Dawson the Butler's dead: Although I think <br />Poets were ne'er infusde with single drinke <br />Ile spend a farthing muse; some watry verse <br />Will serve the turne to cast upon his hearse; <br />If any cannot weepe amongst us here <br />Take off his pott, and so squeeze out a tear: <br />Weepe, O his cheeses, weepe till yee bee good, <br />Yee that are dry or in the sun have stood; <br />In mossy coats und rusty liveries mourne, <br />Untill like him to ashes you shall turne: <br />Weep, O ye barrells, lett your drippings fall <br />In trickling streams: make waste more prodigal <br />Than when our drinke is badde, that John may flote <br />To Styx in beere, and lift upp Charon's boate <br />With wholesome waves. And as our conduits run <br />With clarett at a Coronation, <br />So lett our channells flow with single tiffe, <br />For John, I hope, is crownde: take off your whiffe, <br />Yee men of Rosemary: Now drinke off all, <br />Remembring 'tis a Butler's funeral: <br /> Had he bin master of good double beere, <br /> My life for his, John Dawson had beene here.<br /><br />William Strode<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/on-john-dawson-butler-of-c-c/
