To make them to themselves give answers,
For which they pay the necromancers;
To fetch and carry intelligence
Of whom, and what, and where, and whence, 340
And all discoveries disperse
Among th' whole pack of conjurers;
What cut-purses have left with them,
For the right owners to redeem;
And what they dare not vent, find out, 345
To gain themselves and th' art repute;
Draw figures, schemes, and horoscopes,
Of Newgate, Bridewell, brokers' shops,
Of thieves ascendant in the cart,[1]
And find out all by rules of art: 350
Which way a serving-man, that's run
With clothes or money 'way, is gone;
Who pick'd a fob at holding-forth,[2]
And where a watch, for half the worth,
May be redeem'd; or stolen plate 355
Restor'd at conscionable rate.[3]
Beside all this, he serv'd his master
In quality of poetaster,
And rhymes appropriate could make
To ev'ry month i' th' almanack;[4] 360
- ↑ Ascendant, a term in astrology, is here equivocal.
- ↑ Holding-forth was merely preaching, and the term was borrowed, without much appropriateness, from the Epistle to the Philippians, chap. ii. 16. But Dean Swift, in his "Tale of a Tub," gives a different derivation of the term, and humorously says that it arose from the way in which the dissenters held forth their ears "of grim magnitude," first on one side and then on the other. At this period warning was customarily given in churches and chapels, either by a notice board, or orally from the minister, to beware of pickpockets.
- ↑ It was a penal offence to compound a felony. And the astrologers' profession naturally led them to be brothers in such affairs. Lilly acknowledges that he was once indicted for his performance in this line.
- ↑ Alluding to John Booker, who, Lilly informs us, "made excellent verses upon the twelve mouths, framed according to the configuration of each."
hold it all." "There it is," said he, "you have just left those five stairs behind you!" Another story somewhat similar is told by Grey of a Sidrophel in Moorfields, who had in his waiting-room different ropes to little bells which hung in his consulting room upstairs. If a girl had been deceived by her lover, one bell was pulled; if a peasant had lost a cow, another; and so on; his attendant taking care to sift the inquirer beforehand and give notice accordingly.
