The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #52843   Message #810545
Posted By: Stewie
24-Oct-02 - 07:15 PM
Thread Name: Lyr Add: The Buck's Elegy (corrupt text?)
Subject: RE: BUCK'S ELEGY -- A corrupt text?
John Holloway and Joan Black (Eds) 'Later English Broadside Ballads' Routledge & Kegan Paul 1975 at page 48 give the text exactly as posted above. Their interpretation is that the piece simply implies that the buck and his 'dearest comrade' have been promiscuous with the same women. They note that 'pila cotia' = pill of cochia, colocinth, was an early remedy for venereal disease. For more info on pila cotia and white mercury, they reference Reeves 'The Everlasting Circle' p 226. They suggest the sense of 'bumble' as 'bandage for blindfolding' (OED).

--Stewie.