(11)
СНАР. VI.
How Tom rode a-Goſſipping:
TOM heard a company of women that would meet at the place a houſewarning, to welcome one of the houſe. Theſe women had formerly abuſed Tom, and now he thought to be even with them, ſo he gees to an apothecary's ſhop, buys a pound of purging comfits, and in a cake with other ſpices, and dreſſes himſelf in women's apparel, and gets a horſe and a pannel, and to the houſe he comes, knocks at the door, and aſked the maid, whether there were any women, came a houſe-warning? The maid ſaid, Not yet: I pray ſays Tom, take this cake, and if I come at the meeting, let them eat it and be merry; for I muſt go to a woman that is ready to lie down, and away he goes. The women came, and wondered what woman it ſhould be that left that cake; ſome of them ſuppoſed that it was ſome midwife: They ſtaid a while, and the perſon they expected to be with them not coming, they fell to their meat, and at laſt to the cake. But it was not long in their bellies before it began to work, ſo that one muſt go to ſtool, another to vomiting, and all of them were ſo ſick, that the ſmell of them per-
