By Jesus sir the ditch be yuge (?) down, Is the best hunting in all the town, The poor say God bless your heart For if it continued they should smart The wives of it also be glad Which for their cattle little meat had. Some have but one sealy (?) cow Where is no hay nor straw in mow Therefore it is good conscience I ween To make that common that ever hath been! JAKE: Thou Pyrse Plowman by name How say’st thou by this game? PYRSE: Sir it is both game and glee All things well ordered to see So suddenly altered in a night. All things yet done is but right. I wonder at this covetous nation That scratt and get all out of fashion. They seem men of no conscience But only to satisfy covetous pretence Ever desiring to take money As greedy of it as bees of honey. JAKE: ... Hodge I thee commend ... Because thou art a sturdy knave Fit to wear anordyn Jacke (?) And to lift up a wool pack Wherewith of times my neck doth crack. And you good friends every chone (_sic_) I exhort ye all in one To pass home right shortly Lest the bailiffs do you spy Or else serjeants with burbolts bright Chance at you to have a flight Therefore eschew before daylight For till then they have no might.... Thus do I, Jack of the stile Now subscribe upon a tile. “This I do and will do with all my might For slandering of me yet do I but right For common to the commons again I restore Wherever it hath been yet common before. If again they enclose it never so fast Again asunder it shall be wrast They may be ware by that is past To make it again is but waste.” Fare well gentle reader. FOOTNOTES: [26] Offenders were mainly members of the Corporation or the University, also some local landowners. [27] Suburbs of Cambridge, Trumpington above, Chesterton below the town. CHAPTER VI EXPLORATION INTRODUCTORY NOTES Voyages of Columbus These accounts were written by Columbus himself, and may be amplified very much by reference to the originals in the Hakluyt Society’s volume. Another account of the fourth voyage written by one of Columbus’ men, Diago Mendez, is of special value. The accounts are here placed in their chronological order, but the passage on voyage three really relates to the whole series, and might with advantage be used as introductory. The Memorial on the second voyage is a very long official document, from which only a few fragments have been given in order to show the relations between Columbus and the sovereigns, and how from the first the Spanish Indies were under their direct personal control. Isabella had forewarded the discovery, and the new regions remained the property of the House of Castille rather than national provinces. New Light on Drake