermon And there I left him I came next to a Noysome Dark hole and there I saw a Company of Dyers all in Dirt and Smoke intermixt with the Devils and so alike that it would have posed the subtlest Inquisitor in Spain to have said which were the Devils and which the Dyers There stood at my Elbow a strange kind of Mungrel Devil begot betwixt a Black and a White with a Head so bestuck with Little Horns that it look't at a Distance like a Hedg-hog I took the Boldness to ask him where they quarter'd the Sodomites the Old Women and the Cuckolds As for the Cuckolds said He they are all over Hell without any Certain Quarter or Station and in Truth 't is no easie matter to know a Cuckold from a Devil for like kind Husbands they wear their Wives favours still and the very same Head-pieces in Hell that they wore living in the world As to the Sodomites we have no more to do with them then needs must but upon all Occasions we either Fly or Face them for if ever we come to give them a Broad-side 'T is ten to one but we get a Hit betwixt Wind and Water and yet we fence with our Tayls as well as we can and they get now and then a Flap o're the Mouth into the Bargain And for the Old women we make them stand off for we take as little pleasure in them as you do And yet the Jades will be persecuting us with their Passions and ye shall have a Bawd of five and fifty do ye all the Gamboles of a Girl of fifteen And yet after all this There 's not an old Woman in Hell for let her be as old as Pauls Bald Blind Toothless Wrinckled Decrepit This is not long of her Age shee 'l tell you but a Terrible Fit of sickness last year that fetch 't off her Hair and brought her so low that she has not yet recover'd her flesh again She lost her Eyes by a Hot Rheum and utterly spoil'd her Teeth with Cracking of Peach-stones and Eating of Sweet-meats when she was a Maid And when the Weight of her Years has almost brought both Ends together 'T is nothing shee 'l tell ye but a Crick she has got in her Back And though she might recover her Youth again by confessing her Age shee 'l never acknowledge it My next encounter was a Number of People making their mone that they had been taken away by sudden Death That 's an Impudent Lye cry'd a Devil saving this Gentleman's presence for no man dyes suddenly Death surprizes no man but gives all men sufficient warning and Notice I was much taken with the Devil's Civility and Discourse which he pursu'd after this manner Do ye complain says He of sudden Death that have carry'd Death about ye ever since you were Born That have been entertain'd with daily Spectacles of Carkasses and Funerals That have heard so many Sermons upon the subject and read so many good Books upon the Frailty of Life and the Certainty of Death Do ye not know that every Moment ye live brings ye nearer to your End Your Cloaths wear out Your Woods and your Houses decay and yet ye look that your Bodies should be Immortal What are the Common Accidents and Diseases of Life but so many warnings to provide your self for a Remove Ye have Death at the Table in your Daily Food and Nourishment for your Life is maintain'd by the Death of â—ther Creatures And you have the â—â—vely picture of it every Night for your Bedfellow With what Face then can you Charge your Misfortunes upon sudden Death that have spent your whole Life both at Bed and at Bord among so many Remembrances of your Mortality No No change your stile and hereafter confess your selves to have been Careless and Incredulous You Dye tâ—inâ—ing you are not to Dye yet and forgetting that Death grows upon you and goes along with ye from one End of your Life to the Other without Distinguishing of Persons or Ages Sex or Quality and whether it finds ye Well or Ill-doing As the Tree falls so it Lies Turning toward my left Hand I saw a great many Souls that were put up in Gally-pots with Assa foetida Galbanum and a Company of Nasty Oyls that served them for Syrrup What a Damn'd stink is here Cry'd I stopping my Nose We are now come undoubtedly to the Devil's house of Office No No said their Tormenter which was a kind of a Yellowish Complexion'd Devil 'T is a Confection of Apothecaries A sort of people that are commonly Damn'd for Compounding the Mediciâ—â—â— by which their Patients hope to be saved To give them their due These are your only True and Chymical Philosophers and worth a thousand of Raymund Lullius Hermes Geber Ruspicella Avicen and their Fellows 'T is true they have written fine things of the Transmutation of Mettals but did they ever make any Gold Or if they did We have lost the Secret Whereas your Apothecaries out of a Little Puddle-water a Bundle of Rotten sticks a Box of Flies Nay
their Hearts upon Avarice Cozening and Extortion and make Money their God That Vagabond Money that 's perpetually trotting up and down like a wandring whore and takes up most commonly with the unworthy leaving the Philosophers and Prophets which are the very Oracles of the Heavens such as Nostradamus to go barefoot But let 's go on with our Prophecyes and see if they be so frivolous and dark as the world reports them When the marry'd shall Marry Then the Jealous will be sorry And though Fools will be talking To keep their tongues walking No man runs well I find But with 's Elbows behind This gave me such a Fit of Laughing that it made me cast my nose up into the Air like a Stone-horse that had got a Mare in the Wind Which put the Astrologer out of all Patience Buffon and Dog-whelp as ye are quoth he There 's a Bone for you to pick you must be snarling and snapping at every thing Will your Teeth serve ye now to fetch out the Marrow of this Prophecy Hear then in the Devils name and be Mannerly Hear and Learn I say and let 's have no more of that Grinning unless ye have a mind to leave your Beard behind he Do you imagine that all that are Marry'd Marry No not the one half of them When you are Marry'd the Priest has done his part but after that to Marry is to do the Duty of a Husband Alack How many Marry'd men live as if they were single and how many Batchelors on the other side as if they were Marry'd after the Mode of the Times And Wedlock to divers Couples is no other than a more sociable state of Virginity Here 's one half of my Prophecy expounded already now for the Rest. Let me see you run a little for Experiment and try if you carry your Elbows before or behind You 'l tell me perhaps that this is ridiculous because every body knows it A pleasant shift As if Truth were the worse for being Plain The things indeed that you deliver for Truths are for the most part meer Fooleries and Mistakes and it were a hard matter to put Truth in such a Dress as would please ye What have ye to say now either against my Prophecy or my Argument not a Syllable I warrant ye and yet somewhat there is to be said for There 's no Rule without an Exception Does not the Physician carry his Elbow before him when he puts back his hand to take his Patients Money And away he 's gone in a Trice so soon as He has made his Purchase But to proceed here 's another of my Prophecies for ye Many Women shall be Mothers And their Babbies Their N'own Daddies What say ye to this now are there not many Husbands do ye think if the Truth were known that father more Children than their own Believe me Friend A man had need have good security upon a Womans Belly for Children are commonly made in the Dark and 't is no easie matter to know the Workman especially having nothing but the woman's bare word for 't This is meant of the Court of Assistance And whoever Interprets my Prophesies to the Prejudice of any Person of Honour abuses me You little think what a world of our Gay folks in their Coaches and six with Lacquies at their Heels by the Dozens will be found at the last Day to be only the Bastards of some Pages Gentlemen-Vshers or Valets de Chambre of the Family nay perchance the Physician may have had his hand in the wrong Box and in case of necessity good Use has been made of a Lusty Coachman Little do you think I say how many Noble Families upon that Grand Discovery will be found Extinct for want of Issue I am now convinc'd said I to the Mathematician of the Excellency of your Predictions and I perceive since you have been pleas'd to be your own Interpreter that they have more weight in them than we were aware of Ye shall have one more quoth he and I have done This Year if I 've any skill i' th' Weather Shall many a one take Wing with a Feather I dare say that your wit will serve ye now to Imagine that I 'm talking of Rooks and Iack-daws but I say No. I speak of Lawyers Attorneys Clerks Scriveners and their Fellows that with the Dash of a Pen can defeat their Clients of their Estates and flye away with them when they have done Upon these words Nostradamus Vanisht and some body plucking me behind I turn'd my face upon the most meager melancholick Wretch that ever was seen and cover'd all in white For pitty's sake says he and as you are a good Christian do but deliver me from the Persecution of these Impertinents and Bablers that are now tormenting me and I 'l be your Slave for ever casting himself at my Feet in the same Moment and crying like a Child And what art thou quoth I for a miserable Creature I am says he an Ancient and an Honest man although defam'd with a thousand Reproches and Slanders And in fine some call me Another and others Some-body and doubtless ye cannot but have heard of me As Some-body says cryes one that has nothing to say for himself and yet till this Instant I never so much as open'd my mouth The Latines call me Quidam and make good use of me to fill up Lines and stop Gaps When you go back again into the World I pray'e do me the Favour to own that you have seen me and to justifie me for one that never did and never will either speak or write any thing whatever some Tatling Ideots may pretend When they bring me into Quarrels and Brawles I am call'd forsooth A certain Person In their Intrigues I know not who and in the Pulpit A certain Author and all this to make a Mystery of my Name and lay all their Fooleries at my Door Wherefore I beseech ye help me which I promis'd to do And so this Vision withdrew to make Place for another And That was the most frightful piece of Antiquity that ever Eye beheld in the shape of an Old Woman She came nodding towâ—rds me and in a Hollow Ratling Tone for she spoke more with her Chops than her Tongue Pray'e says she â—s there not some body come lately hither from the other World This Apparition thought I is undoubtedly one of the Devils Scare-Crows Her Eyes were so sunk in their Sockets that they lookt like a pair of Dice in the bottom of a couple of Red-boxes Her Cheeks and the Soles of her Feet were of the same Complexion Her mouth was pale and open too the better to receive the Distillations of her Nose Her Chin was cover'd with a kind of Goose-Down as Toothless as a Lamprey and the Flaps of her Cheeks were like an Apes Bags Her Head danc'd and her Voice at every word kept time to 't Her Body was vail'd or rather wrapt up in a shroud of Cre'pe
She had a Crutch in one hand which serv'd her for a Supporter and a Rosary in t'other of such a length that as she stood stooping over it a man would have thought she had been fishing for Deaths Heads When I had done gaping upon This Epitome of past-ages Hola Grannum quoth I good lustily in her Ear taking for granted that she was deaf what 's your Pleasure with me with that she gave a Grunt and being much in wrath to be called Grannum clapt a fair pair of Spectacles upon her Nose and pinking through them I am quoth she neither Deaf nor Grannum but may be called by my Name as well as my Neighbours giving to understand that Women will take it ill to be called Old even in their very Graves As she spake she came still neerer me with her Eyes dropping and the smell about her perfectly of a Dead Body I beg'd her Pardon for what was past and for the future her Name that I might be sure to keep my self within the Bounds of Respect I am call'd sayes she Doüegna or Madam the Gouvernante How 's that quoth I in a great Amazement Have ye any of those Cattle in this Country Let the Inhabitants pray heartily for Peace then and all little enough to keep them quiet But to see my mistake now I thought the Women had dyed when they came to be Gouvernantes and that for the punishment of a wicked World the Gouvernantes had been Immortal But I am now better inform'd and very glad truly to meet with a Person I have heard so much talk of For with us Who but Madam the Gouvernante at every turn Do ye see that Mumping Hag cryes One Come here ye Damn'd Iade cryes Another That Old Bawd sayes a Third has forgotten I warrant ye that ever she was a Whore and now see if we do not remember ye You do so and I 'm in your debt for your Remembrance The Great Devil be your Pay-masters ye Son of a Whore you Are there no more Gouvernantes than my self Sure there are and ye may have your Choice without Affronting me Well Well said I have a little Patience and at my Return I 'l try if I can put things in better Order But in the mean time what business have you here her Reverence upon this was a little Qualified and told me that she had now been eight hundred years in Hell upon a Design to erect an Order of the Gouvernantes but the right Worshipful the Devil-Commissioners are not as yet come to any Reâ—olution upon the Point For say they if your Gouvernantes should come once to settle here there would need no other Tormentors and we should be but so many Iacks out of Office And besides we should be perpetually at Daggers drawing about the Brands and Candles-Ends which they would still be filching and laying out of the way and for us to have our Fewel to seek would be very Inconvenient I have been in Purgatory too she said uâ—on the same Project but there so soon as ever they set eye on me all the Souls cry'd out Unanimously Libera Nos c. As for Heaven That 's no place for Quarrels Slanders Disquiets Heart-burnings and consequently None for Me. The Dea◠〈◊〉 none of my Friends neither 〈…〉 grumble and bid me let 〈…〉 as they do me and beg 〈…〉 world again if I please and there they tell me I may play the Gouvernante in saecula saeculorum But truly I had rather be here at my Ease than spend my Life crumpling and brooding over a Carpet at a bed-side like a thing of Clouts to secure the Poultry of the Family from strange Cocks which would now and then have a Brush with a Virgin Pullet but for the Care of the Gouvernantes And yet 't is she good woman beares all the blame in Case of any Miscarriage The Gouvernante was presently of the Plot she had a Feeling in the Cause a Finger in the Pye And 't is she in fine that must answer for all Let but a Sock and old Handkercher the Greasy Lining of a Masque or any such Frippery piece of business be missing Ask the Gouvernante for This or for That And in short they take us certainly for so many Storks and Ducks to gather up 〈◊〉 the filth about the house The 〈…〉 look upon us as Spyes and 〈…〉 Cousin forsooth and ' tother 's 〈…〉 not come to the house for 〈…〉 â—ouvernante And indeed I have made many of them Cross themselves that took me for a Ghost Our Masters they curse us too for Embroyling the Family So that I have rather Chosen to take up here betwixt the Dead and the Living than to return again to my Charge of a Doüegna the very sound of the Name being more Terrible than a Gibbet As appears by one that was lately Travailing from Madrid to Vailladolid and asking where he might lodge that night Answer was made at a small Village call'd Doüegnas But is there no other place quoth he within some reasonable Distance either short or beyond it They told him no unless it were at a Gallows That shall be my Quarter then quoth he for a thousand Gibbets are not so bad to me as one Doüegnas Now ye see how we are abus'd quoth the Gouvernante I hope you 'l do us some Right when it lyes in your Power She would have talk't me to Death if I had not given her the slip upon the removing of her Spectacles but I could not scape so neither for looking about me for a Guide to carry me home again I was arrested by one of the Dead a good proper Fellow only he had a pair of Rams-horns on his head and I was about to salute him for Aries in the Zodiac but when I saw him plant himself just before me with his best Leg forward stretching out his Arms Clutching his Fists and looking as Soure as if He would have Eaten me without Mustard Doubtless said I the Devil is Dead and This is He. No No cry'd a by-stander This is a man Why then sayd I he 's Drunk I perceive and Quarrelsome in his Ale for here 's no body has touched him With that as he was just ready to fall on I stood to my Guard and we were arm'd at all points alike only he had the Ods of the Head-piece Now Sirrah says he have at ye slave that you are to make a Trade of Defaming Persons of Honour By the Death that Commands here I 'l ha' my Revenge and turn your skin over your Ears This Insolent Language stir'd my Choler I confess and so I call'd to him Come come on Sirrah A little neerer yet and if ye have a mind to be twice kill'd I 'l do your business who the Devil brought this Cornuto hither to trouble me The word was no sooner out but we were immediately at it Tooth and Nail and if his Horns had not been flatted to his head I might have had the worst on 't