Scotland/Scots > Works of William Dunbar, including his life, 1465-1536

LIFE AND POEMS OF
I38
Their composition,
Without suspicion,
There finally is endit
With expedition,
And full remission,
And their seals to are pendit.
Alhail almost,
They mak the cost
With sober recompence;
Richt little lost,
They get indost,
Alhail their evidence;
Sic ladies wise,
They are to prise,
To say the veritie,
Sae can devise,
And nocht surprise
Them, nor their honestie.
These satirical verses, bordering on indelicacy,
were no doubt fully borne out by the practices of
the day, as they have been at a much later period.
At the same time, we must not fancy that the poet,
while he abhorred such as “stooped to [interested]
folly,” was insensible to the mighty claims which
the fair sisters of creation have on the manhood of
the world. Hear him
IN PKAISE OF WOMEN.
Now of women this I say for me,
Of earthly things nane may better be :
They should have worship and great honouring
Of men, above all other earthly thing;