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EBBA 31036

British Library - Roxburghe
Ballad XSLT Template
Wonder of Wonders:
OR,
An Excellent SONG of a
Six-Legged Creature.
Tune of, Old Simon the King. This may be Printed. R.P.

COme listen unto my new Ditty,
it is of a Monstrous Creature
Who liveth in Londons fair City
shes known to be loving by Nature.
She liveth in Service with many,
a Creature both loving and quiet,
And wages she ner receives any,
so she hath both Lodging and Dyet.

She is not for running away,
her anger she soon can expell;
Till Death with her Master shel stay,
if that he will use her but well.

This Creature she is not very tall,
sometimes shes upon the Exchange,
Full six Legs she travels withal,
oh! is this not wondrous strange?

Shel venture as far in a Battel
as any stout Souldier that goes;
Tho Cannons and Musquets do rattle,
she cares not a Fig for her Foes.
She values no Pistol nor Gun,
nor any Commanders high words;
Nor will she be put to the run,
for fear of a thousand drawn Swords.

She ranges the streets very late,
her valour and courage is such,
She fears not a knock on the pate
by Constable, Beadle, or Watch.
Thus she in her freedom does reign,
no creature more stouter and bolder:
The Stocks she does highly disdain,
they never was able to hold her.

A Washer she cannot indure,
foul Linnen is all her delight;
For there she can lye most secure,
and never be put to the fright.
That man that hath been a great waster,
and every thing he doth lack,
She chuseth him to be her master,
although not a shirt to his back.

Although he be never so poor,
without ere a Groat in his Purse,
Shel guard him behind and before,
her love it is never the worse.
A fuller account I will give
of her worthy Fame or Renown:
This creature she often doth live
with many fine Blades of the Town.

Her Pedigree now Ile unfold,
resolving to speak in her praise;
She sprung from a Nation of old,
where I never was many days:
Twas AEgypt, as I have heard say,
which once was our natural soil;
But now she is grown very gray,
With travelling many a Mile.

You know when old Herod was King,
there then was a wonderful sort
Of these in that Nation did spring,
and nurst by his Ladies at Court.
The reason that many dont love her,
because she such numbers doth breed:
But this is the worst I say of her,
she is a Back-biter indeed.


FINIS.
Printed for James Bissel at the Bible and
Harp in West-Smithfield.
Where any Chapmen may be furnished
with all sorts of new and old Songs.

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