his patrimony, then to have his band ruffled; at a feast if hee be not placed in the highest seat, hee eats nothing, howsoever, hee drinks to no man, talks with no man for feare of familiarity. He professeth to keep his stomack for the pheasant or the quaile, and when they come, he can eat little, hee hath been so cloyed with them that yeare, although they be the first he saw. In his discourse he talks of none but Privy Councellors, and is as prone to be-lye their acquaintance, as he is a ladies favors: if he have but twelve-pence in's purse, he will give it for the best room in a play-house. He goes to sermons, only to shew his gay clothes, and if on other inferiour daies he chance to meet his friend, hee is sorry he sees him not in his best suit.

A Prison.

T should be Christs hospitall: for most of your wealthy citizens are good benefactors to it; and yet it can hardly be so, because so few in it are kept upon almes. Charities house and this, are built many miles asunder. One thing notwithstanding is here praise worthy, for men in this persecution cannot chuse but prove good. Christians, in that they are a kind of martyrs, and suffer for the truth. And yet it is so cursed a peece

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of land, that the sonne is ashamed to be his fathers heire in it. It is an infected pest-house all the yeare long the plague-sores of the law, are the diseases here wholely reigning. The surgeons are atturnies and pettifoggers, who kill more then they cure. Lord have mercy upon us, may well stand over these doores, for debt is a most dangerous and catching city pestilence. Some take this place for the walks in Moore-fields, (by reason the madmen are so neere) but the crosses here and there are not alike. No, it is not halfe so sweet an ayre, for it is the dunghill of the law, upon which is thrown the ruines of gentry, and the nasty heaps of voluntary decayed bankrupts, by which means it comes to bee a perfect medall of the iron age, sithence nothing but gingling of keyes, rattling of shackles, bolts and grates are here to be heard. It is the horse of Troy, in whose womb are shut up all the mad Greeks that were men of action. The Nullum vacuum (unlesse in prisoners bellies) is here truly to bee proved. One excellent effect is wrought by the place it selfe, for the arrantest coward breathing, being posted hither, comes in three dayes to an admirable stomack. Does any man desire to learne musick? every man here sings Lachrymæ at first sight, and is hardly out; hee runnes division upon every note; and yet (to their commendations bee it spoken) none of them (for all that division) doc trouble the Church. They

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are no Anabaptists; if you aske under what horizon
this climate lyes, the Bermudas and it are both
under one and the same height. And wheras some
suppose that this Iland (like that) is haunted with
divels, it is not so: for those divels (so talked of,
and feared) are none else but hoggish jaylors.
Hither you need not sayle, for it is a ship of it selfe :
the masters side is the upper deck. They in the
common jayle lye under hatches, and helpe to ballast
it. Intricate cases are the tacklings, executions the
anchors, capiasses the cables, chancery-bils the huge
sayles, a long terme the mast, law the helme, a
judge the pylot, a councel the purser, an atturney
the boatswain, his fleeting clark the swabber, bonds
the waves, out-lawries gusts, the verdicts of juries
rough winds, extents the rocks that split all in pecccs.

Or if it be not a ship, yet this and a ship differ not
much in the building; the one is a mooving misery,
the other a standing. The first is seated on a spring,
the second on piles. Either this place is an embleme
of a bawdy-house, or a bawdy-house of it; for
nothing is to be seene (in any roome) but scurvy
beds and bare walls. But (not so much to dishonor
it) it is an university of poore schollers, in which
three arts are chiefely studied: to pray, to curse,
and to write letters.

A Prisoner

S one that hath beene a monied man,

and is still a very close fellow; whoso

ever is of his acquaintance, let them make much of him, for they shall find him as fast a friend as any in England: he is a sure man, and you know where to find him. The corruption of a bankerupt, is commonly the generation of this creature hee dwels on the back side of the world, or in the suburbs of society, and lives in a tenement which he is sure none will goe about to take over his head. To a man that walkes abroad, he is one of the antipodes, that goes on the top of the world; and this under it. At his first comming in, hee is a peece of new coyne, all sharking old prisoners lye sucking at his purse. An old man and he are much alike, neither of them both goe farre. They are still angry, and peevish, and they sleepe little. Hee was borne at the fall of Babel, the confusion of languages is onely in his mouth. All the vacations, he speakes as good English, as any man in England; in tearme times he breaks out of that and hopping one-legg'd pace, into a racking trot of issues, billes, replications, rejoynders, demurres, querelles, subpena's, &c. able to fright a simple countrey fellow, and make him beleeve he conjures. Whatsoever

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his complexion was before, it turnes (in this place)
to choler or deepe melancholy, so that hee needs
every houre to take physick to loose his body, for
that (like his estate) is very foule and corrupt, and
extremely hard bound. The taking of an execution
off his stomack, gives him five or sixe stooles, and
leaves his body very soluble. The withdrawing of
an action, is a vomit. Hee is no sound man, and
yet an utter Barrester (nay, a sergeant of the case)
will feed heartily upon him, hee is very good picking
meat for a lawyer. The barber surgeons may (if
they will) beg him for an anatomie after hee hath
suffered execution; an excellent lecture may bee
made upon his body: hee is a kind of dead car-
kasse, creditors, lawyers, and jaylors devoure it:
creditors peck out his eyes with his owne teares,
layers flay off his owne skinne, and lappe him in
parchment, and jaylors are the promethean vultures
that gnaw his very heart. Hee is a bond-slave to
the law, and (albeit he were a shop-keeper in Lon-
don) yet he cannot with safe conscience write him-
selfe a freeman. His religion is of five or six
colours; this day he prayes that God may turne
the hearts of his creditors: and to morrow he curseth
the hour that ever he saw them. His apparell is
dawb'd commonly with statute lace, the suit it selfe
of durance, and the hose full of long paines. He
hath many other lasting suits, which he himselfe is

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