= 'In some of our old dictionaries,
_fid_ is explained to caulk with oakum: figgum, or fig'em, may
therefore be a vulgar derivative from this term, and signify the
lighted flax or tow with which
jugglers
stuff their mouths when
they prepare to amuse the rustics by breathing out smoke and
flames:
--a nut-shell
With tow, and touch-wood in it, to spite fire (5.
Ben Jonson - The Devil's Association
_ 4. 92.
=5. 8. 78 He is the Master of Players.= An evident allusion
to the Puritan attacks on the stage. This was the period of the
renewed literary contest. George Wither had lately published
his _Abuses stript and whipt_, 1613. For the whole subject see
Thompson, E. N. S., _The Controversy between the Puritans and
the Stage_, New York, 1903.
=5. 8. 81 Figgum.
= 'In some of our old dictionaries,
_fid_ is explained to caulk with oakum: figgum, or fig'em, may
therefore be a vulgar derivative from this term, and signify the
lighted flax or tow with which
jugglers
stuff their mouths when
they prepare to amuse the rustics by breathing out smoke and
flames:
--a nut-shell
With tow, and touch-wood in it, to spite fire (5.
3. 4. 5).'
--G.
=5. 8. 86, 7 to such a foole, He makes himselfe.= For the omission of
the relative adverb cf. 1. 3. 34, 35.
=5. 8. 89 To come to dinner, in mee the sinner.= The conception of
this couplet and the lines which Fitzdottrel speaks below was later
elaborated in Cocklorrel's song in the _Gipsies Metamorphosed_.
