Glen Collection of printed music > Printed text > Popular music of the olden time > Volume 1

REIGNS OF JAMES I. AND CHARLES I.
299
Her needle she can use well,
In that she doth most excel ;
She can spin and knit,
And every thing fit,
As all her neighhours can tell.
Her fingers apace
At weaving bone-lace
She useth all day long.
All arts that he
To women free.
Of each degree,
Performeth she :
O that she could rule her tongue !
For huswifery she doth exceed ;
She looks to her business with heed ;
She's early and late
Employ'd, I dare say't.
To see all things well succeed.
She is very wary
To look to her dairy.
As doth to her charge belong ;
Her servants all
Are at her call.
But she'll so brawl
That still I shall
Wish that she could hold her tongue.
THE QUEEN'S OLD COURTIER.
This ballad, whicli obtained a long and extensive popularity, seems to have
been first printed in the reign of James I. (by T. Symcocke).
Pepys thus refers to it in his Diary, under the date of 16th of June, 1668.
" Came to Newbery, and there dined, and music : a song of the Old Courtier of
Queen Elizabeth's, and how he was changed upon the coming in of the King, did
please me mightily, and I did cause W. Hewer to write it out." There are many
other versions of the ballad (sometimes entitled " The Old and New Courtier"),
and some are of greater length than others. Besides those in the great collections,
copies will be found in Le Prince d' Amour, 1660 ; Antidote to Melanclioly, 1661 ;
Wit and Drollery, 1682 ; Dryden's Miscellany Poems, iv., 108 (1716), &c.
In Le Prince d'' Amour, and in Merry Drollery Complete, 1661 and 1670, there
is a song of " An old Soldier of the Queen's ;" commencing —
" Of an old Soldier of the Queen's,
With an old motley coat and a malmsey nose,"
and in Wit and Drollery, 1682, p. 165, one entitled " Old Soldiers;" commencing —
" Of old soldiers the song you would hear,
And we old fiddlers have forgot who they were,"
and at p. 282, " The new Soldier" (" With a new beard," &c.).
A ballad, written on the occasion of the overthrow of the Rump Parliament,
by General Monck, and dated Feb. 28, 1659, is amongst the King's Pamphlets,
Brit. Mus. (folio broadsides, vol. xvi.). It is entitled " Saint Geoi-ge and the
Dragon, anglice Mercurius Poeticus." To the tune of " The old Soiddier of the
Queen's;" commencing —
" News, news, — here's the occurrences and a new Mercurius,
A dialogue between Haselrigg the baffled, and Arthur the furious.
With Ireton's readings upon legitimate and spurious, &c."
It is reprinted in Wright's Political Ballads (Percy Soc, No. 11).
In the reign of Charles IL, " T. Howard, Gent.," wrote and published " An
old song of the Old Courtiers of the King's, with a new song of a New Courtier of