_tear_ stood right in the gap, and filled to overflowing the eye of the needle. It was weeping for the death of its old mistress; it refused consolation; it was never threaded again. We give this incident on the testimony of a gallant naval officer; an unquestionable authority, though we are fully aware that some of our readers may be ungenerously sceptical, and perhaps even rude enough to attempt some vile pun about the brave sailor's "drawing a long yarn." If, however, Gammer Gurton's needle resembled the one we have just referred to, and that, too, at a time when a needle, even not supernaturally endowed, was not to be had of English manufacture, and therefore could only be purchased probably at a high price, we cannot wonder at the aggrieved feelings of her domestic circle when the catastrophe occurred which is depicted as follows:--The parties interested were the Dame Gammer Gurton herself; Hodge, her farming man; Tib, her maid; Cocke, her boy; and Gib, her cat. The play from which our quotation is taken is not without some pretensions to wit, though of the coarsest kind: it is supposed to have been first performed at Christ's College, Cambridge, in 1566; and Warton observes on it, that while Latimer's sermons were in vogue at court, Gammer Gurton's needle might well be tolerated at the university. Act I. Scene 3. Hodge and Tib. _Hodge._ "I am agast, by the masse, I wot not what to do; I had need blesse me well before I go them to: Perchance, some felon spirit may haunt our house indeed, And then I were but a noddy to venter where's no need." _Tib._ "I'm worse than mad, by the masse, to be at this stay. I'm chid, I'm blam'd, and beaten all th' hours on the day. Lamed and hunger starved, pricked up all in jagges, Having no patch to hide my backe, save a few rotten ragges." _Hodge._ "I say, Tib, if thou be Tib, as I trow sure thou be, What devil make ado is this between our dame and thee?" _Tib._ "Truly, Hodge, thou had a good turn thou wart not here this while; It had been better for some of us to have been hence a mile: My Gammer is so out of course, and frantike all at once, That Cocke, our boy, and I poor wench, have felt it on our bones." _Hodge._ "What is the matter, say on, Tib, whereat she taketh so on?" _Tib._ "She is undone, she saith (alas) her life and joy is gone: If she hear not of some comfort, she is she saith but dead, Shall never come within her lips, on inch of meat ne bread. And heavy, heavy is her grief, as, Hodge, we all shall feel." _Hodge._ "My conscience, Tib, my Gammer has never lost her neele?" _Tib._ "Her neele." _Hodge._ "Her neele?" _Tib._ "Her neele, by him that made me!"