[67] So in "the second three-man's song," prefixed to Dekker's
"Shoemaker's Holiday," 1600, though in one case the bowl was _black_, in
the other _brown_--
"_Trowl the bowl_, the jolly _nut-brown_ bowl;
And here, kind mate, to thee!
Let's sing a dirge for Saint Hugh's soul,
And drown it merrily_."
It seems probable that this was a harvest-home song, usually sung by
reapers in the country: the chorus or burden, "Hooky, hooky," &c. is
still heard in some parts of the kingdom, with this variation--
"Hooky, hooky, we have shorn,
And bound what we did reap,
And we have brought the harvest home,
To make bread good and cheap."
Which is an improvement, inasmuch as harvests are not brought home
_to town_.
[68] Shakespeare has sufficiently shown this in the character of
Francis, the drawer, in "Henry IV. Part I."
[69] [A play on the double meaning of the word].
[70] In the original copy this negative is by some accident thrust into
the next line, so as to destroy at once the metre and the meaning. It is
still too much in the first line.
[71] This expression must allude to the dress of Harvest, which has many
ears of wheat about it in various parts.
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