Versatile ingenium, The Wittie companion, or Jests of all sorts. From citie and countrie, court and universitie. : With an account of the life of the laughing philosopher Democritus of Abder̀a. / By Democritus Junior.

(382.)

Within one of the Provinces of the United Neatherlands there lived a Mercenary Scribler, who wrote a Pasquil, or Defamatory Libel against the house of Austria, and presented it to the Gover∣nour of the same place, which was a person of the

most ancient Family of Nassaw. The Governour haveing read it, dissembled his displeasure, but with a kind of feigned smile, told him, that his invective was as sharp as could be imagined. Sir, said the Author, I have one in the press, as sharp a∣gain; let me see it, said the Governour; this libel∣lous author, thinking he should be highly rewar∣ded, brought him this second copie; in which was writ, as in the former, a thousand notorious and scandalous lies, not sparing the bespattering of the then virtuous Infanta with lewd reproach and oblo∣quy; not omitting the King, Emperour, &c. The Governor hardly forbearing the concealment of his great indignation, bid him come in the after∣noon, and his reward should be ready: takeing his leave of his Excellency, he returns home to his friends, further fraught with joy and hopes, than an East-India Ship with pepper, comes at the time appointed. He went to wait for his reward, and the Governor hearing of the coming of this Libel∣ler, ordered him to go up such a pair of stairs, and there he should meet with a person should give him his due; coming to the top of the stairs, he was asked, whether he was the man that wrote the Libel, he answered very jollily, That he was the Person that had serv'd his countrey with his pen, though he could not with his Sword: and that he had (he thought) painted the King of Spain, and Emperor to the Life, in their own proper colours: pray, Sir, come in said the other, I have order to give you double recompence; where presently he was seized by half a dozen strong fellows, and being strip'd they gave him forty lashes on the bare back with a cat of nine tails, and were laid on by remembring him, that the first was for the Emperour: The se∣cond for the King of Spain: The third for the Infanta:

And the fourth for Marquis Spinola: And so over with them again, till the number was expired; at which time the Governour came in, and told him, that this punishment was the least of desert, for ab∣useing so Illustrious an House as that of Austria, and that though an enemie, yet should not be ab∣used with the scandalous reproaches of every lying Pamphleter, Let all such, like this, wear their re∣ward on their backs, and not in their purses.