The Careless Good Fellow

The Careless Good Fellow

Original Text
John Oldham, Poems and Translations (London: Joseph Hindmarsh, 1684). B-12 6177 Fisher Rare Book Library
1A pox of this fooling, and plotting of late,
2What a pother, and stir has it kept in the state?
3Let the rabble run mad with suspicions, and fears,
4Let them scuffle, and jar, till they go by the ears:
5    Their grievances never shall trouble my pate,
6    So I can enjoy my dear bottle at quiet.
7What coxcombs were those, who would barter their ease
10Had they been but true subjects to drink, and their king;
11    A friend, and a bottle is all my design;
12    He has no room for treason, that's top-full of wine.
13I mind not the members and makers of laws,
14Let them sit or prorogue, as his majesty please:
16At my lodging, when dead, so alive I have wine:
17    Yet oft in my drink I can hardly forbear
19I mind not grave asses, who idly debate
20About right and succession, the trifles of state;
22That will trouble his head with who shall come after:
23    Come, here's to his health, and I wish he may be
24    As free from all care, and all trouble, as we.
28If the conqueror take it by storming, or gold?
30    And when the fleet's coming, I pray for a wind.
32By dull cutting of throats, and vent'ring his own;
33Let him fight and be damn'd, and make matches and treat,
34To afford the news-mongers, and coffee-house chat:
35    He's but a brave wretch, while I am more free,
36    More safe, and a thousand times happier than he.
37Come he, or the Pope, or the Devil to boot,
38Or come faggot, and stake; I care not a groat;
41    I'll drink in defiance of gibbet, and halter,
42    This is the profession, that never will alter.

Notes

8] Alluding to the martyrdom of Roman Catholics at the time of the Popish Plot; see note on Dryden's Absalom and Achitophel, 108. Back to Line
9] Tyburn. The principal place of execution of malefactors in London until 1783. Back to Line
15] damn us to woollen. Charles II had, for the encouragement of the woollen industry, passed a law ordering all corpses to be buried in a woollen shroud. Back to Line
18] Alluding to taxes levied on luxuries for the expenses of government. Back to Line
21] Referring to contemporary disputes over the succession to Charles II; see notes to Dryden's Absalom and Achitophel. Back to Line
25] English foreign policy at this time was chiefly concerned with Louis XIV's military operations in the Netherlands. Back to Line
26] Sidney. Probably Algernon Sidney, formerly a republican, executed for complicity in the Rye House Plot, 1683.
D'Avaux. Ambassador of Louis XIV to Holland; later accompanied James II in his campaign against William III in Ireland. Back to Line
27] Cassel. A fort of Louis XIV in north-eastern France, near Dunkirk. Back to Line
29] Bordeaux. Where Bordeaux wine came from. Back to Line
31] bully of France. Louis XIV, whose intrigues, wars and alliances form most of the political history of the time. Back to Line
39] Smithfield. Where Protestants were burnt under the persecution of Queen Mary's reign. Back to Line
40] Mr. Fox. John Foxe, author of the Book of Martyrs (1563), an account of the victims of the Marian reaction. Back to Line
Publication Start Year
1684
RPO poem Editors
N. J. Endicott
RPO Edition
2RP.1.519, ed. N. J. Endicott; RPO 1996-2000.