This is founded on the following:
"They contain the Histories of the Old and New Testaments, and are placed in two rows one above the other; those that represent the Old Testament are in the uppermost reaching round the room and are sixteen. Those of the new are under them, but being only eight reach not so far as the former, and where no pictures are be the doors to the presses where the sacred vestments are kept."
"Travelling by night not proper to take a view of the adjacent countries, p. 223."
This is a version of the following:
"The heat of the weather made travelling in the night most desirable and we chose it between Sienna and Florence.... By this means I could see little of the country."
"The Duchess dowager of Savoy who was grandmother to the present Duke was mother to his father, p. 243."
This is a perversion of the following perfectly natural observation:
"This was designed by the Dutchess Christina grandmother of this Duke in the minority of her son (his father) in 1660."
The entry, "Jews at Legorn not obliged to wear red hats, p. 223," contains nothing absurd, but rather is an interesting piece of information, because the Jews were obliged to wear these hats in other parts of Italy, and it was the knowledge of this fact that induced Macklin to wear a red hat when acting Shylock, a personation which induced an admirer to exclaim:
"This is the Jew
That Shakespeare drew."
Such perversions as these could have done Bromley, one would think, little harm; but the real harm done consisted in bringing to light and insisting upon the author's political attitude when he referred to King William and Queen Mary as "the Prince and Princess of Orange." The passage is as follows:
"A gallery, where among the pictures of Christian Princes are those of King Charles the Second and his Queen, King James the Second and his Queen and the Prince and Princess of Orange."