That which he dresses we may rather call a drinking than a
meal, yet he is so full of variety that he brags, and truly, that he
gives you but a taste of what he can do. He dares not for his life come
among the butchers, for sure they would quarter and bake him after the
English fashion, he's such an enemy to beef and mutton. To conclude, he
were only fit to make, a funeral feast, where men should eat their
victuals in mourning.
A SEXTON
Is an ill-wilier to human nature. Of all proverbs he cannot endure to
hear that which says, We ought to live by the quick, not by the dead. He
could willingly all his lifetime be confined to the churchyard; at
least, within five foot on't, for at every church stile commonly there's
an alehouse, where, let him be found never so idle-pated, he is still a
grave drunkard. He breaks his fast heartiest while he is making a grave,
and says the opening of the ground makes him hungry. Though one would
take him to be a sloven, yet he loves clean linen extremely, and for
that reason takes an order that fine Holland sheets be not made
worms'-meat. Like a nation called the Cusani, he weeps when any are born
and laughs when they die; the reason, he gets by burials not
christenings. He will hold an argument in a tavern over sack till the
dial and himself be both at a stand; he never observes any time but
sermon-time, and there he sleeps by the hour-glass. The ropemaker pays
him a pension, and he pays tribute to the physician; for the physician
makes work for the sexton, as the ropemaker for the hangman.
Pages:
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107