Origins: Who is Miss Creswell & Ignoramus Toney?

Subject: Origins: Who is Miss Creswell & Ignoramus Toney?
From: chico
Date: 01 Jul 05 - 03:57 PM

This is from an interregnum era song, "Phanatick Zeal, Or A Looking-glass For The Whigs". It mentions two people which I cannot find out more about. One is "Miss Creswell", the other is "Ignoramus Toney".

  Example, we do own, than precept better is;
  For Creswell she was safe, when she lived a private Miss.
  
  For ignoramus Toney has left you in the lurch; 
  And you have spent your money, so, faith, e'en come to Church; 
  
  

What/who are these people? here is the total song:

  AIR --  'A-swearing we will go.' (Used below: 'Laird o'Cockpen')
  
        Am                           G
  Who would not be a Tory when the loyal are call'd so:
         Am                      E            7
  And a Whig now is known to be the nation's foe?
         C                     G
  So a Tory I will be, I will be, I will be;
        Am         Em          Am    Dm   Am
  And a Tory I will be, I will be, I will be.
  
  With little band precise, hair Presbyterian cut,
  Whig turns up hands and eyes though smoking hot from slut.
  
  Black cap turn'd up with white, with wolfish neck and face,
  And mouth with nonsense stuft, speaks Whig a man of grace,
  
  The sisters go to meetings to meet their gallants there; 
  And oft mistake for 'my Lord', and snivel out 'my dear'.
  
  Example, we do own, than precept better is;
  For Creswell she was safe, when she lived a private Miss.
  
  To be and to be not at once is in their power;
  For when they're in, they're guilty, but clear when out o' the tower.
  
  The old proverb doth us tell, each dog will have his day;
  And Whig has had his too, for which he'll soundly pay;
  
  They are of no religion, be it spoken to their glories, 
  For St Peter and St Paul with them both are Tories; 
  
  But now your holy cheat is known throughout the nation;
  And a Whig is known to be a thing quite out of fashion.
  
  To carry their designs, though 't contradicts their sense;
  They're clear a Whiggish traytor against clear evidence.
  
  For ignoramus Toney has left you in the lurch; 
  And you have spent your money, so, faith, e'en come to Church; 
  
  They're excellent contrivers, I wonder what they're not, 
  For something they can make of nothing and a plot.
  
  [Omit]
  These mushrooms now have got their champion turn-coat hick;
  But if the naked truth were known they're assisted by old Nick. [CAPO +3?]
  

Subject: RE: Origins: Who is Miss Creswell & Ignoramus Tone
From: chico
Date: 02 Jul 05 - 05:56 AM

Someone

Subject: RE: Origins: Who is Miss Creswell & Ignoramus Toney?
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 03 Jul 05 - 12:25 AM

Presumably you found this in MacKay's Cavalier Songs; he doesn't gloss the reference, and you'd need a historian of the period to explain it. If it appears in Roxburghe Ballads, you may be in luck; but only if someone has the time to look for it.

What I can do is identify the tune. Laird of Cockpen is probably anachronistic. A-swearing we will go derives its name from a song issued in 1684, The Swearers Chorus to the First Presbyterian Plot. The publisher was Nathaniel Thompson, who also included it in A Choice Collection of 120 Loyal Songs (1684), which is where MacKay got the text you have quoted.

The broadside included music. For facsimiles and a midi rendition of the tune, see Bodleian Library Broadside Ballads:

The swearers chorus to the first Presbyterian plot

The notation isn't first-rate. Other renditions are in Pills to Purge Melancholy (1719-20, III, 265 and VI, 200) and so on. It was widely used in ballad operas and broadside ballads, under a variety of names including A-Begging We Will Go, Jovial Beggar(s), and so on; these referring to its original appearance in Richard Brome's play Jovial Crew, or The Merry Beggars, probably in the revival run of 1684.

See Simpson, The British Broadside Ballad and Its Music, 40-42, for more detailed information (most of this came from there); though no help with your original question.