Page:Hudibras - Volume 1 (Butler, Nash, Bohn; 1859).djvu/229

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CANTO I.]
HUDIBRAS.
145

And pardon'd for some great offence,[1]
With which he's willing to dispense,
First has him laid upon his belly,
Then beaten back and side t' a jelly;[2]
That done, he rises, humbly bows, 245
And gives thanks for the princely blows;
Departs not meanly proud, and boasting
Of his magnificent rib-roasting.
The beaten soldier proves most manful,
That, like his sword, endures the anvil,250
And justly 's held more formidable,
The more his valour's malleable:
But he that fears a bastinado,
Will run away from his own shadow:[3]
And though I'm now in durance fast,255
By our own party basely cast,[4]
Ransom, exchange, parole, refus'd,
And worse than by the en'my is'd;
In close catasta[5] shut, past hope
Of wit or valour to elope;260
As beards, the nearer that they tend
To th' earth, still grow more reverend;
And cannons shoot the higher pitches,
The lower we let down their breeches;[6]
I'll make this low dejected fate 265
Advance me to a greater height.
Quoth she, Y' have almost made m' in love
With that which did my pity move.

  1. In the editions of 1664, this and the following line read thus:
    "To his good grace, for some offence
    Forfeit before, and pardon'd since."
  2. This story is told in Le Blanc's Travels, Part ii. ch. 4.
  3. The fury of Bucephalus proceeded from the fear of his own shadow. See Rabelais, vol. i. c. 14.
  4. This was the chief complaint of the Presbyterians and Parliamentary party, when the Independents and the army ousted them from their misused supremacy; and it led to their negotiations with the King, their espousal of the cause of his son, and ultimately to his restoration as Charles the Second.
  5. A cage or prison wherein the Romans exposed slaves for sale. See Persius, vi. 76.
  6. See note 2, p. 39, supra.