Towre Out Ben Morts

Notes

Samuel Rowlands, a voluminous writer circa 1570-1628, though little known now, nevertheless kept the publishers busy for thirty years, his works selling readily for another half century. Not the least valuable of his numerous productions from a social and antiquarian point of view is Martin Mark-All, Beadle of Bridewell; his Defence and Answere to the Belman of London (see both Notes ante).

Martin Markall delivers himself of a vivid and “originall” account of “the Regiment of Rogues, when they first began to take head, and how they have succeeded one the other successively unto the sixth and twentieth year of King Henry the Eighth, gathered out of the Chronicle of Crackropes” etc. He then criticizes somewhat severely the errors and omissions in Dekker’s Canting glossary, adding considerably to it, and finally joins issue with the Belman in an attempt to give “song for song”. Dekker’s “Canting Rhymes” (plagiarised from Copland) and “The Beggar’s Curse” thus apparently gave birth to the present verses and to those entitled “The Maunder’s Wooing” that follow.

Stanza I, line i. Ben = Lat. bene = good. Mort = a woman, chaste or not. Line 3. Rome-cove = “a great rogue” (B. E., Dict. Cant. Crew, 1690), i.e., an organizer, or the actual perpetrator of a robbery: quire-cove = a subordinate thief—the money had passed from the actual thief to his confederate. Rom (or rum) and quier (or queer) enter largely into combination, thus—rom = gallant, fine, clever, excellent, strong; rom-bouse = wine or strong drink; rum-bite = a clever trick or fraud; rum-blowen = a handsome mistress; rum-bung = a full purse; rum-diver = a clever pickpocket; rum-padder = a well-mounted highwayman, etc.: also queere = base, roguish; queer-bung = an empty purse; queer-cole = bad money; queer-diver = a bungling pickpocket; queer-ken = a prison; queer-mart = a foundered whore, and so forth. Budge = a general verb of action, usually stealthy action: thus, budge a beak = to give the constable the slip, or to bilk a policeman; to budge out (or off) = to sneak off; to budge an alarm = to give warning.