Page:Hudibras - Volume 1 (Butler, Nash, Bohn; 1859).djvu/229

CANTO I.] And pardon'd for some great offence, With which he's willing to dispense, First has him laid upon his belly, Then beaten back and side t' a jelly; That done, he rises, humbly bows, And gives thanks for the princely blows; Departs not meanly proud, and boasting Of his magnificent rib-roasting. The beaten soldier proves most manful, That, like his sword, endures the anvil, And justly 's held more formidable, The more his valour's malleable: But he that fears a bastinado, Will run away from his own shadow: And though I'm now in durance fast, By our own party basely cast, Ransom, exchange, parole, refus'd, And worse than by the en'my is'd; In close catasta shut, past hope Of wit or valour to elope; As beards, the nearer that they tend To th' earth, still grow more reverend; And cannons shoot the higher pitches, The lower we let down their breeches; I'll make this low dejected fate Advance me to a greater height. Quoth she, Y' have almost made m' in love With that which did my pity move.