T. R. Smith, comp. Poetica Erotica: Rare and Curious Amatory Verse. 1921–22.
Cuckolds Haven
Roxburghe Ballads(Anonymous. Vol. I. 1871) COME, neighbors, follow me, that cuckolized be, | |
That all the town may see our slavish misery: | |
Let every man who keeps a bride | |
Take heed he be not hornified. | |
Though narrowly I do watch, | 5 |
And use lock, bolt and latch, | |
My wife will me o’er match, | |
My forehead I may scratch: | |
For though I wait both time and tide, | |
I oftentimes am hornified. | 10 |
For now the time’s so grown, | |
Men cannot keep their own, | |
But every slave, unknown, | |
Will reap what we have sown: | |
Yea, though we keep them by our side, | 15 |
We now and then are hornified. | |
They have so many ways | |
By nights or else by days, | |
That though our wealth decays, | |
Yet they our horns will raise: | 20 |
And many of them take a pride | |
To keep their husbands hornified. | |
Oh what a case is this! oh, what a grief it is! | |
My wife hath learned to kiss | |
And thinks it not amiss: | 25 |
She oftentimes doth me deride, | |
And tells me, I am hornified. | |
What ever I do say, | |
She will have her own way; | |
She scorneth to obey; | 30 |
She’ll take time while she may; | |
And if I beat her back and side | |
In spite, I shall be hornified. | |
Now you would little think | |
How they will friendly link, | 35 |
And how’ll they sit and drink | |
Till they begin to wink: | |
And then, if Vulcan will but ride, | |
Some cuckold shall be hornified. | |
A woman that will be drunk | 40 |
Will easily play the punk; | |
For when her wits are sunk | |
All keys will fit her trunk: | |
Then by experience oft is tried, | |
Poor men that may be hornified. | 45 |
Thus honest men must bear | |
And ’tis in vain to fear, | |
For we are ne’re the near | |
Our hearts with grief to tear: | |
For, while we mourn, it is their pride | 50 |
The more to keep us hornified. | |
And be we great or small, | |
He must be at their call; | |
How e’er the cards do fall, | |
We men must suffer all: | 55 |
Do what we can, we must abide | |
The Pain of being hornified. | |
THE SECOND PART If once they bid us go, | |
We dare not twice say “no,” | |
Although too well we know | 60 |
’Tis to our grief and woe: | |
Nay, we are glad their faults to hide, | |
Though often we are hornified. | |
If I my wife provoke | |
With words in anger spoke, | 65 |
She swears she’ll make all smoke, | |
And I must be her cloak: | |
Her baseness and my wrongs I hide, | |
And patiently am hornified. | |
When these good gossips meet | 70 |
In alley, lane or street, | |
(Poor man, we do not see it!) | |
With wine and sugar sweet | |
They arm themselves, and then, beside, | |
Their husbands must be hornified. | 75 |
Not your Italian locks | |
(Which seems a paradox) | |
Can keep these hens from cocks, | |
Till they are paid with a pox: | |
So long as they can go or ride, | 80 |
They’ll have their husbands hornified. * * * * * | |
For if we them do blame | |
Or tell them of their shame,— | |
Although the men we name | |
With whom they did the same,— | 85 |
They’ll swear whoever spoke it lied: | |
Thus still poor men are hornified. * * * * * | |