And lest I my selfe, like some _pedantical Vicar_
stammering out a most false and crackt latine oration
to maister _Maior_ of the towne and his brethren,
should cough and hem in my deliueries; by which
meanes you (my Auditors) should be in danger to
depart more like woodcockes then when you came
to me: O thou venerable father of antient (and
therefore hoary) customes, _Syluanus_, I inuoke thy
assistance; thou that first taughtest Carters to weare
hob-nailes, and Lobs to play Christmas gambols, and
to shew the most beastly horse-trickes: O do thou,
or (if thou art not at leasure) let thy Mountibancke,
goat-footed _Fauni_, inspire me with the knowledge of
all those silly and ridiculous fashions, which the old
dunsticall world woare euen out at elbowes; draw
for me the pictures of the most simple fellowes then
liuing, that by their patterns I may paint the like.
Awake thou noblest drunkerd _Bacchus_, thou must
likewise stand to me (if at least thou canst for reeling),
teach me (you soueraigne skinker) how to take
the _Germanies vpsy freeze_, the Danish _Rowsa_, the
Switzers stoap of _Rhenish_, the _Italians Parmizant_,
the Englishmans healthes, his hoopes, cans, halfecans,
Gloues, Frolicks, and flapdragons, together with the
most notorious qualities of the truest tospots, as
when to cast, when to quarrell, when to fight, and
where to sleepe: hide not a drop of thy moist
mystery from me (thou plumpest swil-bowle), but
(like an honest red-nosed wine-bibber) lay open all
thy secrets, and ye mystical _Hieroglyphick_ of _Rashers_
a' th' coales, _Modicums_ and _shooing-hornes,_ and why
they were inuented, for what occupations, and when
to be vsed. Thirdly (because I will haue more then
two strings to my bow) _Comus_, thou Clarke of
_Gluttonies_ kitchen, doe thou also bid me proface,
and let me not rise from table, till I am perfect in
all the generall rules of _Epicures_ and _Cormorants_.
Fatten thou my braines, that I may feede others,
and teach them both how to squat downe to their
meat, and how to munch so like Loobies, that the
wisest _Solon_ in the world, shall not be able to take
them for any other. If there be any strength in
thee, thou beggerly Monarche of _Indians_, and setter-vp
of rotten-lungd chimneysweepers (_Tobacco_), I beg
it at thy smoaky hands: make me thine adopted
heire, that, inheriting the vertues of thy whiffes, I
may / distribute them amongst all nations, and make
the phantastick _Englishmen_ (aboue the rest) more
cunning in the distinction of thy _Rowle Trinidado_,
_Leafe_, and _Pudding_, then the whitest toothd Blackamoore
in all _Asia_. After thy pipe, shal ten thousands
be taught to daunce, if thou wilt but discouer to me
the sweetnesse of thy snuffes, with the manner of
spawling, slauering, spetting and driueling in all
places, and before all persons. Oh what songs will
I charme out, in praise of those valiantly-strong-stinking
breaths, which are easily purchased at thy
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