Now none knows
A modest bride from a kept whore by 'er cloaths;
For cobweb lawns both spouse and wench expose."
"But, now we talk after the rate of the learned, which," said he, "are
the most difficult trades? I think a physician and a banker: a
physician, because he know's a man's very heart, and when the fits of
an ague will return; tho' by the way, I hate them mortally; for by
their good will I should have nothing but slubber-slops: And a banker,
because he'll find out a piece of brass money, tho' plated with
silver.
"There are also brute beasts, sheep and oxen, laborious in their kind:
Oxen, to whom we are beholding for the bread we eat; and sheep, for
the wooll, that makes us so fine. But O horrid! we both eat the
mutton, and make us warm with the fleece. I take the bees for divine
creatures; they give us honey, tho' 'tis said they stole it from
Jupiter, and that's the reason why they sting: For where-ever ye meet
any thing that's sweet you'll ever find a sting at the end of it."
He also excluded philosophers from business, while the memoirs of the
family were carrying round the table, and a boy, set for that purpose,
read aloud the names of the presents, appointed for the guests, to
carry home with them. Wicked silver, what can it not? Then a gammon
of bacon was set on the table, and above that several sharp sauces, a
night-cap for himself, pudding-pies, and I know not what kind of
birds: There was also brought in a rundlet of wine, boiled off a third
part, and kept under ground to preserve its strength: There were also
several other things I can give no account of; besides apples,
scallions, peaches, a whip, a knife, and what had been sent him; as
sparrows, a flye-flap, raisons, Attick honey, night-gowns, judges
robes, dry'd paste, table-books, with a pipe and a foot-stool: After
which came in an hare and a sole-fish: And there was further sent him
a lamprey, a water-rat, with a frog at his tail, and a bundle of
beets.
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