THE COMPLETE ANGLER, PART TV 



And so they left this honey-suckle hedge ; and went to 

 tell fortunes and cheat, and get more money and lodg- 

 ing, in the next village. 



When these were gone we heard as high a contention 

 amongst the beggars. Whether it was easiest to rip a 

 cloak, or to unrip a cloak ? One beggar affirmed it was 

 all one : But that was denied, by asking her, If doing 

 and undoing were all one? Then another said, 'Twas 

 easiest to unrip a cloak ; for that was to let it alone : But 

 she was answered, by asking her, How she unript it if 

 slie let it alone? And she contest herself mistaken. 

 These, and tv/enty such like questions were proposed, 

 with as much beggarly logick and earnestness as was 

 ever heard to proceed from the mouth of the most perti- 

 nacious schismatick ; and sometimes all the beggars 

 whose number was neither more nor less than the poets' 

 nine muses talked, all together, about this ripping 

 and unripping; and so loud, that not one heard what 

 the other said. But, at last, one beggar craved audi- 

 ence; and told them that old father Clause, whom Ren 

 Jonson, in his Beggar' s-Bush *, created king of their 

 corporation, was tnat night to lodge at an ale-house a 

 called Catcfi -her-by -t he-way, not far from Waltham- 

 Cross, and in the high road towards London ; and he 

 therefore desired them to spend no more time about that 

 and such like questions, but refer all to father Clause at 

 night, for he was an upright judge, and in the mean 

 time drayr cuts, what song should be next sung, and 

 who should sing it. They all agreed to the motion ; 

 and the lot fell to her that was the youngest, and veriest 

 virgin of the company. Andshesung Frank Davison's 

 song, which he made forty years ago ; and all the others 



described in the Life of %/Leriton Latroon^ a ivitty extravagant ; whom he 

 makes to have been a member of a gang of gypsies ; the hero of this 

 book was generally called the " English Gusman;" and there would be 

 no doubt that Walton alludes to it, but that the third edition of the Com- 

 plete Angler , in which this passage first occurs, was published in 1664; 

 whereas the English Rogue bears date 1666; if there was any earlier edition 

 of the latter the matter is clear Rook and Shark can be qnly imaginary 

 associates of the English Gusman. 



* The comedy of the Royal Merchant, or Beggars Busb % was 

 by Beaumont and Fletcher, and not by Ben Jonson. 



