20. A ring found in a fish's belly taken about Gorro; conIceived to be the same wherewith the Duke of Venice had wedded the sea. 21. A neat crucifix made out of the cross bone of a frog's head. 22. A large agath, containing a various and careless figure, which looked upon by a cylinder representeth a perfect centaur. By some such advantages King Pyrrhus might find out Apollo and the nine Muses in those agaths of his whereof Pliny maketh mention. 23. Batrachomyomachia, or the Homerican battle between frogs and mice, neatly described upon the chisel bone of a large pike's jaw. 24. Pyxis Pandora, or a box which held the unguentum pestiferum, which by anointing the garments of several persons begat the great and horrible plague of Milan. 25. A glass of spirits made of æthereal salt, hermetically sealed up, kept continually in quick-silver; of so volatile a nature that it will scarce endure the light, and therefore only to be shewn in winter, or by the light of a carbuncle, or bononian stone. He who knows where all this Apollo. I'm sure I am not he. treasure now is, is a great However, I am, Sir, Yours, &c. Miscellanies. CONCERNING THE TOO NICE CURIOSITY OF CENSURING THE PRESENT, OR JUDGING INTO FUTURE DISPENSATIONS.1 [POSTHUMOUS WORKS, p. 23. MS. SLOAN. 1885 & 1869.] WE E have enough to do rightly to apprehend and consider things as they are, or have been, without amusing ourselves how they might have been otherwise, or what variations, consequences, and differences might have otherwise arisen upon a different face of things, if they had otherwise fallen out in the state or actions of the world. The learned King Alphonso would have had the calf of a man's leg placed before rather than behind: and thinks he could find many commodities from that position. If, in the terraqueous globe, all that now is land had been sea, and all that is sea were land, what wide difference there would be in all things, as to constitution of climes, tides, disparity of navigation, and many other concerns, were a long consideration. If Sertorius had pursued his designs to pass his days in the Fortunate Islands, who can tell but we might have had many noble discoveries of the neighbouring coasts of Africa; and perhaps America had not been so long unknown to us. 1 Concerning, &c.] This most incorrect title I strongly incline to suspect is not genuine. This piece and the following are mere extracts from Sir Thomas's Common Place Book.-Different copies of the first occur in two volumes of MSS. in the Sloanian Collection, from which I have inserted several additional passages. If Nearchus, Admiral to Alexander the Great, setting out from Persia, had sailed about Africa, and come into the Mediterranean, by the straits of Hercules, as was intended, we might have heard of strange things, and had probably a better account of the coast of Africa than was lost by Hanno. If King Perseus had entertained the barbarous nations but stout warriors, which in so great numbers offered their service unto him, some conjecture it might be, that Paulus Emilius had not conquered Macedon. If [Antiochus ?] had followed the counsel of Hannibal, and come about by Gallia upon the Romans, who knows what success he might have had against them? If Scanderbeg had joined his forces with Hunniades, as might have been expected before the battle in the plains of Cossoan, in good probability they might have ruined Mahomet, if not the Turkish empire. It If Alexander had marched westward, and warred with the Romans, whether he had been able to subdue that little but valiant people, is an uncertainty: we are sure he overcame Persia; histories attest, and prophecies foretell the same. was decreed that the Persians should be conquered by Alexander, and his successors by the Romans, in whom Providence had determined to settle the fourth monarchy, which neither Pyrrhus nor Hannibal must prevent; though Hannibal came so near it, that he seemed to miss it by fatal infatuation: which if he had effected, there had been such a traverse and confusion of affairs, as no oracle could have predicted, But the Romans must reign, and the course of things was then moving towards the advent of Christ, and blessed discovery of the Gospel: our Saviour must suffer at Jerusalem, and be sentenced by a Roman judge; St. Paul, a Roman citizen, must preach in the Roman provinces, and St. Peter be Bishop of Rome, and not of Carthage. UPON READING HUDIBRAS. [POSTHUMOUS WORKS, p. 24.] THE way of Burlesque Poems is very ancient, for there was a ludicrous mock way of transferring verses of famous poets into a jocose sense and argument, and they were called ndéar, or Parodia; divers examples of which are to be found in Athenæus. The first inventor hereof was Hipponactes, but Hegemon, Sopater and many more pursued the same vein; so that the Parodies of Ovid's Buffoon, Metamorphoses, Burlesques, Le Eneiade Travastito, are no new inventions, but old fan-✓ cies revived. An excellent Parody there is of both the Scaligers upon an Epigram of Catullus, which Stephens hath set down in his Discourse of Parodies: a remarkable one among the Greeks is that of Matron, in the words and epithets of Homer, describing the feast of Xenocles, the Athenian Rhetorician, to be found in the fourth book of Athenæus, page 134, Edit. Casaub. AN ACCOUNT OF ISLAND, alias ICELAND, IN THE YEAR [POSTHUMOUS WORKS, p. 1.] GREAT store of drift-wood or float-wood, is every year cast up on their shores, brought down by the northern winds, which serveth them for fuel and other uses, the greatest part whereof is fir. Of bears there are none in the country, but sometimes they are brought down from the north upon ice, while they follow seals, and so are carried away. Two in this manner came over and landed in the north of Island, this last year, 1662. No conies or hares, but of foxes great plenty, whose white skins are much desired, and brought over into this country. The last winter, 1662, so cold and lasting with us in England, was the mildest they have had for many years in Island. Two new eruptions, with slime and smoke, were observed the last year in some mountains about Mount Hecla. Some hot mineral springs they have, and very effectual, but they make but rude use thereof. The rivers are large, swift, and rapid, but have many falls, which render them less commodious; they chiefly abound with salmons. They sow no corn, but receive it from abroad. They have a kind of large lichen, which dried, becometh hard and sticky, growing very plentifully in many places; 1 AN ACCOUNT, &c.] The following brief notices respecting Iceland were collected at the request of the Royal Society. They were partly obtained through correspondence with Theodore Jonas, a Lutheran minister, resident in the Is land;-three of whose letters have been preserved in the British Museum. These letters I have preferred to place immediately after the paper to which they relate, rather than in the Correspondence. |
