﻿PLAGIARISM AMONG ELIZABETHAN PAMPHLETEERS 



163 



Is it possible that poor Samuel had never seen Greene's excel- 

 lent description of nips and foists? If so he must have borrowed 

 ''on instinct." 



The Second Part of Conny -catching. 



. . . : therefore an exquisite Foist must have three properties that a good 

 Surgiou should have, and that is an Eagles eie, a Ladies hand, and a 

 Lj'ons heart: an Eagles eie to spie a purchase, to have a quieke insight 

 where the boong lies, and then a Lyonsi heart not to feare what the end 

 will bee, and then a Ladies hand to be little and nimble, the better to dive 

 into the pocket. These are the perfect properties of a Foist : but you must 

 note that there be diversities of this kind of people, for there be cittie 

 Nips & countrey Nips, which haunt from faire to faire, and never come in 

 London, unlesse it be at Bartholomewe faire, or some other great and 

 extraordinarie assemblies : Nowe there is a mortal! hate betweene the Coun- 

 trey Foist, and the Cittie Foist, for if the Cittie Foist spie one of the Con- 

 nies in London, straight he seekes by some meanes to smoake him, and s:> 

 the Countrey Nip if he spie a Cittie Nip in any faire, then hee Smoakes 

 him straight, and brings him in danger.''^ 



The story of how a cut-purse nipped the pocket out of a cheese- 

 monger's apron is now given. This is simply another version of 

 Greene 's ' ' A merry tale how a Miller had his purse cut in New gate 

 market.""" In the first ca-se the pocket is nipped while the mer- 

 chant is stuffing pieces of a large cheese into the conny catcher's 

 cape ; in the second the bung is cut while the miller is kindly wip- 

 ing from the nip 's face flour that had been thrown upon him by an 

 accomplice. 



In exposing the tricks of the "lift" Eowlands steals from, "The 

 Second Part of Conny-catching" and also from "The Ground- 

 worke of Conny-catching." Here again he makes the material 

 over slightly, adding the trick of pretending to drop a ring after 

 dark before a sliop. The rogue thereupon asks the shop-keeper for 

 a candle. This is actually dropped and before another can be sup- 

 l>lied, the "lift" is off with whatever booty he is able to grab up. 

 This trick is, I think, original with Rowlands, as are the next two 

 cjetailed, so far as I know. The first of these is called chopchain ; 

 the second, spoonselling. Dekker steals the latter, calling it spoon- 

 meat but otherwise making very few changes from Rowlands' 

 version. 



Rowlands now continues: "Gentlemen I will acquaint you with 

 a wstrange newe devised arte of stone-carrying." It would indeed 



'■"^ Greene, Worlcs, X, 107-lOS. 



^■^ The Second Pwt't of Gonnij-catchiiuj, X, 110. 



