Note 681:A — Chapter IV · (continued 2)

This writer was the most popular ballad-maker of his day; he was by trade a silk-weaver, and the compiler of various Garlands, under the titles of "The Garland of Good Will;" "The Garland of Delight," &c. &c. Nash, in his "Have with you to Saffron-Walden," 1596, says, that "his muse from the first peeping forth, hath stood at livery at an alehouse wispe, never exceeding a penny a quart day nor night; and this deere yeare, together with the silencing of his looms, scarce that; he being constrained to betake himself to carded ale: whence it proceedeth, that since Candlemas, or his jigge of John for the King, not one merrie dittie will come from him, but The thunder-bolt against swearers, Repent England repent, and The strange judgements of God."