OF Alterations strange, Of various Signs, Hear are Composed A few Poetic Lines:  

Hear you may find, Whe● You this Book have read,  
The Crowne's transformed, Into the Poets Head.   Read well: Be merry and wise. 
Written by John Taylor.  
Printed at London, 1651.   


I Oft have seen a Saints head for a Sign,  
And many a King's head too, then why not mine?  
As every bare untruth is not a Lie,  
So Signs are not the things they signify.  
All Lies are Lies, but Metaphors and Fictions  
Are Morals, not Truths real contradictions.  
Some lies may run out of a Poet's Standish,  
(By Art or Nature, native, or outlandish)  
But if he be a Poet right, his quill  
No Blasphemy or Scandal will distil:  
Nor can he lie, for with Similitudes,  
With fancies and with fictions he alludes,  
From things Terrestrial to Celestial things,  
From Cottages unto the Thrones of Kings.  
True Poesy doth not consist in Rhyme,  
It scorns to be a slave to times or time:  
A Poet right will suffer pinching want,  
And to no greatness be a Sycophant.  
He'll wear his threadbare Suit as thin as Serge,  
And hates to come within the flatterer's Verge:  
Necessity doth quick invention lend him,  
And Appetite (his page) doth still attend him;  
He rather will far hard, with no soles booted,  
Then Writ base adulating lines splay-footed;  
Such Roguish stuff as wisdom will deride,  
Which none will read but wits who are squint-eyed,  
Whose Brains are Cork, whose Fancies all are Feather,  
Right Shuttlecocks, tossed here, there, hither, thither.  
These sons of ignorance which praise advance  
The Rhyming Rascal brood of Ignorance.  
These are the Patrons of such sordid Wits,  
Who vent their pilfered lines by girds and fits,  
But as a Fidler's a Musician's Ape,  
And on the Art of Music makes a Rape,  
So puffy Poetasters do beguile  
Admiring Fools, and steal a Poet's stile:  
Such Poet's Sponges are, at meals and Feasts,  
And there they steal and pocket up stolen Jests:  
There every flash and excrement of wit  
He catches, pickles up, makes use of it.  
Old jeers and Bulls, and clenches set him on  
Parnassus' top, there finds he Helicon;  
There in the Well of Tempe he hath lapped,  
And with Enthusiastic Rhaptures Raped,  
That strait he is a Poet for these times,  
And beyond reason write most grievous Rhimes.  
This scraping, thieving Knave can with completeness  
Flatter, and fawn, and lick the tail of greatness.  
Such are the swarms of paper and ink-spillers,  
The scorn of Poets, good wits Caterpillars.  
To make a Poet doth all Art outstrip;  
he's th' master piece of Heavenly workmanship,  
He is Angellically Intellected  
With Rhaptures, and of God and man respected;  
Adorned with nature so, that Art is still  
His servant, and a Subject to his quill.  
Right Poets are Apollo's only Heirs,  
And though wealth comes but seldom to their shares,  
To each of them contentment is a bliss,  
And to them all Their mind a Kingdom is.  
They are the Muse's Darlings, and their Lays  
To immortality can Mortals raise,  
Whose sugared Numbers, and Mellifluous Verse  
Doth season Good Capacities, and pierce  
Ingenious noble minds with such a touch,  
That good Inventions with ' are mended much.  
He that doth understand a Verse abhors  
Such lines as are not curled with Metaphors,  
Adorned with flowing Wit, with Sense embellished,  
(Which only is to ignorance disrellished)  
Lousy Hexameters, and limping Rhymes,  
Are much in use these Loggerheaded times.  
The world is Aged, Age is apt to dote,  
And boasters of the Spirit which talk by rote,  
Their wits are crooked warped, their wisdom blind,  
Their judgements with served ignorance warm lined.  
Ballads are precious Poetry with them,  
(The Cock respects the Corn, rejects the Gem)  
Their weathercock opinions will prefer  
Base scurrile scandals of each Libeler,  
Whilst all the Poets who have ever writ  
Such lines as scald the altitude of wit,  
Are by such dunghills hated, scorned, despised,  
Of no esteem at all or too low prized:  
To such I will not write a line of mine,  
A Halter fits them better than a line.  
Draffe.'s fit for Hogs, there's Rhyming Knaves enough;  
Sir-reverence is a Pancake for a Sow.  
As Homer for his worth was Greece's Fame,  
So for his want he was the Grecians shame;  
His lines gave them fame's immortality,  
And they let him live poor and beggarly;  
No place would own his birth whilst he had life,  
But when he died seven Cities were at strife,  
And like together by the ears to fall,  
T'he honoured with his bones and Funeral:  
He was the Prince of Poets, and since he  
A beggar was, 'tis no great shame to me:  
For I that am so short of him in wit,  
To be in wealth before him 'twere unfit.  
My spirits Pegassus is Fancy, and  
My Muse doth Ride, and flee o'er sea and Land,  
From every Coast and Clime, North, South, West, East,  
She brings me curious Cates to feed and feast:  
Sometimes a Dish of Sonnets sweet she brings;  
Sometimes Heroic Acts of famous things:  
iambics, Sapphics, Odes, and Epigrams,  
Tart Satyrs, Chronograms, and Anagrams,  
Epithalamiums, Epicediums, Cantos,  
Harmonious Measures, Canzoes', and Corantoes,  
Sad Eligies, and merry Madrigals;  
These are right Poets sumptuous Feastivals.  
All these and more are my contented cheer  
Though Butcher's flesh and poultry beware be dear.  
These are to me Hen, Capon, Turkey, Quail,  
Duck, Hare, Goose, Mallared, Woodcock, Snipe, or Rail,  
My Pig, and Partridge, Widgeon, P●geon, Pheasant;  
With these (Chameleon-like) I live most pleasant.  
For full paunched Gormondizing Gluttony  
With Poets hold no correspondency:  
The ones delight's a moment's luscious taste,  
The other feeds on that shall ever last:  
One, with a minutes joy his  pleaseth:  
The other takes repast that never ceaseth.  
The Emperor Maximinus used to eat  
At every dinner forty pounds of meat,  
With bread, fruit, Wine, which down his throat did go,  
He eat no supper sure that dined so.  
The Emperor Geta had his Dishes set  
After the order of the Alphabet:  
The Flesh, fish, fowl, whose names with A begun,  
First into his Imperial paunch must run:  
And so to B, C, D, E, F, and G,  
H, I, K, L, M, N, with O, and P.  
Q, R, S, T, V, W, X, Y, Z. Said,  
Their mighty Majesties thus daily fed.  
Such Monsters as these were Biberius Mero,  
And so was Rome's great Tyrant, bloody Nero:  
Such was Vitellius, Heliogabalus,  
Such was th' Assyrian Sardanap●●●●s.  
Such would Nick Wood of Kent, and Marriot be,  
If they had had such wealth and dignity.  
But none of these did ever study spend  
To be a Poet, or a Poet's friend:  
If they to Learning any love had boar,  
Their teeth had wrought much less, their brains much more.  
If ever Poet graced a Kingdom's Throne,  
King James was He, the one, and only one.  
as a nameless honest Poet wrote of Poetry.  
It is not dressed in Rags of lousy Rhimes,  
To please such Gulls as understand it not;  
It soars a pitch above these Haggard Times,  
And slights the censure of each Cockbrained Sot.  
King James his Crown was made of Massy gold,  
His Crown of Laurel was more excellent:  
The one consuming time will waste and mould,  
The other everlasting permanent.   

Thus when old time hath wasted Tomb and Hearse,  
True Honour is preserved by lasting Verse.  
Time, Tomb, and black oblivion will devour  
Their Honours that dares slight a Poet's power.  
'Twas not Achilles' Sword, but Homer's Pen  
Made Worthy Hector chiefest Man of Men.  
Who had e'er heard of Alexander's fame,  
If Quintus Curtius had not wrote the same?  
A Poet's love is lovely, but his hate  
Can strike great Kings beneath the foot of Fate.  
The sword cuts sharp, kills Sires, and spares the sons:  
The Pens keen stroke a generation runs.  
Two men, named Hypponax and Bibullus,  
Poet and Painter, dwelled in Ephesus:  
The Poet had th'ill favouredst face and feature,  
That scarce the like had any two-legged creature;  
And he such sharp satiric lines could write,  
Which would both smart and rankle, where they by't.  
The Painter made the Picture of the Poet  
So ill shaped, that all men that did but know it,  
Did every one poor Hipponax much jeer  
With scorns and scoffs, and many a flout and jeer.  
The Poet on revenge did meditate,  
And (from the Limbeck of's distilling pate)  
He ('gainst the Painter) wrote harsh lines, so furious,  
That Buballus did hang himself most curious.  
And I do wish, all that are Poet haters  
Were as that Painter, or his Imitaters.  
So I that am a Poet, old forlorn,  
(Loved by the learned, and ignorances' scorn)  
Worn from my waxing, to the lowest weine,  
Though time tread on me, I dare turn again,  
As doth a worm; but I perceive and see  
My Muse and Pen, both curbed and muzzled be;  
That (over us) there's Lincean watch,  
That we (poor fooles) dare neither bite or scratch;  
Yet had I all free liberty, I hate  
To meddle with Authority or State,  
Or write a line that scandal may produce,  
Or be the present Governments abuse:  
For States are men, no State so perfect is,  
But some things (many things) are oft amiss.  
For 'tis a maxim, all men have received  
To be deceivers, and to be deceived.  
I served two Kings full five and forty year,  
Am now grown old, bald, with some hoary hair:  
Besides, seven times Elizabeth I served  
At Sea, and from my Loyalty ne'er swerved:  
Now Kingly Government expulsed is,  
I must live in obedience under This:  
From those two Kings I had such means to live,  
And (with those means) a willing mind to give:  
But now I am a Taker, and no Giver,  
From which poor state good Jesus me deliver:  
Ten years are past, since penny pay I had,  
For my unlucky fortune is so bad,  
That though I was a Yeoman of the Guard,  
And that my fellows some poor pay have shared:  
Though (as a Waterman) much pay is due,  
Yet not one groat will unto me accrue:  
Though no man in a poorer state than I,  
Aged 72. in extreme poverty;  
Since first these woeful cruel wars began,  
I ne'er bore arms, I was no martial man:  
I ne'er saw slaughtering swords drawn from their sheaths,  
Or mangled men destroyed with various deaths.  
A pair of Crutches all my weapons were,  
Wherewith I crawled in Oxford nigh three year:  
For I was lame, and my Imposthumed leg  
My Patent was, with privilege to beg:  
Thus Lameness was my fault, my grief, my blame,  
And this did get me a Malignants name.  
Petitions there hath been two hundred given,  
To show to what extreme want we are driven,  
Whereby few of us some relief have got,  
But not one cross to my unlucky lot;  
Necessity and I both married be,  
In love and fellowship we both agree.  
She made m'a Merchant (now most Trades do fail)  
A Trade in Ale, and sell it by retail:  
My Sign was once the Crown, but now it is  
Changed by asudden Metamorphosis,  
The Crown was taken down, and in the stead  
Is placed John Tailors, or the Poets Head.  
Indeed these are the days of Transformation,  
In ten years' time hath fallen some alteration.  
For Charingcross, that had stood times and lives,  
Is turned to Saltsellers, and hephts for Knives.  
A Tavern where Saint Martin's Picture was,  
Is turned t'a Goat that ne'er eat hay or grass.  
The Salutation, or Annunciation,  
Is made two Gallants with sweet salutation;  
Signs subject are to mutability,  
And seldom are the things they signify.  
The Signs of King's heads are not heads of Kings:  
The Signs of Fountains are no watery Springs:  
Blue Boars, Black Swans, and Maidenheads are signs:  
Grapes are but Signs, 'tis pressing makes 'em Wines.  
So is a Poet with oppression pressed,  
Want squeeseth him, and then he writeth best.  
The Painter hath his fancy, I did see,  
And looking on two Loggerheads made three:  
And I have seen Saints Heads for Signs hanged up,  
And Sir John Oldcastle with a quaffing Cup;  
The Signs of many a King's Head, many a Queen,  
Popes, Bishops, Arius, Taurus, I have seen  
Their Heads set up for Signs; likewise I have  
Seen Goats heads, with their beards like Townsmen Grave,  
Rams heads, Boars heads, Bulls heads, all heads that are,  
The Painter's Art describes them near and far:  
The Sun and Moon are God's signs, but yet they 
1. Gen.   
Are Tavern Signs, where men waste time away.  
I Knew a Time (when times were not so evil)  
There was a famous Tavern, called the Devil;  
But 'twas a nickname that the house did bear,  
For I have found good entertainment there.  
In great Apollo (no man seemed to gull us)  
My father Ben and I fared like Lucullus: 
M. Johnson.   
Thus Poetry, and painting in commixion  
Do correspond in fancy, and in fiction;  
Both liked alike, alike disliked both,  
As various humours like to like or loath.  
Of Poets I have somewhat said before,  
And now of Painters I'll say somewhat more.  
The Painters cheated, for I am acquainted  
With sundry Signs that never yet were painted:  
The crooked Billet who e'er painted, who  
The Gridir'ne Paint? who did the Horse-shoe do?  
Or tell me, honest Reader, if you can,  
What man's so mad to paint a Frying-Pan?  
A Painter seldom do●h paint Whores, for they  
Themselves do with a Pox paint every day.  
A Painter right is like a Poet true:  
Ultra Maria is the chiefest Blue;  
They in their Art are downright, just, and plain,  
True honesty they have died deep in grain.  
A painter did my Picture Gratis make,  
And (for a Sign) I hanged it for his sake.  
One De la Roche, here many years hath been  
Famed for Teeth-drawing out, and setting in:  
He dwells close by Fleet Bridge, and there I saw  
His Picture hanged, which was a Sign to draw  
Such as were grieved with tooth tormenting pain,  
He drew, and in their place set new again.  
My Picture likewise hangs to draw, but not  
Teeth, but Ale, nappy as e'er came in Pot:  
Now if my Pictures drawing can prevail,  
'Twill draw my friends to me, and I'll draw Ale.  
Two strings are  to a Bow then one,  
And Poetry doth me small good alone:  
So Ale alone yields but small means to me,  
Except it have some spice of Poesy.  
Take of a spark of wit some pretty Cantle,  
And toast it for your Ale, 'twill make it mantle.  
For Poetry with Ale together Brewed  
Doth mount men's wits into an ALetitude.  
Blind Fortune is to Poetry unkind;  
And Poets wast their wits, and win but wind.  
A Poet's like a Candle, that burns bright,  
And spends himself in giving others light.  
But Ale and I together will agree,  
I'll make the Barrel light, and Ale lights me.  
And (to conclude) a Satire I'll relate,  
To show how Ale will valour Elevate;  
How it can make man vapour and extol  
Himself, that from his tongue both arines and Arts will troll:  
If he be in his Ale, no man comes near him,  
Provided you'll believe him when you hear him,  
His Travels then will mighty volumes fill,  
Beyond our famous Sir John Mandevill.  
And to his reputation 'twere a blot,  
To put him in the rank of Don Quixot.  
He passed the Zones, Phrygia, and Torrida,  
Surveyed the South World, called Incognita,  
And there he saw Great Gorgon's empty, Scull  
So big, four Bushels scarce could fill it full.  
At Stamboloya (a most stately Port)  
Where the Emperor great Robombo keeps his Court:  
There in a Shamaranguah (which we call  
A Chapel) was a building round and tall,  
Where as the huge Gargantuas' corpse were laid,  
The Tomb is a full Furlongs length 'tis said;  
Built of a Polished stone like Crimson jet,  
(Surpassing far the Tomb of Mahomet)  
Enchased with precious Stones that dims the sight,  
That none can look on't, it doth shine so bright.  
From thence he passed the straits of Magellan,  
And feasted was by mighty Pouhatan,  
Where 'mongst a world of dainties to be brief,  
A Phoenix stewed in White-broth was the chief.  
Tut, it will tyre a man to hear him half,  
He hath seen Miloes' Bull, and Walthams' Calf;  
The Monmouth Cap of famous Owen Glendor,  
And three eye tee of th' ancient witch of Endor:  
Ischariots Lantern, at Saint Dennisis,  
Th' Ephesian Diana, at the Lovure is:  
The Amphitheatre that's at Ulismos,  
The Pirramids of Egypt, or the Isthmos,  
That parts Utopia from fair Thessaly,  
Or lofty Atlas that doth prop the sky.  
If all be true he says, we may him call  
The God of Wars Lieutenant General:  
No Turk or Tartar, Moor, or Myrmidon,  
Such valiant exploits hath under-gone:  
He learned Wars Hornbook first, and did not stint,  
But past his Grammar Rules was perfect in't;  
He first began with training, Mustering, Drilling,  
Before he came to fight, or to killing:  
To March, to put his men in Files, and Ranks,  
To order a Battalions, wings, or Flanks,  
To lead the Vanguard, or bring up the Rear,  
To be here, there, (and almost every where)  
To guide and manage men, and make them stoict,  
Double your Ranks and Files, faces about:  
He served the Turk nine years a Renegado,  
Where often times he felt the Bastinado;  
And though he wore a Coat of Bare-freezado,  
Yet there he learned the Art of a Soldado,  
T'affront an Enemy with a Braveado,  
To make a Battery, and to use Scalado;  
To use Petards, Engines, Wild-sire, Granado,  
T'entrap the foe by secret Ambuscado;  
To Raise, Mount, Parapet, or Camisado;  
To make a strength more strong with Canvasado;  
With his good sword to use the Imbrocado;  
The Punto, the Reverso, the Stockado:  
And for Land service or the Sea Armado,  
He knows a roll of Match from Trinidado.  
His Music, Drums, Guns, Cannons, thundering roar,  
As if the Welkin were in totters tore;  
The Harquebuz and Muskets go pit, pat,  
Towers, Castles, Forts, and Citadels laid flat:  
Mines, Countermines, Assaults, Repulses, Sallies,  
Whilst Horse and men slain strew the Fields and valleys,  
Battalia's, Battries, Breaches, Armies, Arms,  
Broyles, Garboils, hot Encounters, fierce Alarms:  
Fortifications, Camps, Redoubts, and Trenches,  
Vamures, and Countermures, Walls, Sconces, Fences;  
On-sets and Onslaughts he hath been upon,  
He blew up Tauris, conquered Babylon:  
He stood perdue beneath the frozen Zone,  
Turned to a man of Ice, or Crystal Stone.  
The same day Mars his Valour did inspire  
And thawed him brave, with Sulphur, smoke, and fire.  
He in the Battle seemed a man all flame,  
In smouldering Powder, he that day o'ercome  
The Tartar Chrim, and near to Samercand,  
He with Mackoughly Shaugh, fought hand to hand.  
The Leaguers, and the Sieges he hath seen,  
The dreadful dangers where he oft hath been:  
He hath danced Antiques in a Crimson Flood,  
And swom Levoltaes in a sea of blood:  
In greatest perils he would bravely on,  
His throat belched fog, and flames like Phlegeton.  
Thus Salamader like, he oft hath been  
In scorching flashes, and three winters in  
An Icy coat, like Armour shining bright  
He served the Pole, against the Muscovite.  
He hath lain down to sleep a Man, in show,  
And risen a Snowball, or a Ball of Snow.  
Like the Chameleon, (not to food inclined)  
He lived by sucking the cold Northern wind:  
Famed by the blast of Fame, that swiftly flies,  
Compounding and confounding truth and lies.  
He hath a Blade (if his report be true)  
Wherewith he sixteen desperate Corporals slew;  
And eight Lieverenants he outright hath killed,  
Four Valiant Sergeants he hath slain in Field:  
Two Noble Captains and one General,  
His fury, force perforce did force to fall.  
Blades broke, and battered Hilts, he hath had more  
Than any Castle can contain the store;  
He had a Rapier, sharp, pure Castilliano,  
With which he gored and killed a great Umbrano,  
For guided with an Arm and courage fierce,  
It quite through double Cannon proof will pierce.  
He'll Guard himself from any Bullets fall,  
His Sword's his Racket, and the shot the Ball,  
Which though it swiftly come, he's so quick-eyed,  
That with his Morglay he would turneed aside:  
With the same Bilbo, once he madly strikes  
And cropped the tops off, from a Grove of Pikes:  
Thus fight oft in Winter, and in Summer,  
He had more wounds than holes are in a Scummer.  
A thousand blows and bruises, knocks and cuts  
He hath received; eight times shot through the guts.  
He was in Leaguer late before Breda,  
Associate with the marquis Spinola:  
And being in a Boat upon the Water,  
A Musket shot ran through his Pia mater,  
It pierced his Perricranion, that his brain  
Was taken out and washed, put in again.  
Yet all these wounds, and all his desperate matches,  
He calls them petty hurts, or simple scratches:  
He was so mewled once at Berghen ap Zone,  
Boys called him Rawhead there, and Bloudy-bone.  
From thence he took his Journey into Flanders,  
And so to England, where he cants and maunders;  
Where though he be not now the man he was,  
For an old beaten Soldier he may pass.  
The fruits of Ale are unto Drunkards such,  
To make 'em swear and lie that drink too much:  
But my Ale (being drank with mod eration)  
Will quench thirst, and make merry Recreation.  
My Book and Sign were published for two ends,  
T' invite my honest civil, sober Friends:  
From such as are not such, I kindly pray,  
Till I send for 'em, let 'em keep away  
From Phoenix Alley, the Globe Tavern near,  
The middle of Long-Aker: I dwell there.   
JOHN TAYLOR, Poeta Aquatica.  
FINIS.