may--!_
Without any more ado, the Man dies, and the Woman, immediately breaks
into such Transports of tearing her Hair, and beating her Breast, that
everybody thought she'd have run stark-mad upon it. But, upon second
Thoughts, she wipes her Eyes, lifts them up, and cries, _Heaven's will
be done!_ and turning to her Father, _Pray Sir_, says she, _about t'
other Husband you were speaking of, is he here in the
House_?"--_Complete London Jester_, 1771, p. 49.

This story was appropriated by the editor of _Pasquil's Jests, mixed
with Mother Bunch's Merriments_, of which there were several editions,
the first appearing in 1604. In Pasquil's Jests, the tale is told of a
"young woman of Barnet."

_She rowned her father in the eare._

Gower (_Confessio Amantis_, ed. Pauli, Vol. 1. p. 161) has a precisely
similar expression:--

"But whan they rounenin her ere,
Than groweth all my moste fere."

P. 21. _Of him that kissed the mayde with the longe nose._

"'Good Sir William, let it rest' quoth shee, 'I know you will not
beleeue it when I haue reuealed it, neither is it a thing that you can
helpe: and yet such is my foolishnesse, had it not beene for that, I
thinke, verily I had granted your suite ere now. But seeing you vrge me
so much to know what it is, I will tell you: it is, sir, your
ill-fauoured great nose, that hangs sagging so lothsomely to your lips,
_that I cannot finde in my heart so much as to kisse you_.'"--_Pleasant
History of Thomas of Reading_, by T. D. circa 1597, p. 73 (ed. Thoms).

P. 26. _Of the Marchaunt that lost his bodgetie betwene Ware and
Lon[don]._

In _Pasquil's Jests_, 1604 occurs an account substantially similar to
the present, of "how a merchant lost his purse between
_Waltam_ and London."

P. 28. _Of the fatte woman that solde frute._

"Being thus dispatcht he layes downe Jacke
A peny for the shot:
'Sir, what shall this doe?' said the boy.
'Why, rogue, discharge my pot!
So much I cald for, but the rest
By me shall nere be paid:
For victualls thou didst offer me;
_Doe and thou woot_, I said.'"

_The Knave of Clubbs_, by S. Rowlands, 1600 (Percy Soc. ed. p. 20).

P. 31.--Wilson introduces the "notable historie" of Papirius Pretextatus
into his _Rule of Reason_, 1551, 80, and it had previously been related
in Caxton's _Game and Playe of the Chesse_, 1474.

P. 33. _Of the corrupte man of law._

"An arch Barber at a certain Borough in the West, where th