than three boar's heads of him
painted. He was sometimes the terrible coat of Mars, but is now for more
merciful battles in the tilt-yard, where whosoever is victorious, the
spoils are his. He is an art in England but in Wales nature, where they
are born with heraldry in their mouths, and each name is a pedigree.

XLVII.

THE COMMON SINGING-MEN IN CATHEDRAL CHURCHES

Are a bad society, and yet a company of good fellows, that roar deep in
the quire, deeper in the tavern. They are the eight parts of speech which
go to the syntaxis of service, and are distinguished by their noises much
like bells, for they make not a concert but a peal. Their pastime or
recreation is prayers, their exercise drinking, yet herein so religiously
addicted that they serve God oftest when they are drunk. Their humanity is
a leg to the residencer, their learning a chapter, for they learn it
commonly before they read it; yet the old Hebrew names are little beholden
to them, for they mis-call them worse than one another. Though they never
expound the scripture, they handle it much, and pollute the gospel with
two things, their conversation and their thumbs. Upon worky-days, they
behave themselves at prayers as at their pots, for they swallow them down
in an instant. Their gowns are laced commonly with streamings of ale, the
superfluities of a cup or throat above measure. Their skill in melody
makes them the better companions abroad, and their anthems abler to sing
catches. Long lived for the most part they are not, especially the base,
they overflow their bank so oft to drown the organs. Briefly, if they
escape arresting, they die constantly in God's service; and to take their
death with more patience, they have wine and cakes at their funeral, and
now they keep[73] the church a great deal better, and help to fill it
with their bones as before with their noise.

FOOTNOTES:

[73] _Keep_ for attend.

XLVIII.

A SHOP-KEEPER.

His shop is his well stuft book, and himself the title-page of it, or
index. He utters much to all men, though he sells but to a few, and
intreats for his own necessities, by asking others what they lack. No man
speaks more and no more, for his words are like his wares, twenty of one
sort, and he goes over them alike to all commers. He is an arrogant
commender of his own things; for whatsoever he shews you is the best in
the town, though the worst in his shop. His conscience was a thing that
would have