Page:Biographical and critical studies by James Thomson ("B.V.").djvu/249

BEN JONSON 233 cross-ways over the country between Kentish Town and Hamstead Heath. The nominal time seems to be early in the reign of Elizabeth, as one says he beheld " King Edward, our late liege and sovereign lord," ride forth in state ; but the author probably wrote in accordance with his own time and experience. Most of the personages are uneducated ; and, strangely enough, these all speak in a sort of West Country dialect, thus : — "Why, 'tis thirty years, e'en as this day now, Zin Valentine's Day, of all clays kursined, look you ; And the zame day o' the month as this Zin Valentine, Or I am vowly deceived." The woman of my Lady Tub, of Totten Hall, speaks of the city ladies and court ladies as if the capital were far remote. Strangely enough, moreover, we read of the new year in January, though for a con- siderable period after Jonson's time the old year did not end until Lady-day. Further, Hilts says to the intended bride, referring to the intended bridegroom, poor Clay, the tile-maker, who is sorely diddled : — " it's true, you are a proper woman ; But to be cast away on such a clown-pipe As Clay I " which, if an anachronism, appears to imply that in Jonson's days (the earlier, if not the latter) clay pipes were left to the lower classes. The comedy, or comedy-farce, is full of genial fun, and I should think would prove popular even now on the stage, if fairly acted. The author himself says of it in the Prologue : —