The Penguin Book of Dragons by The Penguin Book of Dragons (retail) (epub)

Author:The Penguin Book of Dragons (retail) (epub)
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Published: 2021-10-12T00:00:00+00:00

A FARTING DRAGON BURLESQUE1

The popularity of Spenser’s lofty Christian verses invited parody in the form of humorous and raunchy songs like the anonymous “Dragon of Wantley.” This burlesque first appeared in print in 1685 and remained popular for centuries, inspiring both a successful opera by Henry Carey (1737) and a widely read novel by Owen Wister (1892). The original lyrics made fun of traditional tales of dragon battles, subverting their religious symbolism while adorning them with absurd characters, like an arrogant knight whose spiky armor gave him the appearance of a “porcupig” and a farting dragon the size of the Trojan Horse. While heroes of old typically vanquished their foes with epic sword blows, “The Dragon of Wantley” depicted a rowdy warrior delivering a lethal kick to his flatulent enemy’s “assgut.” As revealed in the final stanza of the song, this dragon’s Achilles’s heel was his anus!

Old stories tell, how Hercules

A dragon slew at Lerna,

With seven heads, and fourteen eyes,

To see and well discern-a:

But he had a club, this dragon to drub,

Or he ne’er had done it, I warrant ye:

But More of More-hall, with nothing at all,

He slew the dragon of Wantley.2

This dragon had two furious wings,

Each one upon each shoulder;

With a sting in his tayl, as long as a flayl,

Which made him bolder and bolder.

He had long claws, and in his jaws

Four and forty teeth of iron;

With a hide as tough, as any buff,

Which did him round environ.3

Have you not heard how the Trojan horse

Held seventy men in his belly?

This dragon was not quite so big,

But very near, I’ll tell ye.

Devoured he poor children three,

That could not with him grapple;

And at one sup he eat them up,

As one would eat an apple.

All sorts of cattle this dragon would eat,

Some say he ate up trees,

And that the forests sure he would

Devour up by degrees:

For houses and churches were to him geese and turkies;

He ate all, and left none behind,

But some stones, dear Jack, that he could not crack,

Which on the hills you will find.

In Yorkshire, near fair Rotherham,4

The place I know it well;

Some two or three miles, or thereabouts,

I vow I cannot tell;

But there is a hedge, just on the hill edge,

And Matthew’s house hard by it;

O there and then was this dragon’s den,

You could not chuse but spy it.

Some say, this dragon was a witch;

Some say, he was a devil,

For from his nose a smoke arose,

And with it burning snivel;

Which he cast off, when he did cough,

In a well that he did stand by;

Which made it look, just like a brook

Running with burning brandy.

Hard by a furious knight there dwelt;

Of whom all towns did ring;

For he could wrestle, play at quarter-staff, kick, cuff and huff,

Call son of a whore, do any kind of thing:

By the tail and the main, with his hands twain

He swung a horse till he was dead;

And that which is stranger, he for very anger

Eat him all up but his head.

These children, as I told, being eat;

Men, women, girls, and boys,

Sighing and sobbing, came to

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.