Alas, our Englishmen are the plainest dealing soules that euer God put life in: they are greedie of newes, and loue to be fed in their humors and heare themselues flattered the best that may be. Euen as Philemon a Comick Poet dyde with extreame laughter at the conceit of seeing an Asse eate fygges: so haue the Italians no such sport, as to see poore English asses how soberly they swallow Spanish figges deuour any hooke baited for them. He is not fit to trauell, that cannot with the Candians liue on serpents, make nourishing foode euen of poyson. Rats and mice engender by licking one another, he must licke, he must croutch, he must cogge, lye and prate, that either in the Court or a forraine Countrey will engender and come to preferment. Bee his feature what it will, if he be faire spoken he winneth frends: Nonformosus erat, sed erat facundus Vlysses; Vlysses the long traueller was not amiable, but eloquent. Some alleadge, they trauell to learne wit, but I am of this opinion, that as it is not possible for anie man to learne the Arte of Memorie, whereof Tully, Quintillian, Seneca, and Hermannus Buschius haue written so manie bookes, except he haue a naturall memorie before: so is it not possible for anie man to attaine anie great wit by trauell, except he haue the grounds of it rooted in him before. That wit which is thereby to be perfected or made stayd, is nothing but Experientia longa malorum; The experience of manie euills: the experience that such a man lost his life by this folly, another by that: such a young Gallant consumed his substance on such a Curtizan: these courses of reuenge a Merchant of Venice tooke against a Merchant of Ferrara: and this poynt of iustice was shewed by the Duke vppon the murtherer. What is heere but wee maye read in bookes and a great deale more too, without stirring our feete out of a warme studie.
Vobis alii ventorum prolia narrent, (saith Ouid) Quasq; Scilla infestat, quasue Charybdis aquas. Let others tell you wonders of the winde, How Scalla or Charybdis is enclinde.
—vos quod quisque loquetur Credite —Beleeue you what they say, but neuer trie.
So let others tell you straunge accidents, treasons, poysonings, close packings in Frounce, Spaine and Italy: it is no harme for you to heare of them, but come not neere them. What is there in Fraunce to be learnd more than in England, but falshood in fellowship, perfect slouenrie, to loue no man but for my pleasure, to sweare Ah par la mort Dieu when a mans hammes are scabd. For the idle Traueller, (I meane not for the Souldiour) I haue knowen some that haue continued there by the space of halfe a dozen yeare, and when they come home, they haue hyd a little weerish leane face vnder a broad French hat, kept a terrible coyle with the dust in the streete in their long cloakes of gray paper, and spoke English strangely. Nought else haue they profited by their trauell, saue learnt to distinguish of the true Burdeaux Grape, and knowe a cup of neate Gascoygne wine, from wine of Orleance : yea and peraduenture this also, to esteeme of the poxe as a pimple, to weare a veluet patch on their face, and walke melancholy with their armes folded.
From Spaine what bringeth our Traueller? a scull cround hat of the fashion of an olde deepe poringer, a diminutiue Aldermans ruffe with shorte strings like the droppings of a mans nose, a close-bellied dublet comming downe with a peake behinde as farre as the crupper, and cut off before by the breast-boane like a partlet or neckercher, a wyde payre of gascoynes which vngatherd would make a couple of womens ryding kyrtles, huge hangers that haue halfe a Cowe hyde in them, a Rapyer that is lineally descended from halfe a dozen Dukes at the least. Let his cloake be as long or as short as you will: if long, it is fac'd with Turkey grogeran raueld; if short, it hath a cape like a calues tung, and is not so deep in his whole length, nor hath so much cloth in it I will iustifie, as onely the standing cape of a Dutchmans cloake. I haue not yet toucht all, for hee hath in eyther shoo as much taffaty for his tyings, as would serue for an ancient: which serueth him (if you will haue the mysterie of it) of the owne accord for a shoo-rag. A souldior and a braggart he is (thats concluded) he ietteth strouting, dancing on his toes with his hands vnder his sides. If you talke with him, hee makes a dish-cloath of his owne Countrey in comparison of Spaine; but if you vrge him more particularly wherein it exceeds, hee can giue no instance, but in Spaine they haue better bread than any we haue: when (poore hungry slaues) they may crumble it into water wel enough and make misons with it, for they haue not a good morsell of meate except it bee salt pilchers to eate with it al the yere long: and which is more, they are poore beggers, and lye in foule straw euery night.
Italy the paradice of the earth, and the Epicures heauen, how doth it forme our yong master? It makes him to kisse his hand like an ape, cringe his neck like a starueling, and play at hey passe repasse come aloft when hee salutes a man. From thence he brings the art of atheisme, the art of epicurising, the art of whoring, the art of poysoning, the art of Sodomitrie. The onely probable good thing they haue to keepe vs from vtterly condemning it, is, that it maketh a man an excellent Courtier, a curious carpet knight; which is by interpretation, a fine close leacher, a glorious hypocrite. It is now a priuie note amongst the better sort of men, when they would set a singular marke or brand on a notorious villaine, to say, he hath been in Italy.
With the Dane and the Dutchman I will not encounter, for they are simple honest men, that with Danaus daughters do nothing but fill bottomles tubs, & wil be drunk & snort in the midst of dinner: he hurts himselfe onely that goes thether, hee cannot lightly be damnd, for the vintners, the brewers, the malt-men and alewiues praye for him. Pitch and pay, they will play all day: score and borrow, they will wysh him much sorrowe. But lightly a man is nere the better for their praiers, for they commit al deadly sinne for the most part of them in mingling their drinke, the vintners in the highest degree.
Why iest I in such a necessary perswasiue discourse? I am a banisht exile from my countrie, though nere linkt in consanguinitie to the best: an Earle borne by birth, but a begger now as thou seest. These many yeres in Italy haue I liu'd an outlaw. A while I had a liberall pension of the Pope, but that lasted not, for he continued not: one succeeded him in his chaire, that car'd neither for Englishmen nor his owne countrimen. Then was I driu'n to picke vp my crums amongst the Cardinals, to implore the beneuolence & charitie of al the Dukes of Italy whereby I haue since made a poore shift to liue, but so liue, as I wish my selfe a thousand times dead.
Cumpatriam amisi, tunc me periisse putato. When I was banisht, thinke I caught my bane.
The sea is the natiue soyle to fishes, take fishes from the sea, they take no ioy nor thriue, but perish straight. So likewise the birds remoued from the aire (the abode wherto they were borne) the beasts from the earth, and I from England. Can a lambe take delight to be suckled at the brests of a she-wolfe? I am a lambe nourisht with the milke of wolues, one that with the Ethiopians inhabiting ouer against Meroe, feede on nothing but scorpions: vse is another nature, yet ten times more contentiue, were nature restored to her kingdome from whence shee is excluded. Beleeue mee, no aire, no bread, no fire, no water agree with a man, or dooth him anye good out of his owne countrey. Colde frutes neuer prosper in a hot soile, nor hot in a cold. Let no man for any transitorie pleasure sell away the inheritance of breathing he hath in the place where he was born. Get thee home my yong lad, lay thy bones peaceably in the sepulcher of thy fathers, waxe old in ouerlooking thy grounds, bee at hand to close the eyes of thy kinred. The diuell and I am desperate, he of being restored to heauen, I of being recalled home.