That all that we determine here,
Commands obedience every where;
When penalties may be commuted
For fines, or ears, and executed;
It follows, nothing binds so fast
As souls in pawn and mortgage past:
For oaths are th' only tests and scales
Of right and wrong, and true and false :
And there's no other way to try

The doubts of law and justice by.

297

225

230

Quoth she,—What is it you wou'd swear? 235
There's no believing till I hear:
For till they 're understood, all tales
(Like nonsense) are not true, nor false.
Quoth he,-When I resolv'd t' obey
What you commanded th' other day,
And to perform my exercise,

(As schools are wont) for your fair

T avoid all scruples in the case,
I went to do't upon the place.
But as the castle is enchanted

eyes:

By Sidrophel the witch, and haunted
With evil spirits, as you know,

Who took my Squire and me for two;

240

245

v. 252. Loud as the Stentrophonick voice] Stentor, a famous crier in the Grecian army, who had a voice as loud as fifty men's put together.

Στέντορι εἰσαμένη μεγαλήτορι χαλκεοφώνῳ.

Homeri Iliad. lib. 5. v. 785.

Heaven's Empress mingles with the mortal crowd,
And shouts, in Stentor's sounding voice, aloud.

Before I'd hardly time to lay
My weapons by, and disarray,
I heard a formidable noise,
Loud as the Stentrophonick voice,
That roar'd far off,-dispatch and strip,
I'm ready with th' infernal whip,
That shall divest thy ribs of skin,
To expiate thy ling'ring sin.

Th' hast broke perfidiously thy oath,
And not perform'd thy plighted troth;
But spar'd thy renegado back,

250

255

Where th' hadst so great a prize at stake: 260
Which now the fates have order'd me
For penance and revenge to flea :

Stentor the strong, endued with brazen lungs,
Whose throat surpass'd the force of fifty tongues.
Mr. Pope.

Vide Juvenal, Sat. 13, 112.

Tu miser exclamas, ut Stentora vincere possis.
You rage and storm, and blasphemously loud,
As Stentor bellowing to the Grecian crowd.

Mr. Dryden.

Vide Erasmi Adag. Chil. 2. Cent. 3. Prov. 37. Isaac Bickerstaff, Esq. (see Tatler, No. 37.) observes of Tom Bellfrey, that he carried a note four furlongs, three rood, and six poles farther than any man in England. And Dr. Derham (Physico-Theology, book 4. chap. 3. p. 134. edit. 1727.) makes mention of a Dutchman, who brake rummer glasses with the strength of his voice.

Mr. Butler probably alludes to the speaking-trumpet, which was much improved by Sir Samuel Morland in the year 1671, (seven years before the publication of this third part.) See Philosophical Transactions. vol. 5, No. 79. p. 3056.

Ibid. The speaking trumpet was formerly called the Stentorophonictube. See Harris's Lexicon Technicum. (ED.)

Unless thou presently make haste;

270

Time is, Time was!-and there it ceas'd.
With which, though startled, I confess, 265
Yet th' horror of the thing was less
Than th' other dismal apprehension
Of interruption or prevention.
And therefore, snatching up the rod,
I laid upon my back a load;
Resolv'd to spare no flesh and blood,
To make my word and honour good.
Till tir'd, and taking truce at length,
For new recruits of breath and strength,
I felt the blows, still ply'd as fast,
As if th' had been by lovers plac'd,
In raptures of Platonick lashing,
And chaste contemplative bardashing :
When facing hastily about,

To stand upon my guard and scout,
I found th' infernal cunning-man,
And th' under-witch, his Caliban,

275

280

v. 278. -chaste contemplative bardashing] Bulwer says, the Turks call effeminate youths, who have no beards, bardasses, that is, sodomitical boys. Artificial Changeling, scene 12. p. 209. (ED.)

v. 280. and scout] A sneer probably upon Sir Samuel Luke's office, as a scout-master.

v. 282. And th' under-witch, his Caliban] See an account of the monster Caliban, son to the witch Sycorax, under subjection to Prospero, Duke of Milan, (a famous magician) who thus describes him :

Then was this island

(Save for the son that she did litter here

A freckled whelp, hag-born) not honour'd with

A human shape.

Shakespear's Tempest, vol. 1. p. 15, &c. Spectator, No. 279.

With scourges (like the Furies) arm'd,
That on my outward quarters storm'd.
In haste I snatch'd my weapon up,
And gave their hellish rage a stop;
Call'd thrice upon your name, and fell
Couragiously on Sidrophel:

Who now transform'd himself t' a bear,
Began to roar aloud, and tear;
When I as furiously press'd on,

My weapon down his throat to run,
Laid hold on him, but he broke loose,
And turn'd himself into a goose,
Div'd under water, in a pond,

To hide himself from being found.
In vain I sought him; but as soon
As I perceiv'd him fled and gone,

285

290

295

v. 289. Transform'd himself t' a bear] Alluding to the fable of Proteus's changes. Ovidii Metamorph. lib. 8. 730, &c.

As thou, blue Proteus, ranger of the seas,
Who now a youth confess'd, a lion now,
And now a boar, with tusky head, dost show;

Now like a hateful, gliding snake art seen,

A bull with horned head, a stone, or spreading green;

Or in a flood do'st flow a watery way,

Dissembling streams, or in bright fire dost play.

Ovid's Metamorphoses, translated by Mr. Sewell, &c. 2d edit. p. 253. (Vide Virgilii Georgic. lib. 4. p. 405, &c.)

v. 293, 294. but he broke loose,-And turn'd himself into a goose] See Amarillis's account of the transforming well, Fletcher's Faithful Shepherdess, act 2. p. 23. act 3. sc. 1. p. 27. edit. 4to.

v. 295, 296. Div'd under water, in a pond,-To hide himself from being found] Alluding to the account of Proteus:

——aut in aquas tenues dilapsus abibit.

Virgilii Georgic. lib. 4. 410.

Prepar'd with equal haste and rage,
His under-sorcerer t' engage.
But bravely scorning to defile
My sword with feeble blood and vile ;
I judg'd it better from a quick-
Set hedge to cut a knotted stick,
With which I furiously laid on ;
Till in a harsh and doleful tone
It roar'd, O hold for pity, Sir:
I am too great a sufferer,

Abus'd, as you have been, b' a witch,
But conjur❜d into a worse caprich:
Who sends me out on many a jaunt,
Old houses in the night to haunt,
For opportunities t' improve
Designs of thievery or love;

With drugs convey'd in drink or meat,
All feats of witches counterfeit,

Kill pigs and geese with powder'd glass
And make it for enchantment pass;
With cow-itch meazle like a leper,

300

305

310

315

And choak with fumes of guinea-pepper; 320

.301, 302. But bravely scorning to defile-My sword with feeble blood and vile, &c.] Thus the Boiarens of Novogrod used their slaves, who had seized their towns, lands, houses, and wives in their absence; and when they met their masters in a warlike manner, the latter determined to set upon them with no other weapons but their horse-whips, to put them in mind of their servile condition, and to terrify them; and so marching and lashing all together with their whips, they gave the onset, which seemed so terrible in the ears of their villains, that they fled all together, like sheep before the drivers. (See Dr. Giles Fletcher's Account of Russia. Purchase his Pilgrims, part 3. lib. 3. p. 418, 419.)