aversion, and many were the nicknames and vulgar terms applied to him. The slang language of the day, therefore, was not unknown to Luther.

At page 204 of Williams’ Lectures on Ecclesiastical History, 4to. (apparently privately printed for the use of the students of St. Begh’s College,) is the following foot-note:—

Of the violence with which Luther’s enemies attacked his character, and strove to render his name and memory odious to the people, we have an example in the following production of a French Jesuit, Andreas Frusius, printed at Cologne, 1582:—

Elogium Martini Lutheri, ex ipsius Nomine et Cognomine.
Depinget et dignis te nemo coloribus unquam;
Nomen ego ut potero sic celebrabo tuum.

Magnicrepus Ambitiosus Ridiculus Tabificus Impius Nyctocorax Ventosus Schismaticus Lascivus Ventripotens Tartareus Heresiarcha Erro Retrogradus Vesanus Sacrilegus

Mendax Atrox Rhetor Tumidus Inconstans Nebulo Vanus Stolidus Leno Vultur Torris Horrendus Execrandus Reprobus Varius Satanas

Morofus Astutus Rabiosus Tenebrosus Impostor Nugator Vilis Seductor Larvatus Vinosus Tempestas Hypocrita Effrons Resupinus Veterator Sentina

Morio Apostata Rabula Transfuga Iniquus Noxa Vulpecula Simia Latro Vappa Tarbo Hydra Effronis Rana Vipera Sophista

Monstrum Agaso Raptor Turpis Ineptus Nefandus Vecors Scurra Lanista Voluptas Tyrannus Hermaphroditus Eriunis Rebellis Virus Scelestu

Each column is an acrostic of the name Martinvs Luthervs, making 80 scurrilous epithets.

ENGLISH BOOKS ON VAGABONDS

MUST now say something about the little books on vagabonds which appeared in this country fifty years after the Liber Vagatorum had become popular in Germany. The first and principal of these was edited by Thomas Harman, a gentleman who lived in the days of Queen Elizabeth, and who appears to have spent a considerable portion of his time in ascertaining the artifices and manœuvres of rogues and beggars. From a close comparison of his work with the Liber Vagatorum, I have little hesitation in saying that he obtained the idea and general arrangement, together with a good deal of the matter, from the German work edited by Luther. The title of Harman’s book is:—A Caueat for Cvrsetors vulgarely Called Vagabones, set forth for the vtilitie and profit of his naturell countrey.

This first appeared in 1566. It was very popular, and soon ran through four editions, the last being “augmented and enlarged by the first author thereof, with the tale of the second taking of the counterfeit Crank, and the true report of his behaviour and punishment, most marvellous to the hearer or reader thereof.”

The dates of the four editions are—

The printer of the third edition is not known. The book is dedicated, somewhat inconsistently, considering the nature of the subject, to Elizabeth, Countess of Shrewsbury. It gives, like the Liber Vagatorum, short but graphic descriptions of the different kinds of beggars, and concludes with a cant dictionary.

The next work on this subject which appeared in England was published nine years later:—

The Fraternitye of Vacabondes, with a Description of the crafty Company of Cousoners and Shifters; whereunto also is adioyned the XXV Orders of Knaues, other wise called a Quartern of Knaues. Confirmed for ever by Cocke Lorell. (London by John Awdeley, 4to. 1575.)8

Some have conjectured that it was an original compilation by Audley, the printer; but this little book, perhaps more than Harman’s, shows traces of the German work. The “XXV Orders of Knaues” is nearly the number described in the Liber Vagatorum, and the tricks, and description of beggars’ dresses in both are very similar. There are the rogues with patched cloaks, who begged with their wives and “doxies;” those with forged licenses and letters, who pretended to collect for hospitals; those afflicted with the falling sickness, a numerous number; some without tongues, carrying letters, pretending they have been signed and sealed by the authorities of the towns from whence they came; others, “freshe-water mariners,” with tales of a dreadful shipwreck, and many more, all described in similar words, whether in the pages of the Liber Vagatorum, Harman, or Audley. It is reasonable to suppose, therefore, that the German account, being in the hands of the people abroad half a century before anything of the kind was issued here, copies must have found their way to England, and that from these the other two were in a great measure derived.

I might remark that other accounts of English vagabonds were published soon after this. The subject had become popular, and a demand for books of the kind was the result. Harrison, who wrote the Description of England, prefixed to Holinshed’s Chronicle (1577), describes the different orders of beggars. Greene, about 1592, wrote several works, based mainly on old Harman’s book; and Decker, twenty years later, provided a similar batch, giving an account of the vagabonds and loose characters of his day.

Shakespeare, too, and other dramatists of the period, introduced beggars and mendicants into their plays in company with the Gipsies, with whom, in a great measure, in this country they were allied.

ANCIENT CUSTOMS OF ENGLISH BEGGARS

MONGST those passages which refer to the customs and tricks of beggars, in the Liber Vagatorum, there are few which receive illustration by a reference to the early laws and statutes of this country.

The licenses, or “letters with seals,” so frequently alluded to, and which were granted to deserving poor people by the civil authorities, are mentioned as customary in this country in the Act for the ordering of Vagrants, passed in the reign of Henry VIII. (1531). It appears