One time when he wanted his fingers to warm, She fronted the fire, and thought of no harm; Her seat he upset, and she fell on the floor, Depriv’d of her senses for more than an hour.
As he and his harlot one time sat at tea, To taste a bit toast, his own matron made free; For which misdemeanor his concubine cog’d her, And for the offence he unfeelingly flog’d her.
One afternoon, ent’ring the parlour, he saw, Expos’d on the carpet, prostrate, a piece straw; His spouse he suspected for the foul offence, And snatching the poker, depriv’d her of sense.
His children he taught with a dutiful grace, To piss upon _Mammy_, and spit on her face; And laugh when he lash’d her, ’till sickly and sore, And in storms and in tempests turn’d her to the door.
With hunger and hardships, by bruises and blows, His help-mate is render’d so lank and so low; She seems to surrender the lease of her life, And wind up the warfare of a wailing wife.
This song is imperfectly compiled from part of a “Satyr upon Women,” wrote in Preston prison, in 1715 by Mr James Robson, a freeholder in Thropton, near Rothbury, Northumberland, at that time a musician in the rebel army. He sung the Satyr aloud, at an iron barred window looking into a garden, where a lady and her maid were walking: after the song was finished, the former says, “That young man seems very severe upon our sex; but perhaps he is singing more from oppression than pleasure; go give him that half crown piece,” which the girl gave him through the grating, at a period when he was at the point of starving.
All men of high and low degree, Come listen to my song; The subject suits both you and me, With attestations strong: Therefore I hope you’ll not be nice, Attention true to pay, And hence adhere to my advice, Lest you be led astray.
Should you to marry be inclin’d, I charge you to beware; And caution you to change your mind, Thus to escape that snare; Be not decoy’d by age nor youth, Whose aims are artful all; But take my word as standard truth, You here may stand or fall.
If you should wed one with a dower, Obedience you must pay; Or if you marry one who’s poor, In rags you must array: If you a blooming beauty wed, A cuckold you must be; And if a brunet blight your bed, You’ll blush when belles you see.
