In Reply To His Father's Complaints Of His
Extravagance, He Declares:
"My promised relation of Tuscany your last
letter hath so dashed, as I am resolved not to proceed withal.
"[75] The
journal of Richard Smith, Gentleman, who accompanied Sir Edward Unton
into Italy in 1563, shows how even an ordinary man, not inclined to
writing, conscientiously tried to note the fortifications and fertility
of each province, whether it was "marvellous barren" or "stood chiefly
upon vines"; the principal commodities, and the nature of the
inhabitants: "The people (on the Rhine) are very paynefull and not so
paynefull as rude and sluttyshe." "They are well faced women in most
places of this land, and as ill-bodied."[76]
Besides writing his observations, the traveller laboured earnestly at
modern languages. Many and severe were the letters Cecil wrote to his
son Thomas in Paris on the subject of settling to his French. For
Thomas's tutor had difficulties in keeping his pupil from dog-fights,
horses and worse amusements in company of the Earl of Hertford, who was
a great hindrance to Thomas's progress in the language.[77] Francis
Davison hints that his tour was by no means a pleasure trip, what with
studying Italian, reading history and policy, observing and writing his
"Relation." Indeed, as Lipsius pointed out, it was not easy to combine
the life of a traveller with that of a scholar, "the one being of
necessitie in continual motion, care and business, the other naturally
affecting ease, safety and quietness,"[78] but still, by avoiding
Englishmen, according to our "Directions," and by doggedly conversing
with the natives, one might achieve something.
To live in the household of a learned foreigner, as Robert Sidney did
with Sturm, or Henry Wotton with Hugo Blotz, was of course especially
desirable. For there were still, in the Elizabethans, remnants of that
ardent sociability among humanists which made Englishmen traverse dire
distances of sea and land to talk with some scholar on the Rhine - that
fraternizing spirit which made Cranmer fill Lambeth Palace with Martin
Bucers; and Bishop Gardiner, meanwhile, complain from the Tower not only
of "want of books to relieve my mind, but want of good company - the only
solace in this world."[79] It was still as much of a treat to see a wise
man as it was when Ascham loitered in every city through which he
passed, to hear lectures, or argue about the proper pronunciation of
Greek; until he missed his dinner, or found that his party had ridden
out of town.[80] Advice to travellers is full of this enthusiasm. Essex
tells Rutland "your Lordship should rather go an hundred miles to speake
with one wise man, than five miles to see a fair town." Stradling,
translating Lipsius, urges the Earl of Bedford to "shame not or disdaine
not to intrude yourself into their familiarity." "Talk with learned men,
we unconsciously imitate them, even as they that walke in the sun only
for their recreation, are colored therewith and sunburnt; or rather and
better as they that staying a while in the Apothecarie shop, til their
confections be made, carrie away the smell of the sweet spices even in
their garments."[81]
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