In Chaloner's translation of the "Praise of Folly," by Erasmus, 1549, is the following passage: "And by the fayeth ye owe to the immortal godds, may any thing to an indifferent considerer be deemed more happie and blisful than is this kinde of men whome commonly ye call fooles, poltes, ideotes, and _paches_?" Again, "I have subtraied these my selie _paches_, who not onelye themselves are ever mery, playing, singing, and laughyng, but also whatever they doo, are provokers of others lykewyse to pleasure, sporte, and laughter, as who sayeth ordeyned herefore by the Godds of theyr benevolence to recreate the sadnesse of mens lyves." [203] In all cases of distress, and whenever the assistance of a superior power was necessary, it was usual with the Roman Catholics to promise their tutelary saints to light up candles at their altars, to induce them to be propitious to such applications as were made to them. The reader will see a very ridiculous story of this kind in the first volume of Lord Oxford's "Collection of Voyages," p. 771, quoted in Dr Grey's "Notes on Shakspeare," vol. i. p. 7. Erasmus has a story to the same purpose in his "Naufragium." [204] [Respecting this song, see Bell's "Songs from the Dramatists," p. 34.] [205] Alluding to the drunkenness of the Friars. [206] So in act iii., sc. 4-- "A cup of ale had in his hand, and _a crab_ lay in the fire." Again-- "Now _a crab_ in the fire were worth a good groat, That I might quaff with my Captain Tom tospot." --Fulwell's _Like will to Like_, c. 2. Again-- "And sometime lurk I in a gossip's bowl, In very likeness of a _roasted crab_." --_Midsummer Night's Dream_, act ii., sc. 1. Upon this last passage, Mr Steevens has given the following examples of the use of this word-- "Yet we will have in store _a crab_ in the fire, With nut-brown ale."--_Henry V._, Anon. "And sit down in my chaire by my faire Alison, And turn a _crabbe_ in the fire as merry as Pope Joan." --Edwards's _Damon and Pithias_. "Sitting in a corner turning _crabs_, Or coughing o'er a warmed pot of ale." --_Description of Christmas in Summer's last Will and Testament_, by Nash, 1600. [207] _Trowl_, or _trole the bowl_, was a common phrase in drinking for passing the vessel about, as appears by the following beginning of an old catch-- "_Trole, trole_ the bowl to me, And I will _trole_ the same again to thee." And in this other, in Hilton's Collection-- "Tom Bouls, Tom Bouls, Seest thou not how merrily this good ale _trowles_? --Sir John Hawkins's _History of Music_, Vol. III., 22. Again-- "Sirra Shakebagge, canst thou remember Since we _trould the boule_ at Sittingburn." --_Arden of Feversham_, 1592.