The Careless Curate and the Bloudy Butcher:
In a Narrative of sad News from Chelmsford in Essex, declaring an Execrable Murther Committed by a Barbarous Butcher, who coming home at midnight, and finding the Parson of the Parish in bed with his Wife, in a revengeful p [...]ssion with his Knife cut off his privy Members, By which he dyed: and the Malefactor being immediately Apprehended, is Committed to Chelmsford Gaol. A deplorable Example to dehort all sorts of Men and Women from Adultery and Murther.
To the tune of,
Oh women, monstrous women,
BLack
Murther and
Adultery
Are two such sworn Brothers,
That whosoere their fathers be
Hot passions are their Mothers,
As Will appear in this
Narration,
More full of woe and lamentation,
Then ever came into this Nation,
And by report 'tis true.
From
Chelmsford Town in
Essex this
Sad
Narrative was sent,
I wish 'twere false because there is
A
Clergy person in't:
But when the Divel doth begin
With fly deceits to draw us in.
Princes and
Priests are all but Men
And prone to do amiss.
When p'ety is quite forgot
We fear each Rock and shelf,
This Minister it seems was not
A
Curat to himself,
Had he bin so(I must be true l're)
He had not been betray'd by beauty
To lay aside his holy duty,
To run at
Butchers Wives
And though from this Adulterous sin
I can no whit exempt her,
She met much disadvantage when
Her Tutor prov'd her Tempter:
But this is no excuse before
That Iudg whom all good men adore
Or plea for playing of the whore
With any man alive.
They say this Parson often
[...]spyed
This Butchers Wife at Church;
'Twas there that Divel was his guide
Which left him in the lurch:
But that foul fiend is every where
and though y
e house of
prayer it were
the devil would have his chappel there
Witness the
Butchers Wife.
The second part,
to the same tune.
This Parson did solicit her
And she in time old yield,
Women are not like men of war
That stoutly
[...]éep the field:
One night y
t
Butcher went from home
Then did this jolly Gamester come
To take some lawless pleasure from
The beau
[...]ious
Butchers Wife.
But in the midst of all their sport
The bloudy
Butcher came
Who séeing them in such a sort
Was strangely out of frame:
He star'd and loo'kd about him then
and thought (when he y
t black Coat had séen)
Hugh Peters had béen alive agen
And fumbling with his Wife.
The Parson and the Woman to
Began to preach and pray,
But he (as bloudy
Butchers do)
Is deaf to all they say,
Without regard unto his
Coat
He took his rival by the throat,
And with a fury flaming hot
He drew a desperate
Knife.
The
Butcher knéel'd upon his brest,
The woman cry'd forbear,
But he (with ranck revenge possest)
Cut off his
Lady-ware:
He might as well have stab'd his heart;
For after grievous pain and smart,
His soul did from his body part,
This
Butcher was a Beast.
The Buther's wife shréek't and cry'd
Which calld the Neigbours in,
And there (in little time) they spyed
Two h
[...]rrid Acts of sin,
And then the Officers were call'd,
Who to a Iustice had him hal'd,
And now he is (li
[...]e an Oxe instal'd)
Shut up in a
Chelmsford Gaol.
There he untill the Sizes come
Is close confin'd to lye,
From whence he may expect his doom:
For surely he shall dye,
His wife is full of sorrow fraught,
To think that she (by courses nought)
Hath such a sad confusion brought
Vpon thrée Souls at once.
But now 'tis time I should conclude
This fatal sad report,
I hope ther's none will be so rude
To judge the Clergy for't:
They are but Men as well as we,
And subject to infirmity:
God kéep us from Adultery,
Malice, Revenge and Bloud,