the literary fops of his days, the "rackers of orthography;" and his conversation is described by his friend, Sir Nathaniel, the Curate, as possessing all the requisites to perfection. "Sir: your reasons at dinner have been sharp and sententious; pleasant without scurrility, witty without affection, audacious without impudency, learned without opinion, and strange without heresy." "It is very difficult," remarks Dr. Johnson, "to add any thing to this character of the schoolmaster's table talk, and perhaps all the precepts of Castiglione will scarcely be found to comprehend a rule for conversation so justly delineated, so widely dilated, and so nicely limited."† The country-schoolmasters in the reigns of Elizabeth and James, were, however, if we trust to accounts of Ascham and Peacham, in general many degrees below the pedagogue of Shakspeare in ability; tyranny and ignorance appear to have been their chief characteristics; to such an extent, indeed, were they deficient in point of necessary knowledge, that Peacham, speaking of bad masters, declares," it is a generall plague and complaint of the whole land; for, for one discreet and able teacher, you shall finde twenty ignorant (and carelesse; who (among so many fertile and delicate wits as England affordeth) whereas they make one scholler, they marre ten." ‡ Ascham had endeavoured, by every argument and mode of persuasion in his power, to check the severe and indiscriminate discipline which prevailed among the teachers in his time; it would seem in vain; for Peacham, about the year 1620, found it necessary to recommend lenity in equally strenuous terms, and has given a minute and we have no doubt a faithful picture of the various cruelties to which scholars were then subjected; a summary of the result of this conduct may be drawn from his own words where he says, "Masters for the most part so behave themselves, that their very name is hatefull to the scholler who trembleth at their comming in, rejoyceth at their absence, and looketh his master (returned) in the face, as his deadly enemy."S To the charges of undue severity and defective literature, we must add, I am afraid, the infinitely more weighty accusation of frequent immorality and buffoonery. Ludovicus Vives, who wrote just before the age of Shakspeare, asserts, that "some schoolmasters taught Ovid's books of love to their scholars, and some made expositions, and expounded the vices ;"** and Peacham, at the close of the era we are considering, censures in the strongest terms their too common levity and misconduct : "The diseases whereunto some of them are very subject, are humour and folly (that I may say nothing of the grosse ignorance and insufficiency of many) whereby they become ridiculous and contemptible both in the schoole and abroad. Hence it comes to passe, that in many places, especially in Italy, of all professions that of pedanteria is held in basest repute the schoole-master almost in every comedy being brought upon the stage, to parallel the Zani or Pantaloun. He made us good sport in that excellent comedy of Pedantius, acted in our Trinity Colledge in Cambridge, and if I be not deceived, in Priscianus Vapulans, and many of our English plays. "I knew one, who in winter would ordinarily in a cold morning whip his boyes over for no other purpose than to get himselfe a heat: another beat them for swearing, and all the while he sweares himselfe with horrible oathes, he would forgive any fault saving that. I had I remember myselfe (neere S. Albanes in Hertfordshire, where I was borne) a master, who by no entreaty would teach any scholler he had, farther than his father had learned before him; as, if he had onely learned but to reade English, the sonne, though he went with him seven yeeres, should goe no further: his reason was, they would then proove saucy rogues and controule their fathers yet these are they that oftentimes have our hopefull gentry under their charge and tuition, to bring them in science and civility."++ We must, I apprehend, from these representations, be induced to conclude, that ignorance, despotism, and self-sufficiency were leading features in the composition of the country-schoolmaster, during this period of our annals; it would not be just, however, to infer from these premises that the larger schools were equally unfortunate in their conductors; on the contrary, most of the public seminaries of the capital, and many in the large provincial towns, were under the regulation of masters highly respectable for their erudition; men, indeed, to whom neither Erasmus nor Joseph Scaliger would have refused the title of ripe and good scholars. We shall now pass forward, in the series of our rural characters, to the delineation of one of great importance in a national point of view, that of the substantial Farmer or Yeoman, of whom Harrison has left us the following interesting definition : "This sort of people have a certaine preheminence, and more estimation than labourers and the common sort of artificers, and these commonlie live wealthilie, kéepe good houses, and travel to get riches. They are also for the most part farmers to gentlemen, or at the leastwise artificers, and with grazing, frequenting of markets, and keeping of servants (not idle servants, as the gentlemen doo, but such as get both their owne and part of their masters living) do come to great welth, in somuch that manie of them are able and doo buie the lands of unthriftie gentlemen, and often setting their sonnes to the schooles, to the universities, and to the ins of the court; or otherwise leaving them sufficient lands whereupon they may live without labour, doo make them by those meanes to become gentlemen: these were they that in times past made all France afraid. And albeit they be not called master, as gentlemen are, or sir as to knights apperteineth, but onelie John and Thomas, &c. : yet have they beene found to have doone verie good service and the kings of England in foughten battels, were woont to remaine among them (who were their footmen) as the French kings did amongst their horsemen : the prince thereby shewing where his chiefe strength did consist." * After this description of the rank which the farmer held in society we shall proceed to state the mode in which he commonly lived in the age of Elizabeth; and in doing this we have chosen, as usual, to adopt at considerable length the language of our old writers; a practice to which we shall in future adhere, while detailing the manners, customs, etc. of our ancestors, a practice which has indeed peculiar advantages; for the authenticity of the source is at once apparent, the diction possesses a peculiar charm from its antique cast, and the expression has a raciness and force of colouring, which owes its origin to actual inspection, and which, consequently, it is in vain to expect, on such subjects, from modern composition. The houses or cottages of the farmer were built, in places abounding in wood, in a very strong and substantial manner, with not more than four, six, or nine inches between stud and stud; but in the open and champagne country, they were compelled to use more flimsy materials, with here and there a a girding to which they fastened their splints, and then covered the whole with thick clay to keep out the wind. "Certes this rude kind of building," says Harrison, "made the Spaniards in quéene Maries daies to wonder, but chéeflie when they saw what large diet was used in manie of these so homelie cottages, in so much that one of no small reputation amongst them said after this manner: These English (quoth he) have their houses made of sticks and durt, but they fare commonlie so well as the king.' Whereby it appeareth that he liked better of our good fare in such coarse cabins, than of their owne thin diet in their prince-like habitations and palaces." The cottages of the peasantry usually consisted of but two rooms on the ground-floor, the outer for the servants, the inner for the master and his family, and they were thatched with straw or sedge; while the dwelling of the substantial farmer was distributed into several rooms; above and beneath was coated with white lime or cement, and was very neatly roofed with reed; hence Tusser, speaking of the farm-house, gives the following directions for repairing and preserving its thatch in the month of May: 66 The juster ye drive it, the smoother and plaine, A few years before the era of which we are treating, the venerable Hugh Latimer, describing in one of his impressive sermons the economy of a farmer in his time, tells us that his father, who was a yeoman, had no land of his own, but only "a farm of three or four pounds by the year at the utmost; and hereupon he tiled so much as kept half a dozen men. He had a walk for an hundred sheep; and my mother milked thirty kine. He kept his son at school till he went to the university, and maintained him there; he married his daughters with five pounds or twenty nobles a piece; he kept hospitality with his neighbours, and some alms he gave to the poor; and all this he did out of the said farm." + Land let, at this period, it should be remembered, at about a shilling per acre; but in the reign of Elizabeth its value rapidly increased, together with a proportional augmentation of the comfort of the farmer, who even began to exhibit the elegancies and luxuries of life. Of the change which took place in rural economy towards the close of the sixteenth century, the following faithful and interesting picture has been drawn by the pencil of Harrison, who, noticing the additional splendour of gentlemen's houses, remarks, "In times past the costlie furniture staied there, whereas now it is descended yet lower, even unto manie farmers, who by vertue of their old and not of their new leases, have for the most part learned also to garnish their cupbords with plate, their ioined beds with tapistrie and silke hangings, and their tables with carpets and fine naperie, whereby the wealth of our countrie (God be praised therefore, and give us grace to imploie it well) dooth infinitlie appeare. Neither doo I speake this in reproch of anie man, God is my judge, but to shew that I do rejoise rather, to see how God hath blessed us with his good gifts; and whilest I behold how that in a time wherein all things are growen to most excessive prices, and what commoditie so ever is to be had, is daily plucked from the commonaltie by such as looke in to everie trade, we doo yet find the means to obtein and atchive such furniture as here to fore hath beene unpossible. There are old men yet dwelling in the village where I remaine, which have noted three things to be marvellouslie altered in England within their sound remembrance; and other three things too too much encreased. One is, the multitude of chimnies latelie erected, whereas in their yoong daies there were not above two or three, if so manie in most uplandish townes of the realme, (the religious houses, and manor places of their lords alwaies excepted, and peradventure some great personages) but ech one made his fire against a rere dosse in the hall, where he dined and dressed his meat. "The second is the great (although not generall) amendment of lodging, for (said they) our fathers (yea and wee ourselves also) have lien full oft upon straw pallets, on rough mats covered onlie with a sheet, under coverlets made of dagswain or hop harlots (I use their owne termes), and a good round log under their heads instead of a bolster or pillow. If it were so that our fathers or the good man of the house, had within seven yeares after his mariage purchased a matteres or flockebed, and thereto a sacke of chaffe to rest his head upon, he thought himselfe to be as well lodged as the lord of the towne, that peradventure laie seldome in a bed of downe or whole fethers; so well were they contented, and with such base kind of furniture: which also is not verie much amended as yet in some parts of Bedfordshire, and elsewhere further off from our southerne parts. Pillowes (said they) were thought meet onelie for women in child bed. As for servants, if they had anie sheet above them it was well, for seldome had they anie under their bodies, to keepe them from the pricking straws that ran oft through the canvas of the pallet, and rased their hardened hides. "The third thing they tell of, is the exchange of vessell, as of treene platters into pewter, and wodden spoones into silver or tin. For so common was all sorts of tréene stuff in old time, that a man should hardlie find four péeces of pewter (of which one was peradventure a salt) in a good farmer's house, and yet for all this frugalitie (if it may so be justly called) they were scarce able to live and paie their rents at their daies without selling of a cow, or an horsse, or more, although they paid but foure pounds at the uttermost by the yeare. Such also was their povertie, that if some one od farmer or husbandman had béene at the alehouse, a thing greatlie used in those daies, amongst six or seven of his neighbours, and there in a braverie to shew what store he had, did * Three editions of Tusser's Poem on Husbandry are now before me; the first printed in 1557, entitled, "A hundreth good Pointes of Husbandrie;" the 4to. edition of 1586, termed “Five Hundred Pointes of Good Husbandrie;" and "Tusser Redivivus." by Daniel Hilman, first published in 1710, and again in 1744; the quatrain just quoted is from the copy of 1744, p. 56. Gilpin's Life of Latimer, p. 2. cast down his purse, and therein a noble or six shillings in silver, unto them (for few such men then cared for gold, because it was not so readie paiment, and they were oft inforced to give a penie for the exchange of an angell) it was verie likelie that all the rest could not laie downe so much against it whereas in my time, although peradventure foure poundes of old rent be improved to fortie, fiftie, or an hundred pounds, yet will the farmer as another palme or date trée thinke his gaines verie small toward the end of his terme, if he have not six or seven yeares rent lieing by him, therewith to purchase a new lease, beside a faire garnish of pewter on his cupbord, with so much in od vessell going about the house, three or foure feather beds, so manie coverlids and carpets of tapistrie, a silver salt, a bowle for wine (if not an whole neast) and a dozzen of spoones to furnish up the sute."* To this curious delineation of the furniture and household accommodation of the farmer, it will be necessary, in order to complete the sketch, to add a few things relative to his diet and hospitality. Contrary to what has taken place in modern times, the hours for meals were later with the artificer and the husbandman than with the higher order of society; the farmer and his servants usually sitting down to dinner at one o'clock, and to supper at seven, while the nobleman and gentleman took the first at eleven in the morning, and the second at five in the afternoon. It would appear that, from the cottage to the palace, good eating was as much cultivated in the days of Elizabeth as it has been in any subsequent period; and the rites of hospitality, more especially in the country, were observed with a frequency and cordiality which a further progress in civilisation has rather tended to check than to increase. Of the larder of the cotter and the shepherd, and of the hospitality of the former, a pretty accurate idea may be acquired from the simple yet beautiful strains of an old pastoral bard of Elizabeth's days, who, describing a nobleman fatigued by the chase, the heat of the weather, and long fasting, adds that he "Did house him in a peakish graunge Within a forrest great: Wheare, knowne, and welcom'd, as the place The picture of the shepherd youth is so A cushion made of lists, a stoole Were brought him, and he sitteth down The poor old couple wish't their bread portion of it is illustrative of our subject, we cannot avoid giving so much of the text as will render the figure complete. "Sweet growte, or whig, his bottle had As much as it might hold: A sheeve of bread as browne as nut, And wildings, or the season's fruite, And whil'st his py-bald curre did sleepe, On hollow quilles of oten strawe With the sun And with the sun doth folde againe ; Holinshed, vol i. p. 317, 318. Nor lackes he gleeful tales to tell, Theare sleeps he soundly all the night, Nor feares he blasting of his corne Or stormes by seas, or stirres on land, Not spending franklier than his flocke Wel wot I, sooth they say that say: + Warner's Albion's England, chap. 42. Chalmers's English Poets, vol iv. p. 602. Warner in Chalmers's Poets, vol. iv. p. 552, 553. The lines in Italics allude to the favourite beverage of the peasantry, and the mode in which they recreated themselves over the spicy bowl. To "turne a crab" is to roast a wilding or wild apple in the fire, for the purpose of being thrown hissing hot into a bowl of nut-brown ale, into which had been previously put a toast with some spice and sugar. To this delicious compound Shakspeare has frequently referred; thus, in Love's Labour's Lost one of his designations of winter is, and Puck, describing his own wanton tricks, in Midsummer Night's Dream, says "And sometime lurk I in a gossip's bowl, In very likeness of a roasted crab, And when she drinks, against her lips I bob." + The very expression to turn a crab will be found in the following passages from two old plays, in the first of which the good man says he will "Sit down in his chaire by his wife faire Alison, And turne a crabbe in the fire;"‡ and in the second, Christmas is personified Nor can we omit, in closing this series of quotations, the following stanzas of a fine old song in the curious comedy of "Gammer Gurton's Needle," first printed in 1575: "I love no rost, but a nut brown toste, and a crab layde in the fyre; A lytle bread shall do me stead, No froste nor snow, no winde, I trow, I am so wrapt, and throwly lapt Back and syde go bare, go bare, booth foote and hande go colde; But belly, God sende thee good ale ynoughe, To tell gleeful tales, "whilst round the bole doth trot," was an amusement much more common among our ancestors, during the age of Elizabeth, and the subsequent century, than it has been in any later period. The Winter's Tale of Shakspeare owes its title to this custom, of which an example is placed before us in the first scene of the second act. And Burton, the first edition of whose "Anatomy of Melancholy" was published in 1617, enumerates, among the ordinary recreations of Winter, "merry tales of errant knights, queens, lovers, lords, ladies, giants, dwarfs, thieves, cheaters, witches, fayries, goblins, friars, etc.-which some delight to hear, some to tell; Summer's Last Will and Testament, by Nash, 1600 } Vide Ancient British Drama, vol. i. |