—— _most goodlyhod_] i. e. perfect goodness.
Page 26. v. 40. _mastres_] i. e. mistress.
v. 43. _more desyrous_] i. e. more desirable.
v. 12. _fals poynt_] “This _fals poynt_ ... Hæc _fraus_.” Hormanni _Vulgaria_, sig. s viii. ed. 1530.
Page 27. v. 15. _lesard_] In the Latin above, the corresponding word is _anguis_: long after Skelton’s time, the poor harmless lizard was reckoned venomous; so in Shakespeare’s _Third Part of Henry VI._, act ii. sc. 2., “_lizards’_ dreadful stings.”
v. 1. _rasyd_] i. e. torn, wounded. Skelton in his _Woffully Araid_ has
—— _blo_] i. e. livid. “_Blo_, blewe and grene coloured, as ones body is after a drie stroke, _iaunastre_.” Palsgrave’s _Lesclar. de la Lang. Fr._, 1530. fol. lxxxiiii. (Table of Adiect.).
v. 5. _ouerthwart_] i. e. cross, perverse, adverse.
Skelton mentions this piece among his works, in the _Garlande of Laurell_, v. 1198. vol. i. 409. Sir John Hawkins, who printed it together with the music, says that it “appears to have been set by William Cornish of the Chapel Royal in the reign of Henry vii.” _Hist. of Music_, iii. 2.
Page 28. v. 1. _besherewe yow_] i. e. curse you,—confound you!
v. 2. _This wanton clarkes be nyse all way_] i. e. These wanton scholars be always foolish, inclined to folly, to toyish tricks: compare our author’s _Phyllyp Sparowe_;
“Phyllyp, though he were _nyse_, In him it was no vyse,” &c.
v. 5. _Tully valy_] Or _Tilly vally_—an exclamation of contempt, the origin of which is doubtful.
—— _Cristian Clowte_] Compare our author’s _Colyn Cloute_;
“He coud not syng himselfe therout But by the helpe of _Christyan Clout_.”
—— _Jak of the vale_] So our author in his _Magnyfycence_; “some iangelynge _Jacke of the vale_,” v. 260. vol. i. 234. Compare two pieces of a much later date;
“I am not now to tell a tale Of George a Greene, or _Jacke a Vale_.”
“And they had leauer printen _Jacke a vale_ Or Clim o Clough,” &c.
J. Davies,—_Other Eglogues_ annexed to _The Shepheards Pipe_, 1614. sig. G 4.
—— _praty pode_]—_praty_, i. e. pretty: _pode_, i. e., perhaps, toad. Compare Roy’s satire, _Rede me, and be nott wrothe_, &c.;
“A littell, _pratye_, foolysshe _poade_.”
v. 10. _Strawe, Jamys foder, ye play the fode_] The meaning of _Jamys foder_,—and whether “fode” is used here in the sense of—deceiver, one who feeds another with words (compare our author’s _Magnyfycence_, v. 1719. vol. i. 281.),—I must leave the reader to determine.