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EPIGRAM 94.
"THE WOODCOCK AND THE DAW."
A woodcock and a daw1 sat upon a plain,
Both showed comparison each other to disdain.
"Back!" (quoth the woodcock). "Straw for thee!" (quoth the daw);
"Shall woodcocks keep daws now in dreadful awe?"
"None awe," (quoth the woodcock), "but in behaviour;
Ye ought to reverence woodcocks, by your favour!"
"For what cause?" (quoth the daw), "For your long bills?"
"Nay," (quoth the woodcock), "but lords will, by their wills,
Rather have one woodcock than a thousand daws;
Woodcocks are meat, daws are carron2—weigh this clause."
"Indeed, sir," (said the daw), "I must needs agree;
Lords love to eat you, and not to eat me—
Cause of daws' courtesies!—so, if woodcocks thus gather,
Ye shall have courtesy; for this, I would rather
Be a daw, and to woodcock courtesy make,
Than be a woodcock, and of daws courtesy take.
I were3 double a daw, had I not liever4
Birders should, (in their birding endeavour),
Take up gins5 and let me go when they geat6 me,
Than set gins to get me, for lords to eat me."
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[AJ Notes:]
1. The jackdaw, a relative of crows and ravens.
2. Carrion.
3. Would be.
4. Rather.
5. Traps.
6. Get; catch.
Source:
Farmer, John S., ed. The Proverbs, Epigrams, and Miscellanies of John Heywood.
London: Early English Drama Society, 1906. 150-151.
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This page created by Anniina Jokinen on November 21, 2010. Last updated December 16, 2018.
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