From ‘Pimlyco, or Runne Red-Cap’ (1609) (STC 19936), B 2-2V. This curious work Is part Skeltonic imitation, part direct quotation from ‘Elynor Rumming’ and part a burlesque dream vision.
… By chance I found a Booke in Ryme,
Writ in an age when few wryt well,
(Pans Pipe (where none is) does excell.)
O learned Gower! It was not thine,
Nor Chaucer, (thou are more Diuine.)
To Lydgates graue I should do wrong,
To call him vp by such a Song.
No, It was One, that (boue his Fate,)
Would be Styl'd Poet Laureate;
Much like to Some in these our daies,
That (as bold Prologues do to Playes,)
With Garlonds haue their Fore-heads bound,
Yet onely empty Sculles are crownde:
Or like to these (seeing others bye)
Will sit so, tho their Seate they buy,
And fill it vp with loathed Scorne,
Fit burdens being by them not borne,
But seeing their Trappings rich and gay,
The Sumpter-Horses trudge away,
Sweating themselves to death to beare them,
When poore Iades (drawing the Plough) outweare them.
But all this while we haue forgot
Our Poet: tho I nam'de him not,
But only should his Rymes recite,
These (all would cry) did Skelton write.
I tournde some leaues and red them o're
And at last spyed his Elynor,
His Elynor whose fame spred saile,
All England through for Nappy Ale
Elynour Rumming warmde his wit
With Ale, and his Rimes paide for it.
But seeing thou takst the Laureats name
(Skelton) I iustly thee may blame,
Because thou leau'st the Sacred Fount,
For Liquor of so base account
Yet (I remember) euen the Prince
Of Poesie, with his pen (long since)
Ledde to a fielde, the Mice and Frogges;
Others haue ball'd out bookes of Dogges:
Our diuine Maro (1) spent much oyle
About a Gnat. One keeps a coyle
With a poore Flea (Naso, (2) whose wit
Brought him by Phoebus side to wit.)
Since then these Rare-ones stack'd their strings,
From the hie-tuned acts of Kings
For notes so low, lesse is thy Blame,
For in their pardon stands thy Name.
Let's therefore lead our eyes astray,
And from our owne intended may,
Go backe to view thine Hostesse picture
Whome thus thou draw'st in liuely coloure
[Goes on to quote (B3–B4V), lines 1–100 of ‘Elynour Rumming’; subsequently C1v–C4 quotes lines 101–234, 243–50.]
1 A reference to the poem ‘Culex’ sometimes attributed to Virgil.
2 A reference to the late medieval ‘Carmen de Pulice’ ascribed to Ovid.