Who was old Ross of Pottern, who lived till all the world was weary of him? all the world has forgotten him now. Who was Jack Raker, once so well known that he was named proverbially as a scape-grace by Skelton, and in the Ralph Roister Doister of Nicholas Udall,—that Udall, who on poor Tom Tusser's account, ought always to be called the bloody schoolmaster? Who was William Dickins, whose wooden dishes were sold so badly that when any one lost by the sale of his wares, the said Dickins and his dishes, were brought up in scornful comparison? Out-roaring Dick was a strolling singer of such repute that he got twenty shillings a day by singing at Braintree Fair: but who was that Desperate Dick that was such a terrible cutter at a chine of beef, and devoured more meat at ordinaries in discoursing of his frays and deep acting of his flashing and hewing, than would serve half a dozen brewers' draymen? It is at this day doubtful whether it was Jack Drum or Tom Drum whose mode of entertainment no one wishes to receive;—for it was to haul a man in by the head and thrust him out by the neck and shoulders. Who was that other Dick who wore so queer a hat-band that it has ever since served as a standing comparison for all queer things? By what name besides Richard was he known? Where did he live and when? His birth, parentage, education, life, character and behaviour, who can tell? Nothing, said the Doctor, is remembered of him now, except that he was familiarly called Dick, and that his queer hat-band, went nine times round and would not tie. “O vain World's glory, and unstedfast state Of all that lives on face of sinful earth!”[2] Who was Betty Martin, and wherefore should she so often be mentioned in connection with my precious eye or yours? Who was Ludlam whose dog was so lazy that he leant his head against a wall to bark? And who was Old Cole whose dog was so proud that he took the wall of a dung-cart and got squeezed to death by the wheel? Was he the same person of whom the song says Old King Cole Was a merry old soul, And a merry old soul was he? And was his dog proud because his master was called King? Here are questions to be proposed in the Examination papers of some Australian Cambridge, two thousand years hence, when the people of that part of the world shall be as reasonably inquisitive concerning our affairs, as we are now concerning those of the Greeks. But the Burneys, the Parrs and the Porsons, the Elmsleys, Monks and Blomfields of that age, will puzzle over them in vain, for we cannot answer them now. [Footnote 2: SPENSER.]