If Hudibras but once come at her,
He id quickly make her chaps to water :
Then for his equipage and shape,
On vestals they 'd commit a rape ;
Which often, as the story says,
Have made the ladies weep
Ill has he read, that never heard
How he with Widow Tomson far'd,
And what hard conflict was between
Our Knight and that insulting quean.
Sure captive knight ne’er took more pains,
For rhymes for his melodious strains,
Nor beat his brains, or made more faces,
To get into a jilt's good graces,
Than did Sir Hudibras to get
Into this subtle gypsy's net;
Who, after all her high pretence:
To modesty and innocence,
Was thought by most to be a woman
That to all other knights was common..
Hard was his fate in this, I own,
Nor will I for the trapes atone ;
Indeed to guess I am not able,
What made her thus inexorable,
Unless she did not like his wit,
Or, what is worse, his perquisite.
Howe'er it was, the wound the gave
The Knight, he carry'd to his grave :
Vile harlot ! to destroy a knight,
That could both plead, and pray, and fight.
Аа 2
Oh! cruel, base, inhuman drab,
To give him such a mortal stab,
That made him pine away and moulder,
As though that he had been no soldier :
Could'st thou find no one else to kill,
Thou instrument of death and hell!
But Hudibras, who stood the Bears
So oft against the Cavaliers,
And in the very heat of war
Took stout Crowdero prisoner ;
And did such wonders all along,
That far exceed both pen and tongue?
If he had been in battle Nain,
We 'ad had less reason to complain ;
But to be inurder'd by a whore,
Was ever knight to serv'd before ?
But, since he 's gone, all we can say,
He chanc'd to die a lingering way ;
If he had liv'd a longer date,
He might, perhaps, have met a fate
More violent, and fitting for
A knight so fam'd in Civil war.
To sum up all—from love and danger
He's now (O happy Knight!) a stranger ;
And, if a Muse can aught foretell,
Hi fame shall fill a chronicle,
And he in after-ages be
Of errant knights th' epitome.
NDER this stone rests Hudibras,
A Knight as errant as e'er was ;
The controversy only lies,
Whether he was more stout than wise;
Nor can we here pretend to say,
5
Whether he best could fight or pray;
So, till those questions are decided,
His virtues must rest undivided.
Full oft he suffer'd bangs and drubs,
And full as oft took pains in tubs;
Of which the most that can be said,
He pray'd and fought, and fought and pray'd.
As for his personage and shape,
Among the rest we'll let them scape ;
Nor do we, as things stand, think fit
This stone should meddle with his wit.
One thing, 'tis true, we ought to tell,
He liv'd and dy'd a colonel ;
And for the Good old Cause stood buff,
'Gainst many a bitter kick and cuff.
But, since his Worship 's dead and gone,
And mouldering lies beneath this stone,
The Reader is desir'd to look,
For his atchievements in his Book ;
Which will preserve of Knight the Tale,
25 Till Time and Death itself thall fail.
CON.
TUDIBRAS, Part III. Canto II.
Page 3
Hudibras, Part III. Canto III.
80
An Heroical Epistle of Hudibras to his Lady
The Lady's Answer to the Knight
125
The Genuine Remains of Mr. Butler
141
Mr. Thyer's Preface
143
The Elephant in the Moon
147
The same in long verle
166
A Satire on the Royal Society. A Fragment
187
Repartees betwe, a Cat and Puss at a Caterwauling.
In the modern Heroic way
192
To the honourable Edward Howard, Esq; upon his in-
comparable Poem of the British Princes 197
A Palinode to the Hon. Edward Howard, Esq; upon
the same
199
A Panegyric upon Sir John Denham's recovery from
his madness
203
Upon Critics, who judge of Modern Plays precisely by
the Rules of the Ancients
207
Prologue to the Queen of Arragon, acted before the
Duke of York, upon his birth-day
Epilogue to the fame. . To the Dutchefs
213
Upon Philip Nye’s Thanksgiving Beard
214
Satire upon the weakness and milery of man
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