Posts from December 2021
Scenes from Terry Pratchett's Hogfather.
IN PRAISE OF ALE, c. pre-1629?
from The Academy of Compliments (1650)
by Thomas Bonham (d. 1629-ish)
When that the chill Charocco blows
And winter tells a heavy tale,
When pies and daws and rooks and crows
Do sit and curse in frost and snows,
Then give me ale.
Ale in a Saxon rumkin then,
Such as will make grimalkin prate,
Bids valour burgeon in tall men,
Quickens the poet's wit and pen,
Despises fate.
Ale, that the absent battle fights,
And scorns the march of Swedish drum;
Disputes of princes, laws and rights;
What's done and past tells mortal wights,
And what's to come.
Ale, that the ploughman's heart up keeps
And equals it to tyrants' thrones;
That wipes the eye that fain would weep,
And lulls in sweet and dainty sleep
The o'erwearied bones.
Grandchild of Ceres, barley's daughter,
Wine's emulous neighbour if but stale,
Ennobling all the nymphs of water
And filling each man's mouth with laughter—
Oh, give me ale!
- Thomas Bonham, “In Praise of Ale”, in Seventeenth Century Lyrics, edited by Norman Ault, London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1950, pp. 48-49.
Bernard de Monfaucon, L' antiquité expliquée et représentée en figures: Les dieux des Grecs & des Romains, Paris, 1722 (source: Heidelberg University Library).
