406
HUDIBRAS.
[PART III.
For those who run from th' enemy,
Engage them equally to fly; 290
And when the fight becomes a chase,
Those win the day that win the race;[1]
And that which would not pass in fights,
Has done the feat with easy flights;
Recover'd many a desp'rate campaign 295
With Bourdeaux, Burgundy, and Champaign;
Restor'd the fainting high and mighty,
With brandy-wine,[2] and aqua-vitæ;
And made them stoutly overcome
With bacrack, hoccamore, and mum;[3] 300
Whom th' uncontroll'd decrees of fate
To victory necessitate;
With which, altho' they run or burn,[4]
They unavoidably return;
Or else their sultan populaces 305
Still strangle all their routed bassas.[5]
Engage them equally to fly; 290
And when the fight becomes a chase,
Those win the day that win the race;[1]
And that which would not pass in fights,
Has done the feat with easy flights;
Recover'd many a desp'rate campaign 295
With Bourdeaux, Burgundy, and Champaign;
Restor'd the fainting high and mighty,
With brandy-wine,[2] and aqua-vitæ;
And made them stoutly overcome
With bacrack, hoccamore, and mum;[3] 300
Whom th' uncontroll'd decrees of fate
To victory necessitate;
With which, altho' they run or burn,[4]
They unavoidably return;
Or else their sultan populaces 305
Still strangle all their routed bassas.[5]
- ↑ An old philosopher, at a drinking match, insisted that he had won the prize because he was first drunk.
- ↑ In Germany it is still called Branntwein. Aqua vitæ was formerly used in this country as a medicine only.
- ↑ The first is an excellent kind of Rhenish wine, called Bacharach, from a town of that name in the lower Palatinate, said to be derived from Bacchi ara, the altar of Bacchus. Hoccamore means Hochheimer, the Rhenish wine which first became familiarly known in this country, whence all the others obtained, though improperly, the name of Hock. Mum is a rich, strong beer, made in Brunswick, and called Braunschweiger Mumme. It had great reputation everywhere, and is said to have been introduced into this country by General Monk. The invention of it is attributed by some to Christopher Mumme, in 1489, but it seems not unlikely to have derived its name from its being a delicious beer used on feast-days and holidays, or Mummen, the old German word for revels, whence our term mummeries. A receipt for making it is preserved in the Harleian Miscellany, vol. i. p. 524. This signification of Mum seems to have nothing in common with that indicating silence, explained in a previous note.
- ↑ That is, though they run away, or their ships are fired. See v. 308. This may refer to the repulse of Popham at Kinsale, which he had expected to take by bribing the royalist commander, who having received the bribe, nevertheless resisted, and with success, the attack of the Parliament's fleet and army.
- ↑ The mob, like the sultan or grand seignior, seldom fail to strangle any of their commanders, called Bassas, if they prove unsuccessful; thus Waller
three days, might save a state. Napoleon understood these tactics thoroughly. See many stories of the same kind in the "General Dictionary," vol. x. p. 337.
