London in Flames, London in Glory: Poems on the Fire and Rebuilding of London 1666–1709 [Reprint 2022 ed.] 9781978810761


123 57 23MB

English Pages 400 Year 2022

Report DMCA / Copyright

DOWNLOAD PDF FILE

Table of contents :
Contents
Introduction
1667 Simon Ford, The Conflagration of London
1667 Samuel Wiseman, Londons Fatal Fire
1667 Joseph Guillim, The Dreadful Burning
1666 John Crouch, Londons Second Tears
1666 London Undone
1667 The Burning of London
1667 John Tabor, Seasonable Thoughts in Sad Times
1667 John Allison(?), The Late Lamentable Accident
i666(?)The Londoners Lamentation
1666 London's Fatal-Fall
1667 Simon Ford, Londons Remains
1679 Thomas Gilbert, Englands Passing-Bell
1666 Vox Civitatis
1667 The Citizens Joy
1667 Jeremiah Wells, On the Rebuilding of London
1669 Simon Ford, Londons Resurrection
1669 Upon the Rebuilding the City
1670 (?) William Fenne(?), London Surveyed
1672 Londons Stately New Buildings
1668 Henry Duke, Londons-Nonsuch
1671 George Eliott, Great Brittains Beauty
1672 Theophilus Philalethes, pseud., Great Britains Glory
1674 The Glories of London
1676 London's Index
1676 Bethlehems Beauty
1679 On Bow-Church and Steeple
i678(?)The Misfortunes of St. Paul's Cathedral
1668 James Wright, The Ruins in St. Paul's Cathedral
1677 James Wright, Ecclesia Restaurata
1697 James Wright, The Choire
1709 James Wright, Phoenix Paulina
1708 The Cupulo
Explanatory Notes
Index
Recommend Papers

London in Flames, London in Glory: Poems on the Fire and Rebuilding of London 1666–1709 [Reprint 2022 ed.]
 9781978810761

  • 0 0 0
  • Like this paper and download? You can publish your own PDF file online for free in a few minutes! Sign Up
File loading please wait...
Citation preview

RUTGERS UNIVERSITY STUDIES I N ENGLISH NUMBER

THREE

London in Flames, London in Glory

LONDON in Cjflames

J^ondon IN G L O R Y POEMS ON THE A N D REBUILDING OF

FIRE LONDON

1666-1709 EDITED BY

ROBERT ARNOLD AUBIN

NEW BRUNSWICK

RUTGERS UNIVERSITY PRESS 1943

Copyright 1943 by the Trustees of Rutgers College in New

Jersey

PRINTED IN T H E UNITED STATES OF AMERICA I-43L

To

MY WIFE

Contents Introduction

ix

1667

Simon Ford, The Conflagration of London

1667

Samuel Wiseman, Londons Fatal Fire

3 20

1667

Joseph Guillim, The Dreadful Burning

1666

John Crouch, Londons Second Tears

31 46

1666

London Undone

53

1667

The Burning of London

56

1667

John Tabor, Seasonable Thoughts in Sad Times

60

1667

John Allison(?), The Late Lamentable Accident

i666(?)The Londoners Lamentation

73 84

1666

London's Fatal-Fall

89

1667

Simon Ford, Londons Remains

1679

Thomas Gilbert, Englands Passing-Bell

93 106

1666

Vox Civitatis

116

1667

The Citizens Joy

119

1667

Jeremiah Wells, On the Rebuilding of London

122

1669

Simon Ford, Londons Resurrection

x

1669

Upon the Rebuilding the City

1670 (?) William Fenne(?), London Surveyed

151 158

1672

Londons Stately New Buildings

167

1668

Henry Duke, Londons-Nonsuch

170

1671

George Eliott, Great Brittains Beauty vii

185

34

Vili 1672

CONTENTS

Theophilus Philalethes, pseud., Great Britains Glory

189

1674

The Glories of London

209

1676

London's Index

238

1676

Bethlehems Beauty

245

1679

On Bow-Church and Steeple

249

i678(?)The Misfortunes of St. Paul's Cathedral

252

1668

James Wright, The Ruins in St. Paul's Cathedral

265

1677

James Wright, Ecclesia Restaurata

273

1697

James Wright, The Choire

278

1709

James Wright, Phoenix Paulina

282

1708

The Cupulo

298

Explanatory Notes

305

Introduction The English Nation remembers we have had a fearful Plague; to second it, a dreadful Fire in her Metropolis, viz. London, an almost three years War; heavy judgments if well considered, all happening one as it were in the neck of another. . . . WILLIAM LILLY

T

is for lovers of London, whether or not they profess and call themselves antiquaries. These thirty-two metrical accounts of the Great Fire of 1666 and its aftermath are offered not so much for their rarity (a notorious incentive to reprinting) as for their historical and human interest. For they present the spectacle of London's calamity, "the most deplorable, but withal the greatest, argument that can be imagin'd: the destruction being so swift, so sudden, so vast, and miserable, as nothing can parallel in story," 1 and that of London's no less wonderful recovery; they employ a variety of styles illustrating the popular tastes of the Restoration period; and they provide an object-lesson in grim fortitude. Accordingly, with all deference to those who hold a contrary view, I see no reason to cringe before these products of the Pie Corner muse. Though they provide little accurate history, they manage to "lie like truth"; though some at least of them are dull, they are the stuff of their time, since their authors for the most part were divines or solid citizens or journalists, not members of the facile gentlemanly mob, and their pedantry, earnestness, civic pride, zeal for stability and common sense, piety, charity, and patience, their wretched conceits, puns, and dubious syntax and grammar all smack of the City. " T h e Fire of London," it has been justly said, "inspired more bad poetry than was happily destroyed by it." Yet in 1807 Southey wrote: 2 HIS BOOK

1 2

Dryden, preface to Annus Mirabilis. Specimens of the Later English Poets, I, vii. ix

X

INTRODUCTION

D o w n to the Restoration it is to be wished, that every Poet, however unworthy of the name, should be preserved. In the worst volume of elder date, the historian may find something to assist, or direct his enquiries; the antiquarian something to elucidate what requires illustration; the philologist something to insert in the margin of his dictionary. Time does more for books than for wine, it gives worth to what originally was worthless. N o w , four generations after this pronouncement, may not the hunting season for literary antiquities be slightly extended? These pieces, then, reveal what ordinary people thought of the Fire and its sequel. T h e y supplement the seventeenth-century accounts as well as the recent authoritative studies of Mr. Walter G . Bell 3 and Mr. T . F. Reddaway. 4 In the presence of these studies any full-dress account of the Fire and the rebuilding would be otiose in this introduction. Yet a f e w essential facts should be recalled. First, Londoners had not been caught entirely unprepared for disaster. For years they had listened to voices ancestral and contemporary, amateur and professional, prophesying doom. T h e morbidity of all this vaticination had been intensified by a continual harping from pulpit and press upon the terror and majesty of King Death, especially after the terrible plague of 1665 had made of London virtually a city of the dead: Trade interrupted, and the Royal Burse, Quitted and Empty as the Cities Purse; While Steeples howling Day and Night, do call Thousands together to one Funerall; Our Bells, neither the Old, and Consecrate; N o r the unhallowed New, could help our Fate; N o t with perpetual Motion purge the Sky, Still Mid-night and Meridian Arrows fly; Graves wide and deep, Gape like the mouth of Hell, In which whole Lanes (now nearer Neighbors) fell; Pitts round the Church, cast like a fatal Line, Threatn'd the Sacred Pyle to undermine. 3 4

The Great Fire of London, John Lane, T h e Bodley Head, 1920. The Rebuilding of London after the Great Fire, Jonathan Cape, 1940.

INTRODUCTION

xi

Pale Famine feeds upon the Plague; The Poor All Searchers grown, to find the Rich maris Door; If One in a whole Street live here and there, Their Gates are shut, either by Pest or Fear. . . .5 Possibly Londoners had been somewhat less apprehensive of fire, to judge at least by James Howell's words: 6 There's no place . . . better armed against the fury of the fire; for besides the pitched Buckets that hang in Churches and Halls, there are divers new Engines for that purpose. But it had bin wished, that the Proclamations of the two last Kings for building with Brick, had bin observed by London, for besides that, it had made Her lesse subject to casual fyrings, it had conduced much to the beauty of her Streets, and uniformity of Structure. None the less, officials as well as seers had expressed their dread of something worse than mere "casual fyrings," thus adding one more terror to life in an age when mutability had invaded the heavens and when the eschatological twilight was fast approaching. And then before daybreak on Sunday, September 2, 1666, "the miserable and calamitous spectacle," as Evelyn called it, rose from a petty fire in a baker's house not far from the northern end of London Bridge. At first people thought it merely "casual" and treated it contemptuously. But presently, Fire, fire, fire, fire, the Bells all backward ring: Haste, haste to every Well and Spring; Let ev'ry Cock, and ev'ry Spout With noise and fury rush like Winter-torrents out. Pull from the Churches Walls the Buckets down; Bring forth those Engines that defend each T o w n ; Engines which now singly more useful are Than all that Archimedes made for War. 7 6 John Crouch, Uorripiov YXvuvirucpov. Londons Bitter-Sweet-Cup of Tears, for Her Late Visitation: and Joy, for the Kings Return, 1666, pp. 4-j. 6 Londinopolis, 1657, p. 398. 7 Corbet Owen, "Upon the Intolerable Heat in the Latter End of May and the Beginning of June, 1665," in [John Bulteel's] New Collection of "Poems and Songs, Written by Several Persons, 1674, p. 121.

xii

INTRODUCTION

For at least four days the conflagration raged, fanned by a northeast wind that happily kept the flames from the powdermagazine in the Tower. The warehouses by the river went. Church followed church. Street after street was swept down. Frenzied attempts to starve the fire by pulling houses down with hooks or blowing them up with gunpowder proved fruitless. The Royal Exchange, St. Sepulchre's, Guildhall, Cheapside, St. Paul's, Christ Church, Baynard's Castle—one could compose a Homeric catalogue of old familiar names—, shops, prisons, hospitals, churches, markets, houses (13,200 of them)—London from Bridge to Temple, five-sixths of Shakespeare's city, was left a forest of chimneys in a great bed of smouldering ashes. One could stand in what had been Cheapside and see the Thames. Although it is impossible to say exactly when the limit of the damage was reached, the fire seems to have ceased, virtually, on Wednesday the fifth, somewhere beyond Pie Corner, having destroyed (Mr. Bell estimates) "an area equal to an oblong with its greatest length a mile and a half, and in depth half a mile," and having reduced the city (as Pepys observed) "from a large folio to a decimo-tertio." There has never been such a fire since the destruction of Jerusalem, nor will be till the last conflagration. Had you been at Kensington, you would have thought for 5 days that it had been Doomsday, from the fire and cries and howlings of the people.8 This occurred long before the era of "men of feeling." Tears not of sensibility but of moral indignation accompanied the thunders that rolled from the surviving and the improvised pulpits. Typical is the text chosen by Bishop William Sancroft for his occasional sermon, Lex Ignea: "When T h y Judgements are in the Earth, the Inhabitants of the world will learn Righteousness." Far outweighing the counsels of patience and of consideration for those ruined by the Fire 9 were the denunciations of a backsliding generation, for many Londoners had become 8 Calendar of State Papers, Domestic, September 8, 1666; Addenda, 1670, p. 713. 8 E.g., [Thomas Goodwin,] Patience and Its Perfect Work, under Sudden eb- Sore Tryals, 1666; " O . S.," Counsel to the Afflicted; or, Instruction and Consolation for Such as Have Suffered Loss by Fire. With Advice to Such as Have Escaped That Sore Judgment, 1667.

INTRODUCTION

xiii

mere Bartholomew-babies. "You remember, Christians, ah you cannot but remember Gods sore judgement of the Plague; and were we not ready to say, Oh now God hath done with us? I, we soothed our selves in all being well, we cryed, the bitterness of death is past, we ranted it up and down the Taverns, Oh a severe judgement cannot overtake us; and behold, where the Plague left us, there the Fire found us; and how, Alas, are we brought to the ground that did dwell securely!" 1 0 Preachers ransacked Job, Jeremy, and such, and turned for parallels to Sodom, Gomorrah, and Jerusalem; Thomas Vincent, for example, prepared "A Catalogue of London's sins, which have provoked the Lord to speak with so terrible a voice in the City.''''11 The Fire, these people held, had proved to be a comparatively merciful dispensation. Worse punishment might be expected for the present; and as for the future, "God hath let the sins of London see a little Embleme of the Day of Judgement." 1 2 Sin deserved chastisement (which might with perfect justice have been much worse)—here was cold comfort for the destitute. Sin, sin, sin; the word was hammered relentlessly into a sturdy audience: the sin of not returning "Gratitude and Obedience" to God for "that wonderful and merciful Restauration" 1 3 of Charles II (who never appeared to better advantage than during and immediately after the Fire), the sin of not examining "what the corporation common sin of England is," 14 the sin of presenting stage-plays,15 the sin of "our not-dedicating of our Houses to God." 1 6 For in spite of charges hurled at Dutch, 10 Robert Elborough, London's Calamity by Fire Bewailed and Improved, 1666, p. 13. 11 Gods Terrible Voice in the City, 1667, pp. 74 ff. 12 James Janeway, Heaven upon Earth; or, The Best Friend in the Worst Times, 1667, sig. [B 3 T ]. 13 Nathaniel Hardy, Lamentation, Mourning and Woe, 1666, sig. [A 4 ]. 14 Richard Baxter, Obedient Patience, 1682; The Practical Works of the Rev. Richard Baxter, 1830, XI, 506. 16 Anon., " T h e Prologue to Witt without Money: Being the First Play Acted after the Fire," Westminster Drollery, The Second Part, 1672, ed. J. Woodfall Ebsworth, Boston (Lines), 1875, p. 8. 16 Thomas Jacombe, "Otrios 'E7Kalvur/ws; or, A Treatise of Holy Dedication, Both Personal and Domestick, 1668, pt. ii, p. 42. After all this, Thomas Sprat is very refreshing ( T h e History of the Royal-Society of London, 1667, pp. 363-364): . . . we may . . . affirm of these particular Judgments: that there is no man, who understands the Circumstances, or occasions of their infliction, but they are one of the deepest parts of God's unsearchable Counsails.

xiv

INTRODUCTION

French, Jesuits, and native malcontents, the Fire was accepted as the patent act of an angry God: "This we are sure of, that whoever kindled the fire, G o d did blow the coal. . . . " 1 7 Such was the preachers' verdict; and the poems in this collection, though they range from broadside ballad to Pindaric ode, from acrostic to epic narrative, share the spirit that animates the sermons preached on the vast, uninsured disaster. Londoners met the first shock of this disaster with lamentation: " N a y , if I forget thee ( O London) let my right hand forget her cunning; if I do not remember thee, let m y tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth." 18 But even before September was out, one wrote: 19 "Men begin now everywhere to recover their spirits again, and think of repairing the old and rebuilding a new City." T h e old civic loyalty was there, seconding a new spirit that had begun to banish "the rebellious Humors, the horrid Sacriledges, . . . and gingling Extravagances"20 of the past age. B y 1668 not even distrust of "enthusiasm" could prevent such outbursts as this: 21 " O that thou (Phoenix-like) may est grow out of thy ashes more glorious than ever thou wast; that (as 'tis with metals new cast) it may be better with thee then before; that (as it was with the person of Job) thy latter end may be blessed more than thy beginning; that (as it was with the Temple) the glorie of second London may be greater than the glorie of the first." Whenever therefore a hevy calamity falls from Heven on our Nation, a universal Repentance is requir'd; but all particular applications of privat men, except to their own hearts, is to be forborn. Every man must bewail his own Transgressions, which have increas'd the Public misery. But he must not be too hasty, in assigning the Causes of Plagues, or Fires, or inundations to the sins of other men. Whoever thinks that way to repent, b y condemning the miscarriages of those parties, that differ from his, own, and b y reproving them, as Authors of such mischiefs, he is grossly mistaken: For that is not to repent, but to make a Satyr: That is not an A c t of humiliation, but the greatest Spiritual Pride. 1 7 Thomas Brooks, London's Lamentation, 1670, p. 12. One writer, indeed ("Rege Sincera," Observations Both Historical and Moral upon the Burning of London, 1667, p. 27), listed with profound attention to detail the "eight things" that G o d had made use of "to accomplish this work." 1 8 Hardy, op. cit., sig. [A ]. a 1 9 A n anon, letter of September 1666, Conway Letters, ed. Marjorie H . Nicolson, Yale University Press, 1930, p. 278. 20 James Howell, 6 poXoyla. The Parly of Beasts; or, Morphandra Queen of the Inchanted Iland, 1660, sig. a. 2 1 Jacombe, op. cit., sig. [b«v].

INTRODUCTION

XV

The story of the rebuilding has been well told.22 It will suffice here merely to say that the Act for Rebuilding the City followed quickly upon the consideration of a number of plansSir Positive At-all in Shadwell's Sullen Lovers (1668) boasted that he had made seventeen models of the city—, and that preachers and poets urged the work on. The vainglorious words of the inscription on the Fire Monument—"London rises again, whether with greater speed or greater magnificence is doubtful, three short years complete that which was considered the work of an age"—are to a degree misleading. Yet by the early 1670's Londoners had found cause for selfcongratulation; 23 indeed, Clodpate in Shadwell's Epsom-Wells (1673) was "so glad at the burning of it [London], that ever since he has kept the second of September a Festival." The progress of this mood will become evident in these pages. T o Londoners of 1942 the revelation in these poems of disaster resolutely faced and overcome will have an appeal far beyond the merely academic. Five explanatory statements are necessary. ( 1 ) Certain relevant poems have not been included in this volume: the Latin poems,24 the easily accessible Fire stanzas (ccix if.) of Dryden's Annus Mirabilis, and the broadside ballad, London Mourning in Ashes, recently edited by Professor Hyder E. Rollins.25 22 It may be studied in Bell, op. cit.; in Sydney Perks, Essays on Old London, Cambridge University Press, 1927, pp. 33 ff.; in Norman G . Brett-James, The Growth of Stuart London, Allen and Unwin, 1935; in Steen E . Rasmussen, London: The Unique City, N e w York, Macmillan, 1937, ch. 6; and in Reddaway, op. cit. 23 E.g., in Thomas Jordan's Londons Resurrection to Joy and Triumph, 1671. 24 These are: (1) Simon Ford's four Latin poems (see below, pp. 4-5); (2) William Smith, De urbis Londini incendio elegia, 1667; (3) [Jeremiah Wells,] "In Londini incendium," Poems upon Divers Occasions, 1667, pp. 46-49; (4) anon., In tristissimum immanissimumque urbis Londinensis nonas circiter Sept. -LXVI. incendium. Carmen lugubre, n.d.; (j) " W . F.," Londinum heroico carmine perlustratum, 167[o? ] (see below, p. 158); (6) Joshua Barnes, Upon the Fire of London, and the Plague, a Latin Poem, in Heroic Verse, 1679, referred to by Richard Gough (British Topography, 1780, I, 705) and Robert Watt (Bibliotheca Britannica, Edinburgh, 1824, I, 76 n.). 25 The Pepys Ballads, Harvard University Press, III (1930), 5-10. Elkanah Settle is said to have published in 1667 An Elegy on the Late Fire and Ruins of London, but no copy is known to exist (F. C. Brown, Elkanah Settle, His Life and Works, University of Chicago Press, 1910, pp. 12, n o ) .

xvi

INTRODUCTION

(2) The poems are arranged according to subject—Fire and rebuilding. Under these heads they follow an order meant to facilitate consecutive reading. The dates supplied in the table of contents will enable a reader who so desires to observe an approximately chronological order. (3) If the whereabouts of a poem is not specifically indicated, the Harvard College Library is to be understood. (4) If the place of publication of a work mentioned in the notes is not specified, London is to be understood. (5) The editor has not attempted a facsimile reprint: he has largely disregarded ornaments, the customary "FINIS," and uninteresting typographical eccentricities but in other respects has reprinted the texts exactly, with virtually no distracting sic's and no modernization of spelling or punctuation. Title and cuts appearing on the title page are from the illustration in The Surprizing Miracles of Nature and Art by Nathaniel Crouch, second edition, 1685. T o the librarians of the Bodleian Library, the Boston (Massachusetts) Public Library, the British Museum Library, the Glasgow University Library, the Harvard College Library (especially the much-enduring attendants of the Treasure Room), the London Guildhall Library, the University of Minnesota Library, the New York Public Library, the Rutgers University Library, and the Library of the Union Theological Seminary I owe a great debt of gratitude. For most valuable scholarly favors I am genuinely grateful to Mr. Walter G. Bell, Professor W. Knox Chandler, Professor Peter Charanis, Dr. John F. C. Richards, Professor Hyder E. Rollins, Dr. Grace L. Rose, Professor Shirley Smith, Professor Philip W . Souers, Professor B. Jere Whiting, and Professor Donald Wing. And I thank my wife, but for whose restraining influence on my congenital pedantry this book might have been even more portentous. R. A. A.

London in Flames, London in Glory

The Conflagration of London enough is known to fill two of Anthony Wood's Gargantuan columns and more than

F SIMON FORD ( I 6 I 9 ? - I 6 9 9 )

a page in The Dictionary of National Biography. He was a

hard-grained, hard-hitting controversialist, the antithesis of the vicar of Bray; for he was for a season a Puritan among Royalists, and then for another season a Royalist among Puritans. Eventually, a Royalist among Royalists he found his reward. Ford's roots were in Devonshire, although he spent most of his life elsewhere. After school years at Exeter and Dorchester he matriculated at Magdalen Hall, Oxford, and graduated B.A. in 1641. He seems to have left the university under compulsion and to have proceeded to London, where, says Wood, 1 he "closed with the puritanical Party, and had an Employment there sutable to his Condition, but what it was, I cannot yet tell; and when the Civil War was terminated, he returned to Oxon, took the degree of M.A. as a Member of Magd. Hall. an. 1648. in which Year, by the Favour of Dr. Edw. Reynolds, Dean of Ch. Ch. and one of the prime Visitors of the University appointed by Parliament, he became one of the Senior Students of that House, a noted Tutor, and Censor Morum. In the Year following he was admitted Bach, of Div.," for he "had been

expelled the University nvith great injury" and "should be restored 'with all Academical honour imaginable. . . ." 2 He was

a frequent preacher at St. Mary's; but for preaching there "against the Independent Oath called the Engagement, he was (with others) cast out of his Student's Place. . . . " 3 Presently ( 1 6 5 1 ) he was named vicar of St. Lawrence, Reading, where he plunged into controversial hot water, and subsequently (1659) 1

Athene Oxonienses, 1721, II, 1114-15. Anthony Wood, Fasti Oxonienses, 1721, II, 86. 3 Ath. Oxon., II, 1 1 1 j .

2

3

4

LONDON IN

FLAMES

was appointed vicar of A l l Saints, Northampton, where he distinguished himself particularly by a sermon delivered on January 30, 1660/1, on "The unparalleVd parallel between the projessed Murtherer of K. Saul, and the horrid actual Murtherers of K. Ch. I." 4 H e was rewarded in 1665 with a D.D. from Oxford (ironically enough), and in 1670 was named chaplain of Bridewell, the notorious house of correction in London. In 1674 he resigned upon being elected rector of St. Mary's, A l dermanbury; the governors of Bridewell thereupon "paid for the printing of one of his Spital sermons, and parted from him with regret, and many compliments." 5 He retired in 1676 to Old Swinford, Worcestershire, where he died. " H e was accounted," reports Wood, 6 "by those that knew him a very able Scholar, a noted Preacher, and a most Eloquent Latin Poet." W o o d , in fact, was an admirer, for he pronounced him "a most celebrated Lat. Poet of his time," one who "hath published several things of his profession, and therefore . . . ought to be numbered hereafter among the Oxford Writers." 7 For this reason, and because of the sheer bulk of his Fire verse, Ford may be allowed the laureate of the Fire and accordingly merits the place of honor at the head of this collection. Indeed, as poet, Ford made fires his hobby. N o t merely did he publish four poems on the Great Fire of London: he produced another on the burning of Northampton. His London poems begin with: T H E / C O N F L A G R A T I O N / OF / L O N D O N : / P O E T I C A L L Y / DELINEATED. / AND / Directed to the most Noble and / DESERVING / C I T I Z E N / Sir J. L. Knight and Baronet. / [Double line] / JJt Pictura Poesis. Horat. / [Double line] / LONDON, / Printed for Sa. Gellibrand 1667. / [The whole surrounded by a double-line frame.] This was followed in the same year by: Conflagratio Londinensis Poetice Depicta. / T H E / C O N F L A GRATION / OF / L O N D O N : / P O E T I C A L L Y / DESCRIBED, / Both in / LATIN and ENGLISH. / [Line] / Ut Pictura, Poesis. Ibid., col. 1116. Edward G . O'Donoghue, Bridewell Hospital Palace, Prison, Schools from the Death of Elizabeth to Modern Times, John Lane, T h e Bodley Head, 1929, pp. 297-298. 6 Ath. Oxon., II, IIIJ. 7 Fasti Oxon., II, 161. 4

5

LONDON I N

GLORY

5

Horat. Art. Poet. / [Line] / The Second Edition, with large Additions. / [Line] / LONDON, / Printed for Sa: Gellibrand, 1667. / [The whole surrounded by a double-line frame.] The first edition, quarto, contains twenty-three pages of text (pp. 4-27, p. [22] blank), with, on opposite pages, the English version {verso) and the Latin (recto). The second edition, quarto, comprises a single-page Latin dedication to James Langham and twenty-nine pages of text (pp. 4-32) with English and Latin versions as before. The second, longer version is the one reprinted here. This second edition of The Conflagration was bound up with Ford's second and third poems on the Fire, the Londini quod Reliquum (in English and Latin) and the Actio in Londini Incendiarios (in Latin only). The first and second of these three pieces had separate title-pages, and the whole collection appeared as: T H R E E / POEMS / Relating to the late Dreadful / D E S T R U C T I O N / OF T H E / C I T Y OF L O N D O N / B Y / F I R E : Septemb. 1666. / E N T I T U L E D , / I. Conflagratio Londinensis. / II. Londini quod Reliquum. / III. Actio in Londini Incendiarios.8 / [Line] / All by the same Hand. / [Line] / The First of which was before extant; but in this Second / Edition very much amended, with large Additions. ./ The other Two are wholly New. / [Line] / LONDON, / Printed for Sa: Gellibrand, Nov. 20. 1667. / [The whole surrounded by a double-line frame.] A fourth poem, Londini renascentis Imago poética, was published in 1668 and was followed in 1669 by an English version, Londons Resurrection, Poetically Represented. This and the Londini quod Reliquum are reprinted later in this collection. I have found but three contemporaneous references to Ford as Fire poet. In a letter of April 2, 1667, to Lord Wharton, Andrew Marvell mentions 9 "a Poem, writ (but that is a piece of a secret) by Mr. Ford the Minister that was of Northampton, of Exeter &c: The Latin . . . hath severall excellent heights, but the English translation is not so good; and both of them strain for wit and conceit more then becomes the gravity of the 8 T h e three titles are joined by a bracket placed between the Roman numerals and the first letters of the titles. 9 Poems and Letters, ed. H , M. Margoliouth, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1927, II, 296.

6

LONDON IN FLAMES

author or the sadnesse of the subject." Next, in the Bodleian are, or were, some commendatory verses by Dr. John Mill on The Conflagration, which Mill wished to have expunged because of their mediocrity.10 And finally, Samuel Rolls declared 11 that it was "well known to many, that many Romanists have been very jocund and full of triumph since that Fire (as who should say, ah, ah, so they would have it, or as one [Ford] brings them in, saying Ah, this hit better than the Powder-plot)" (cf. The Conflagration, 1. 476). If we cannot trust Ford for the accuracy of his narrativeMr. Bell has warned us against mistaking these poets for historians—, we at least respect his vigor. Better than any of the other Fire poets (Dryden always excepted) he succeeds in communicating the sickening hurry, bewilderment, and terror of those frightful September days. But this masculinity should not blind us to at least one passage of true tenderness: the poet of the scene in Moorfields (11. 159-176) is a minor link between Sandys and May of the early seventeenth century and the weepers of the eighteenth. Finally, the specialist will find in Ford's postscript, "The Author to the Graver," an interesting addition to the "Directions to a Painter" series and a clear connection with the Renaissance emblem literature.

The

CONFLAGRATION of

Poetically

LONDON

Delineated;

Directed to the most Noble and Deserving Citizen, Sir John Langham, Knight and Baronet. POETRY'S PAINTING,

Horat.

What ayls the Poet? What unwonted Fire Thus on a suddain doth his brest inspire? 'Tis Thine, O London. From thy Funeral Urn Those Flames take birth, that do thy Poet burn. 10 Thomas Hearne, Remarks and Collections, ed. C. E. Doble, Oxford, III (1889), 462. 11 The Burning of London in the Year 1666, 1667, sig. [A«].

LONDON IN GLORY

Mtna is m y Parnassus; and a Cup O f liquid Fire, Vesuvius belcheth up, M y Sacred Spring. T o give these Passions vent, I need no other Muse then th' Argument. Your Favour, Sir, my Muse and I implore; (Friend to the Poet, to the Muses more:) 'Tis your Concern. Those Neighbour-flames I sing, That Divine Mercy to remembrance bring, W h i c h those small Reliques, where a part you have, So lately snatcht from a great City's Grave. L o n g had the Pest with an infectious breath From emptied Houses throng'd the Gates of Death. T h e Bed-man's Tumbrill no distinction made: Where once their Dirt, chief Citizens were lay'd: T h e Sexton oft the Grave himself did fill, He digg'd for others; oft the Weekly Bill Swell'd with its Makers; oft it did betide, That w h o lay'd out his Friend, lay by his side: W h e n (th' barking Starr twice lodg'd) 'twas hop'd withall A second Autumn would not prove a Fall. But, trusted Hope, like Bankrupts, doth compound. For ere the long contagious ayre grew sound, A n d from th' excess of Pestilential heat, London's Pulse did to healthful measure beat, A far more doleful Fever her befalls. A Fatal Fire conceiv'd in private Walls, Nurs'd by Contempt, at last grows past Arrest; Defies all Aides, and scorns to be supprest. 'Twas in the dotage of th' expiring Night, W h e n Sol's shrill Bird proclaim'd th' approaching Light, And th' Eastern Starres began to shrink away, Before the gloryes of the mounting Day: W h e n th' wakeful Bell-man from the City's eyes Chas'd tempting sleep with his affrighting cryes. All leave their beds before the earliest Lark, Groping their clothes first, then their way, i' th' dark. Each door's unlockt, and in the clamorous street, Distracted Crowds, and doubtful tydings meet. Till, 'twixt the Sun and Flame, a Sacred Day (London's sad Lords-Day) broke; T h e Heavenly Ray

8

LONDON IN

FLAMES

Strain'd through the waving blaze, upon each Spire Of th' adverse Pyramids pourtray'd the Fire. God's Bellows blow the Coals, and ev'ry where Toss wanton Fire-balls dancing in the Air. The liquid Pitch in flaming clouds doth rowle, (The draught of Heaven shriveWd to a scrowle) And clammy Lightnings in strange Figure, falls, Like sparks, from beaten Links at Funeralls. The scared Citizens, with trembling, gaze T o watch the downfall of the hovering blaze: Till, where least fear'd, it lights; and fatal showres Through Chimney-tops into their dwellings powres. Buckets, and Pumps they now for service press: The service hot, and dubious the success: They drain the Thames, and from the broken Lead Divert the streams which private dwellings fed. Each street a Brook becomes, each dam a Pond; Cask knockt o' th' Head, and noblest Juyces tunn'd Not for these Uses, now to these assigned: The sober stream with sprightful Nectar joyn'd, Great Engines on the thirsty flame did shed, But what the one did quench, the other fed: For th' unctuous Liquors with the Foe conspire, And drunken Vzilcan vomits fiercer fire. W h o dwelt together, now together burn; And Houses mix'd, to mixed Ashes turn. What was the Nurse of Trade, becomes its Fate; And Neighbourhood doth now depopulate: The Flame's augmented by the Houses crowd, Its Hunger still encreasing with its Food. The Mower strikes not more destructive strokes, When from the field he polls her golden lockes; Then doth the flaming Sythe deal fatal blowes, Whiles streets on swathes its keener fury throwes. Now, Water's useless: and the next intent Is, by great Ruines, greater to prevent. By Hooks and Mines, next Houses levell'd lye, In hope the Flames may for meer Hunger dye: But all in vain. Those Ruines prove a Stile O're which the Fire strides to the standing Pile.

LONDON IN GLORY

Yea, where its actual contact is deni'de, Like Mischiefs from inflamed Aire betide. Here ruinous cracks, there doleful shriekes do sound, And those that danger should unite, confound. That hostile Ships possess'd the River, and Pour'd French and Dutch in numerous Hoasts on Land; And vaunting Romanists in armed Troopes Were ready to go forth, and ?neet their Hopes; (Terrors, in th' Issue, vain) mean while, became (Nurs'd by reports) as fatal as the Flame. False fears suggested, common aydes distract: Whiles each his Cabin voids, the Vessel's wrackt. Nothing but flight now any comfort yeelds; As if mens hearts were sunk into their heels: Who stayes behind, is thought resolved to dye; And none trusts ought above him, but the skye. So have I seen, when with a fatal spade The Gard'ner doth an Emmet-hill invade, H o w soon the laden crowd is scatter'd wide, And the black Troopes their narrow paths do hide. Their brood and wealth is all dispers'd abroad; Though none can tell where to discharge his load, Yet all consent to flye their ruinous cell, And seek new homes where they may safer dwell. Thus scatter'd Citizens trudg up and down, Some charg'd with others Goods, some with their own. Each hinders other, and obstructs his way: Useless the most, except (perhaps) they pray. T h ' uncertain crowd with various motion reeles, And following feet oppress preceding heeles. The poor man's burden's light, as is his foot; The rich man's load his slower pace doth suit. The Porter makes his Markets in the wrack, A Friend or Foe, as he bestows his Pack. And happy now's the mean estate! The higher Affords but richer prey to Thieves and Fire. The rates of Portage with the danger rise, Sometimes half-value's thought but equal Price: And sometimes half's too short; Justice gives odds T o him that stakes a Life against my Goods.

9

100

no

120

IO

LONDON I N

FLAMES

The Country is deserted round about, Some love brings in, some fear; to some (no doubt) The motive's gain, no matter how it rises, The greatest Hurryes yeeld the richest prizes. Each Rode grows warm with Travellers, and they Again reflected warmth feel from their way. Some thought it (though) worth many a weary pace, T o see, whiles ought remained, what London was. But stay, my Muse. A thousand Tongues to shew The City's Hurryes, would be found too few. For, as in Shipwrack, when through yawning chinks The batter'd Vessel floods of water drinks: One stares, another's pale, a third doth spill His tears into the Brine he is to swill: A fourth leaps over-board, and for his life Bestirres his Arms; on top-sayle percht, a fifth With's weight the leaning Vessel overbears: A broken Flank another freights, and steers; Yea, oft the same plank divers seek to stride, Till, whose boat it shall be, by battel's try'de. So far'd it here. The fright, in all the same, Appear'd in various shapes. In one, the flame Beheld, congeals his blood to Ice; and then As 'tis felt nearer, thaws that Ice agen. Another, on four legs escapes, his eye Turn'd back, for fear the flame should swifter flye. A third, betwixt two counsels holds the scales; Fear swayes the beam, and then the worst prevails. Others, mistake their way, amaz'd, and run Into the danger that they seek to shun. And some, that spent by long diseases were, For their cure stand obliged to their fear: T o flye, or dye, was now their choice; that, made 'um T o use their limbs, and then they felt, they had 'um. For close, a naked Tribe appears, (though glad Their lives are safe with loss of all they had) Great Instances, how little Nature needs, And, How much too much our Excesses feeds! An hedg with Hangings by Arachne spun, From twig to twig, keeps off the mid-day Sun.

LONDON IN GLORY

From rain, a sheet on cords extended, shields; Next Bank a safe, though homely Chimney, yields, Where, a course loaf on coals dispersed, broyles; And a small pipkin the slight dinner boyles. The Table, Turf; the Cellar, is a Pool; A stone, by turns, a Bolster, and a Stool. The Babe, once lapp'd in Silks, now lyes in Rags; On the green floore the sorry Cradle wags: The Mother, in a Nurses posture, by, Charms him asleep with a sad Lullaby: Kind Robin answers her with mournful Tones, And the shrill Eccho doubles th' Infant-moans. Now range the flames, like Travellers in Peace. Where success hopeless is, endeavours cease. The Battel's given for lost: and former checks The Victor into hotter Vengeance vex. O'reflowing eyes their flaming-Homes bewail; But Tears cannot, where Flouds would not avail. So th' helpless Bird about her plundered Nest Chatters, and flutters; fain she would arrest Her Fate; but over-match11, takes the next Tree, And there bemoans the wrack she's forc'd to see. Some crowd the Tops of Steeples, thence to take Their last farwel of (what they must forsake) Dear LONDON: but soon glutted with the sight, Kiss the kind Turrets, and bid 'um Good night. Here Ccesar comes, with Buckets in His eyes, And Father in His heart. Come, come, he cryes, Let's make one onset more. The scattered Troupes At his word rally, and retrieve their Hopes. The Rebel-Flames, they say, felt CHARLES was there; And sneaking back, grew tamer then they were: So that, no doubt, were Fates to be defeated By man, the City''s Fate had been retreated. But Loyalty befriends the Flames. Their own Dangers neglected, thine affrights. Alone, Alone, dear Sir, let's fall, they cry'd aloud, And hazard not three Kingdoms in a croud. Long may King CHARLES survive his Cityes Fate, His Life, and all our Hopes bear equal Date.

12

LONDON IN

FLAMES

Flames can't undo us, whiles the King's secure: He lost, though sav'd from flames, w e must be poor. Thus did the pious Trojan venture rather All's Treasure to the City's wrack, then's Father! His Subjects Love forc'd Caesar to withdraw, More griev'd to leave the Loyalty he saw. Next, Princely YORK, with sweat and dirt besmear'd, (More glorious thus, then in his Robes) appear'd. He, Neptune-like, his watry Realm doth raise, And's Noble Arm the spit-floud Engine swayes: That baffled, next his Thundring-Cannons spewe A n armed blaze, with Flames, Flames to subdue. But whom the conquered Dutch and French did flie, These Foes ('twas out of's Element) defie. A l l Help at last grows helpless, but the Last. That too, they try. T o Churches, now in hast Some flye for shelter, ne're were there before; Others, to mourn they ne're shall see 'um more. T h e flames even them, with th' owners leave, surprise, N o r was't then Sacriledg, but Sacrifice. That reverend Fabrick which the World admir'd, Amongst a crowd of lesser note is fir'd. Its Cloud-surmounting Steeple flam'd so high, That threatened Heavens ne're fear'd a flame so nigh. Yea, some beholders thought 'twas more then fear'd, Whilst falling-sparks like falling-starres appear'd. T h e Fates themselves burnt Monuments entomb'd, Their Alabaster melts, and (what's presum'd Beyond Art's Power) Marble's fusile grown; T h e sacred Reliques of the dead are thrown Out of their Tombs; and by a means unthought, Are, with their Tombs, from Dust to Ashes brought. [At Building Pauls] in the late Proverbs sense, Henceforth, I doubt, may Prophesie commence. And after-times for what of it they know, Shall more to th' Pencil, then the Trowel owe. O f t , unawares, doth man's presaging mind Sent future Harms! sure, Dugdale, that inclin'd T h y too Prophetick Genius to prevent T h e Fate of that illustrious Monument,

210

220

230

240

13

LONDON IN GLORY

Which, 1vhat it was,

(sith 'twas not long

to

be)

Had scarce been long knoivable, but for Thee. Write Dugdale, with thy Founders, Pauls, and more; Immortal made by him, by none, before. With sacred flames, a learned blaze doth rise; (For Twins, they say, Twin-fates do oft surprise) The Labours of the teeming Press and Brain,

250

(An off-spring Ages can't restore again)

One Hour destroyes. St. Faith's betrusted Cell, (For publique Faith it was) turn'd Infidel. So Phcebus ne're for Phaethorn did mourn, As now he did. The Sisters Nine did burn Their Golden Tresses in the richer Fire; Minerva did her Court in blacks attire. Tear-flouds foul'd Helicon; your Poets Wit Runs muddy

(Sir) with this short sip of it.

The common Wrack the Royal Change doth share, Babel of Tongues; the Universes Fay re; Where both Poles daily met, and what within The spacious distance of the Poles is seen: The Kingdoms Marble Chronicle. To Thee (Great Prince) it shew'd thy Royal

Pedigree,

For three times Nine Descents. Thy Next, the Best, Dislodged by Rebels, by Thee, repossest: Now, with the Church He hugg'd, in Ruines lies, But hopes, by Second CHARLES, a Second Rise. By Him, You stood, His Name's and Venue's Heir; The Make-Peace Act Your gracious Hand did bear, Draught of that Mind which in Your Royal Brest The Image of th' Eternal Mind exprest; In whom, Oblivion Vertue is, and who (As You) by Pardons Treason doth subdue. For Rebels, whom despair with Courage arms, A safe Retreat into subjection charms. Whence, though the Marble, and the Paint be not, CHARLES living, th' Amnesty '11 ne're be forgot. Gresham the Kings survives. The grateful Flame The Founder

260

spar'd, that would not spare the

Frame.

The Watry Region scapes not. Conquering Flames Owe a Revenge unto their Foe the Thames.

270

280

H

LONDON IN F L A M E S

Scullers and Oars now, Westward Ho! all cri'de, Nor had they leasure to expect a Tide. From the Lee-shoare the Ships in hast retire, The Wind was thought a milder Foe, then Fire. The River shrinks, and from the threatning Heats, Now to the Spring, now to the Sea retreats. An Envoy-wave dispatcht to Thetis-Court, Implores her help; which granted, to the Port She marcht; but when she saw the Flames, she fled, And under water hid her frighted Head. Whiles heated Waves thus on themselves recoyle, The Deep, without a Metaphor, doth boyle. The scaly Troupes scarce safe at bottom were, The daring Foes chas'd and attaqu'd 'em there. The Fishermen ne're made so strange a draught; 'Tis thought, the Fish were par-boy I'd that they caught. Four dayes did Phoebus set, but made no Night, A brighter Blaze supply'd his baffled Light. And all that while the City wak'd: What sense Of weakness call'd for, Danger frighted thence. Till the fifth Sun, ascending from the East, With joy beheld the Emulous Fire supprest. Whether because the Suburbs, where it stay'd, Were less with crowded Buildings over-lay'd: Or their Brick Edifices stopt it there: Or, that the Flames so spread, more feeble were: (As Boggs hash'd into Gutters, soon are dry'd:) Or, that the Wind had spit out's Lungs, and dy'd: Is doubted. Out of doubt, At God's Arrest The all-devouring Fires themselves confest Conquered, submitting to receive again Their former (now too long rejected) Chaine. The Fire is out. But dismal marks are seen, To tell succeeding Ages where't hath been. The Fate of old Troy did New-Troy betide, Its doubtful Pedigree's thus justifi'd. The City now is the once-City''s Tomb, A Sceleton of fleshless Bones become. Its Venerable Ruines have the Name Of what it was, but little else the same.

LONDON I N GLORY

As in Kings Monuments, their Ashes bear Titles, and Scutcheons which the Kings did wear. Its greatest part without the Walls bestow'd, London's not now within, but gone abroad. Grief cramps my heart; nor doth my Muse suffice T o the last Act of London's Tragedies. Let those impregnate Fancies, which the view Of that Disaster fill'd, this Theme pursue. Meer Fame, I know, dull Notions must infuse; Yet wish not such a sight t' enrich my Muse. In brief, (for tir'd Accountants close with Greats) Know, Churches, Publique Halls, and Princely Seats, Schools, Hospitals; and what brave Piles soe're For State or Use our Ancestors did reare, Lye raz'd; with what was raised by later Times, T o eternize their Vertues, or their Crimes. All Europe mourns at London's Funerals. Yea, our suspected Foes, (if true or false, Day' 11 bring to light) like solemn grief declare. We, (sith we wish 'em innocent) not dare T o charge 'em with a Guilt they thus disclaim. And yet, if Time shall hidden fraud proclaim, Resolve to lash 'em. Our just Muse bestows Bayes on the valiant, Rods on treacherous Foes.

15

330

340

The A U T H O R to the GRAVER. Upon occasion of a Draught expressing London in Flames, designed to have been prefixed as a Frontispice to the Poem; but forborn upon second thoughts. Hold Graver, hold! In vain thou dost engage T o crowd the Book into the Title-page. T h y Plate too much beneath thy Project falls. For, though it shew us Flames, and tottering Walls, If that be all, thy Title thou'lt bely: None takes the Scene to be the Tragedy. No; Londons Flames should so be set to view, That those who see, in part may feel 'em too; And even those that cannot see, may find

350

16

LONDON IN

FLAMES

T h ' eye's not th' onely Glass that burns the mind. Say then; canst thou express the shriekes and cryes, That rent the Clouds, and pierced the melting Skies? 360 Can thy Descriptions accent Babels Voyces, Or give due Ecchoes to confused Noyses? Canst thou express the baivlings of a Croud, Wherein none's heard, 'cause every one is loud? Or the Extortions, Thefts, and cozening feats Of Porters, Carters, Water-men, and Cheats? Canst thou describe the sounds of tuneless Bells, Whose awkward Musick tolls their Steeples Knells? The cracks of tumbling Houses, and the greeting Of tottering Roofs, and battering Cannons meeting? 370 Canst thou to view present the hissing steams Of melted Metals check'd with cooling streams? Or draw the medley of compounded smells, Forc'd, some from fragrant, some from nasty Cells? Canst reach the Horrors of distracted minds, Where ghastly fear with ivoful grief combines? Grief, which expression from amazement borrows, Whiles Tears are stifled by profounder sorrows. Or th' Hurrey which distempered Fancies fills, Where Thought stabs Thought, and Project, Project kills?

Where what to save, 's in doubt, till all be lost, And slow Resolves by speedy Fates are crost? Canst draw the Misers Passions, while he lags In midst of Flames, hugging his darling Bags; Whom, loath to lose, and loath to give, divide, Neer sacrific'd to what he deifi'd? Or a just Love 'twixt equal Children parted, Where one must be preferred, th' other deserted? Or, whiles both Goods and Childrens danger scares, The Mothers bowels, and the Fathers cares? Or labouring throws, and Births precipitate, Where the Fright's Midwife, and the Nurse is Fate? If none of these within thy Picture come, Confess it short, and give the Poet room. Poetry is an Intellectual Mint, That stamps a Picture with a spirit in't;

380

390

LONDON IN GLORY

Whose secret Magick Senses want supplyes, And makes Spectators where it finds no Eyes. Thus that old Bard doth in his Iliad draw Battels to th' life, 'tis said, he never saw: -too And makes those Hector and Achilles see, Whose outward Organs are as blind as He. 'Tis sacred Flame, whose subtil Influence Can melt the Soul, and never scorch the Sence. 'Tis the Minds Microscope, that helps the Eye To the least insect-thought's Anatomy. That secret'st motions through their Symptomes traces; And renders Souls as visible as Faces. This, this can Londons Fate most lively shew, That paints its inside-Flames, and outside, too. 410 And such an Artist, London, wish I thee; And next, would wishing do't, That I were He. Which, Graver, though I'm not, my Draught of thine Hath th' odds, which better Poems have of mine. Barr Emulation then, and try thy Art; The Poets Zany is the Graver's part. Thy Preface-Lines, I grant, may somewhat do To stead the Stationer, and Poem too. For oft the Book's turn'd for the Baby-Letter, And sorry Cuts helps Ballads off the better. 420 In Legends too, some say, (nor is't deny'd) Some are by th' painted Saints best edify'd: For Lyes in Picture, with their Art delight, Which, told for Truth, the Hearers Faith affright. Yea, perhaps, thou may'st wiser Readers draw, To greet a Muse, till now, they never saw. For 'tis the Bush, that leads us to the Wine; And men know where the Sight is, by the Sign. On therefore, but with my advice comply, And thus thy Scene fit to the Tragedy. 430 Conceit Troy's Flames, and those that Nero made, To symbolize with the sad Tune he play'd: Or those he caus'd, whose *Name did Burning bear, When Jove and Rome to Geese obliged were. With those that laid Jerusalem in dust: * Brennus.

i8

LONDON IN

FLAMES

And those of Foreign Vulcans, tan'e on Trust From Travellers; t' impregnate thy Design, And make thy Fancy more resemble mine. Then from some ghostly Father get a Spell, To view the Cave, they say, joyns next to Hell: 440 From that Original thy Fancy fill, (For that's pure Fancy) and then try thy skill. Or, lastly, antedate the general Fire In thought, and thy Invention thence inspire. Thus amid, take Londons situation right, And spread a Mantle o're't of blackest Night. Take Lights and Shades from its Blaze: Lookers on Were satisfi'd, it might supply the Sun. Next, place in stead of th' often-changing Dame, A black Cloud, big with sheets of Oyly Flame; 450 Ruffled by Eurus, puffing out o' th' East Mtnean Vapours from's incensed Breast. Let them drop melted Starres, toss'd up and down T o scatter ruines through the scared Town. Out of the Skies, (to shew from whence it came) Stretch out an Hand arm'd with a Rod of Flame. Bound with a Scrowle, which let this Motto fill, England amend, his hand is stretcht out still. Let Flames, on march, a mile in front appear, Brought up with Ruines smothering in the Rear: «0 I' th' Van, express me Pauls, as yet entire, But let its Roof run from th' approaching Fire. Some dwellings charged by scouting Heats, let smoak; And others, stand forlorn t' expect the shock. On top of some, thick Crowds with Buckets arm For Charge; but flying at the first Alarm. Let ruining Hooks others exposed shake; And gaping Chasmes let Warlike Engines make. Express me Roofs blown up into the Aire; And Flames they flye beneath let meet 'em there. 470 Next, draw a reeking Thames, and Barges flying With singed Sayles, and stifled Fishes dying. This done, a Jesuit place in view o' th' whole, At Faux's bo-peep in some sneaking hole, Laughing in's sleeve: and let this be the Mot,

LONDON IN GLORY

Ha! this hits better then the Powder-plot. Then on the top of Pauls let be exprest, A melting Phcenix in a flaming Nest. Hope will expound the Emblem; though I fear Few hope, 'twill soon be verified there. Lastly, If any nook remain unfill'd, (He's loath an whole Page for his Face be spill'd) The Poet in a Cypress-wreath insert; (The Lawrel is a badg of a Desert, Which he pretends not to: besides, he wears An heart more suiting to an Age of Tears:) Pale, like the City's Ashes, make his Looks, (Too many wear its Fires:) by, let his Books (Jeremy's Threnes, Salvian, Gildas, and The Tristia of the banish'd Poet) stand: Let his Eyes drop into his Ink, and thence Supply his Quill, and mingle with his sense. But ne're ask, Who He is: Find any He That's such an one, and let him stand for Me.

Londons Fatal Fire Short and Serious / N A R R A T I V E / OF / L O N D O N S / F A T A L Diurnal and Nocturnal Progression, / From Sunday Morning (being) / the Second of SEPTEMBER, / Anno Mirabili 1666. / Until Wednesday Night following. / A P O E M . / AS ALSO / Londons Lamentation to her / Regardless Passengers. / [Line] / TFz'i/} Allowance. / [Line] / LONDON: Printed for P