Of the influence arising from the relation of strange adventures, we have a striking proof in the character of Othello, who won the affections of his mistress by the detail of his "hair-breadth scapes:"—
"Wherein of antres vast, and desarts idle,
Rough quarries, rocks, and hills whose head touch heaven
It was 'his' hint to speak."[155:D]
It appears, indeed, that the conversation of this period very frequently turned upon the wonderful discoveries of travellers, whose
voyages to, and travels in the New World then occupied much of the public attention. Exaggeration, from a love of importance, too often accompanied these narratives, a licence which our poet has happily ridiculed in the following lines:—
—————————————— "When we were boys,
Who would believe that there were mountaineers
Dew-lapp'd like bulls, whose throats had hanging at them
Wallets of flesh? or that there were such men,