--"Merchant's Tale," l. 930. Which Mr Pope hath modernised in the following manner-- "One caution yet is needful to be told, To guide our choice; This wife must not be old: There goes a saying, and 'twas shrewdly said, _Old fish at table, but young flesh in bed_." --"January and May," l. 99. "For sondry scholis maketh sotill clarkis, Woman of many scholis half a clark is: But certainly a yong thing may men gye, Right as men may warm wax with hondis plie." --"Merchant's Tale," l. 943. "No crafty widow shall approach my bed; Those are too wise for batchelors to wed. As subtle clerks by many schools are made, Twice-married dames are mistresses o' th' trade; But young and tender virgins, rul'd with ease, We form like wax, and mould them as we please." --"January and May," l. 106. [308] The Floralia or feast of Flora, Goddess of Flowers, were celebrated with public sports on the 5th of the Kalends of May. The chief part of the "solemnity was managed by a company of lewd strumpets, who ran up and down naked, sometimes dancing, sometimes fighting, or acting the mimic. However it came to pass, the wisest and gravest Romans were not for discontinuing this custom, though the most indecent imaginable: for Portius Cato, when he was present at these games, and saw the people ashamed to let the women strip while he was there, immediately went out of the theatre to let the ceremony have its course."--Kennet's "Roman Antiquities," p. 297. [309] So in "The Return from Parnassus," act iii. sc. 1: "My mistress upon good days puts on a piece of a parsonage; and we pages _play at blow-point_ for a piece of a parsonage." And in Donne ("Poems," 1719, p. 119)-- "Shortly, boys shall not _play_ At span-counter, or _blow-point_, but shall pay Toll to some courtier." ACT II., SCENE I. _Enter +Aurelio+ and +Musicians+._ +Aur.+ This is the window. Now, my noble Orpheus, As thou affect'st the name of rarity, Strike with the soul of music, that the sound May bear my love on his bedewed wing, To charm her ear: as when a sacrifice With his perfumed steam flies up to heaven Into Jove's nostrils, and there throws a mist On his enraged brow. O, how my fancy Labours with the success! [_Song above._ _Enter +Lucretia+._ +Luc.+ Cease your fool's note there; I am not in tune To dance after your fiddle. Who are you? What saucy groom, that dares so near intrude, And with offensive noise grate on my ears? +Aur.+ What more than earthly light breaks through that window? Brighter than all the glittering train of nymphs That wait on Cynthia, when she takes her progress In pursuit of the swift enchased deer Over the Cretan or Athenian hills; Or when, attended with those lesser stars, She treads the azure circle of the heavens.