And when before the fight, th' hadst vow'd
To give no quarter in cold blood;
Now thou hast got me for a Tartar,[1]865
To make m' against my will take quarter;
Why dost not put me to the sword,
But cowardly fly from thy word?
Quoth Hudibras, The day 's thine own;
Thou and thy stars have cast me down:870
My laurels are transplanted now,
And flourish on thy conqu'ring brow:
My loss of honour 's great enough,
Thou need'st not brand it with a scoff:
Sarcasms may eclipse thine own,875
But cannot blur my lost renown:
I am not now in fortune's power,
He that is down can fall no lower.[2]
The ancient heroes were illustr'ous
For being benign, and not blust'rous 880
Against a vanquish'd foe: their swords
Where sharp and trenchant, not their words;
And did in tight but cut work out
T' employ their courtesies about.[3]
Quoth she, Altho' thou hast deserv'd,885
Base Slubberdegullion,[4] to be serv'd
As thou didst vow to deal with me,
If thou hadst got the victory;
Yet I should rather act a part
That suits my fame, than thy desert.890
- ↑ The Tartars (says Purchas, in his Pilgrimes, p. 478) would rather die than yield, which makes them fight with desperate energy; whence the proverb, Thou hast caught a Tartar.—A man catches a Tartar when he falls into his own trap, or having a design upon another, is caught himself. "Help, help, cries one, I have caught a Tartar. Bring him along, answers his comrade. He will not come, says he. Then come without him, quoth the other. But he will not let me, says the Tartar-catcher."
- ↑ A literal translation of the proverb: Qui jacet in terrâ non habet unde cadat.
- ↑ See Cleveland, in his letter to the Protector. "The most renowned heroes have ever with such tenderness cherished their captives, that their swords did but cut out work for their courtesies."
- ↑ That is, a drivelling fool: to slubber, in British, is to drivel; and gul, or its diminutive gullion, a fool, or person easily imposed upon. The word is used by Taylor the Water Poet, in his "Laugh and grow fat."
