Such Is The Voyage Of Italy, With
Instructions Concerning Travel, By Richard Lassels, Gent., Who
"Travelled Through Italy Five Times, As Tutor To Several Of The English
Nobility And Gentry."[314] Lassels, In Reciting The Benefits Of Travel,
Plays Upon That Growing Sensitiveness Of The Country Gentleman About His
Innocent Peculiarities:
"The Country Lord that never saw anybody but his
Father's Tenants and M. Parson, and never read anything but
John Stow,
and Speed; thinks the Land's-end to be the World's-end; and that all
solid greatness, next unto a great Pasty, consists in a great Fire, and
a great estate;" or, "My Country gentleman that never travelled, can
scarce go to London without making his Will, at least without wetting
his hand-kerchief."[315]
The Grand Tour, of course, is the remedy for these
weaknesses - especially under the direction of a wise governor. More care
should go to choosing that governor than to any other retainer. For
lacqueys and footmen "are like his Galoshooes, which he leaves at the
doors of those he visits," but his governor is like his shirt, always
next him, and should therefore be of the best material. The revelation
of bad governors in Lassels' instructions are enough to make one recoil
from the Grand Tour altogether. These "needy bold men" led pupils to
Geneva, where the pupils lost all their true English allegiance and
respect for monarchy; they kept them in dull provincial cities where the
governor's wife or mistress happened to live.
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