TAYLOR THE WATER-POEt's COMPLAINT. 259 



lodgings in Fleet Street or the Strand, how 

 the J are pestered with coaches, especially after 

 a masque or play at Court, where even the 

 very earth shakes and trembles, the casements 

 shatter, totter, patter, and clatter, and such 

 a confused noise is made that a man can neither 

 sleep, speak, hear, write, nor eat his dinner 

 or supper quiet for them ; besides, their tumbling 

 din, like counterfeit thunder, doth sour wine, 

 beer, and ale, almost abominally, to the impair- 

 ing of their healths that drink it, and the 

 making of many a victualler's trade fallen." 



In a publication entitled " The Thief," Taylor 

 writes : — 



" Carroches, coaches, jades, and Flanders mares, 

 Do rob ns of our shares, our wants, our fares ; 

 Against the ground we stand, and knock our heels 

 "Whilst all our profit runs away on wheels." 



The London shopkeepers, too, bitterly com- 

 plained. 



" Formerly," they said, " when ladies and 

 gentlemen walked in the streets there was a 

 chance of obtaining customers to inspect and 

 purchase our commodities ; but now they whisk 

 past in the coaches before our apprentices have 

 time to cry out ' What d'ye lack ?' " 



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