THE BIRTH, LIFE, DEATH, VVIL, AND EPITAPH, OF IACK PVFFE GENTLEMAN.
London, Printed for T.P. 1642.
The Birth, Life, Death, VVill, and Epitaph, of Iacke Puffe Gentleman.
THe people shun the wall, loe here he comes,
With fierce aspect, the
[...]lgar before runs,
To see his stradling gate, his hat advanc't
His down cast eye, upon his boots are glanct
Who huggs himselfe he's view'd so strangely fine;
But one cryes there's a changeling of the time,
A moorcalfe; that doth change so of his shope.
In cloaths, as doth the Moone her bulke abate.
Stay cries a second, you have fed enough,
All this same creature
[...]hat you see's a puffe,
A blast, a vapour, that only a yeare,
Can make Invisible for to appeare:
His birth did make his mothers mountaine shake,
While all the women did stand by and quake,
As did the people in old
Aesops time,
At the shockt mount, when forth a Mouse did clime,
So did this creature, this same peece of stuffe,
Appeare, but forth at last came out a puffe,
But now grown up, as innocently good;
As he is ignorant, so long he stood
From ill: but now he is to London come,
For to see fashions for fashion he's undone,
And must be ill, for if he be nor, then
He is not so as other Gentlemen,
And to become a gradiate of the time,
He learnes the fashions for to make him fine:
Then next, to scoffe and flout a Citizen,
Tearming them Round heads, for that they begin,
To aske their debts: but stay let me not erre
In blaming him who loves his Crediter;
One that doth meane to pay, but alas he
Thinkes it belongs not to Gentility:
For 'tis his glory, who thus can speake,
I in one yeare ten Taylors did breake.
And now grown impupent, him next degree
Is to despise all manners that here be;
For 'tis the Frenchman doth his only please
Who buyed their formes, they give him their disease;
So that the vapour is all frenchified,
With our stucke b
[...]nim, streight breech; and spit at side.
More foole then feather, lesse wit then haire,
Though there is one thing that in him is rare,
A true decorum, each in him doth find,
A simple carriage, to a foolish mind,
No puritane, I vow I thinke he's none,
For what he is he glories to make knowne,
He will not minde his othes, or sticke to swere,
God dame him; doth he man or Diveil feare.
Not cares he, for his credit unto men,
If that the person be a Citizen:
But here he playes the Pope that doth no sticke
To brearke all faith with an Heriticke:
He with a Citizen, what shall I pay,
My money to a Round, head, let him stay
Ile see
[...]he rogue first damd, my whore shall have,
A gown, my mony is not for a slave.
Now sweld with debt, our Puffe to
France is blowne,
England unworthy is of such a one,
A land that borrowes all their wit from
France,
Who can't like them, on anticke forme advance,
They only by the vertue of the shire,
Can make a Country puffe so wife appeare
That when he's caist in a new sute of cloathes,
No Councellor, carries so high his nose;
But nere before, his mothers curds and c came,
Could adde, to make him thus so wifely seeme,
Ariv'd in
France, he doth not long remaine,
Another puffe, soone puffes him backe again,
But all be frenchifide, he vowes the nation,
From all the world to excell in fashion,
His Countries vile, they clownes that in it dwell,
But
France in cloaths, and complement excell,
Shrowded in a strange garbe he walkes the streete.
At l
[...]st his Creditor doth chance to meet,
Who ha
[...]ly now can know him by his feature,
and is amaz'd who should be this creature
Vnto himselfe, them speakes, is this not him?
Whom that a yeare ago I ware did bring,
Sure his the same, or whosoere he be,
Ile venture to arest his bravery,
P
[...]ffe then arested, takes his next degree,
Within the Counters Vniversity,
A staid m
[...]n now he is, for he is none,
Of those that doth not keept themselves at home,
Bu
[...] here he doth not rest himselfe so long,
B
[...] all his cloaths and meanes is spent and gone,
That like some ancient escuchion he doth seeme
All tattered, in shew of no esteeme,
Save that he's honoured of som, and for
He beares the coate of his brave ancestor;
Who was a man perhaps of worth and Spirit,
Whose son doth but his meanes, not mind inherit,
But Puffe not long within the Counter lie's
But that with melancholy streight he dyes:
For being ript, within was quickly found
Bills, bonds and notes of debt, that all lay round
His heart, that all men present did suppose,
The weight of these, thus soone his eyes did close,
His will he left, but 'las 'twas his last will
H
[...]d't been his first, his wealth he had kept still.
That all as he did now, should hate a whore,
For that and wine, did make him dye thus poore:
N
[...]xt that no gallant should not ought suppose
That Prayers and glory, doth consist in cloathes,
Or for to court a wench with words compil'd,
Such ever fame, hath from her court exil'd,
But that they ra
[...]her should enrich their mind,
W
[...]th armes and arts, 'tis those that fame doth find,
Next in his will he Legacies did give,
First all his vices, with our blades to live,
And for his
French disease he did bequeath,
To all those blades that cannot women leave.
Next that the Prentices should have his cloaths,
To make shooclouts, for the shooes of those,
Their Masters, which before he had abus'd,
With n
[...]me of Round-heads, and their debts refus'd,
As for his soule, I thinke it was forgot,
In's life, for here in's will, we find it not.
He never thought of it, sure to bequeath,
He ever that did to God's mercy leave.
His Epitaph.
HEre lyes
Iack Puffe, wrapt up in his skin,
For want of a shirt he lveth thus thin,
Who like cut grasse, did live but a day,
The sunshine of beauty soone burnt him to hay.
His bladder of life, by death being prick't
The bladder shrinkes up, Puffe out soone then skip't:
The great misse of winde might soone cause his death,
For how can a puffe be ought without breath:
But where he is gone, I hardly can tell,
Vnlesse he doth with
Boreas dwell,
That as in his life, so after his death,
He might keepe a storm
[...]ng here still upon Earth.
FINIS.