'twas ne for fight
I hied me out ilk murkie night,
It was for poulterie!'

'Wal, damn your 'poulterie'--and you!
Such deed no generous knight would do!
So I mote thee deter!
I'll show thee, though, the _coop_, sir knight,
Where _chickens_ such as thee are blight--
You are my prisoner!'

Mony maydens weren grieved--
Cleopatras, slouchy-sleeved--
Darksome maydes of work all;
And mony felaws of much might
Ydrink the hades of ye Knight
Of ye grete Golden Cyrcle.

We much fear that it may be said of the chief cavalier of the Golden
Circle, what the old German _lanzknecht_, in Rabelais, said of the
Gascon adventurer: 'The knight pretends that he wants to fight, but is
much more inclined to steal; therefore, good people, look out for your
property.'

* * * * *

The following story, it is averred, can be vouched for, to any
reasonable extent, by a large crowd of witnesses.

DEAR CONTINENTAL: Possibly you would not give 'a Continental dime'
for that which I am about to pen. Possibly, too, you may damn it
into the waste-basket. I have often _heard_ of a 'Continental
damn'--it never occurred to me before what the article really was.
Dante has, I know, provided a corner for those who were
_in_-continentally condemned; but it was reserved for you to
abridge the word, and so _make a vice of a virtue_!

I once lived in a village: to that village came an itinerant
dramatic company; and that company advertised to play a grand
moral temperance drama, entitled _Down the Hill_.

The principal actor called himself Eglantine Mowbray. I believe
that the latter syllable of the last name was the only portion
thereof to which he was really entitled. He _did_ bray.

The bills appeared, with the following heading:

UNPARALLELED ATTRACTION.

On Monday Evening,

THE YOUTHFUL ROSCUSS!

EGLANTINE MOWBRAY!!

Will appear in his great role,

DOWN THE HILL.

Our simple villagers _had_ seen circuses; but youthful Roscusses
were entirely beyond their experience. Quite as unfamiliar was the
word _role_, which, to their badly-lettered fancy, stood for
movement, by 'turning on the surface, or with a circular motion,
in which all parts of the surface are successively applied to a
plane, 'as to roll a barrel or puncheon.' [You use Webster?]

So, when the 'show' opened, t