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FRANCIS BACON'S CRYPTIC RHYMES 107
In Flanders by accident a Flemish tiler fell from the top of
a house upon a Spaniard, and killed him, though he escaped
himself. The next of the blood prosecuted with great violence
against the tiler. And when he was offered pecuniary recompence,
nothing would serve him but lex talionis. Whereupon
the judge said to him ;
That if he did urge that kind of sentence,
it must be, that he should go up to the top of the house, and
thence fall down upon the tiler.
The Judge's answer (printed in italics)
abounds in
rhymes and wit :
That if he did urge that kind of sentence,
It must be, that he should go up to the top
house, and thence fall down upon the tiler.
of the
" Thence " rhymes with " sentence," while in the
long line, with its stair-like internal rhymes, one can
actually hear the Spaniard ascending the stairs, to
tumble down suddenly, in an unrhymed
final line :
That if he did urge that kind of sentence,
that he
It must be
to the top
should go up
Fall down upon the tiler.
of the house, and thence
It would be pedantic to find fault with the comic
rhyme "up " to " top," or with the accent which is of
course on the last syllable of sente'nce " in fact who
;
knows but what in Bacon's time, such words derived
and adopted from the French had the accent on the
last syllable
? In comic rhyme it is permissible even to
this day.
Moreover, such an anecdote must be counted
among the humorous stories. It were well, for many
a judge if he always combined such presence of mind