At what time King Pyrrhus
>> note 1 came
into Italy, after he had surveyed the marshaling
of the army which the Romans sent against
him, "I wot
>> note 2 not," said
he, "what barbarous men these are (for so were the Grecians wont
>> note 3 to
call all strange nations), but the disposition of this army which I see is
nothing
>> note 4 barbarous." So
said the Grecians of that which Flamininus
>> note 5 sent
into their country, and Philip, viewing from a tower the order and distribution
of the Roman camp in his kingdom under Publius Sulpicius Galba. Lo how a
man ought to take heed lest he overweeningly follow vulgar opinions, which
should be measured by the rule of reason, and not by the common report.
I have had a long time dwelling with me
a man who for the space of ten or twelve
years had dwelt in that other world which
in our age was lately discovered, in those
parts where Villegaignon
>> note 6 first
landed and surnamed Antarctic France. This
discovery of so infinite and vast a country
seemeth worthy great consideration. I wot
not whether I can warrant myself
>> note 7 that
some other be not discovered hereafter,
sithence
>> note 8 so
many worthy men, and better learned than
we are, have so many ages been deceived
in this. I fear me our eyes be greater
than our bellies, and that we have more
curiosity than capacity. We embrace all,
but we fasten
>> note 9 nothing
but wind.
This servant I had was a simple and rough-hewn
fellow: a condition fit to yield a true testimony.
For subtle people may indeed mark more curiously
>> note 10 and
observe things more exactly, but they amplify
and gloze
>> note 11 them;
and, the better to persuade and make their
interpretations of more validity, they
cannot choose but somewhat alter the story.
They never represent things truly, but
fashion and mask them according to the
visage they saw them in; and to purchase
credit to their judgment and draw you on
to believe them, they commonly adorn, enlarge,
yea, and hyperbolize
>> note 12 the
matter. Wherein is required either a most
sincere reporter or a man so simple that
he may have no invention to build upon
and to give a true likelihood unto false
devices,
>> note 13 and
be not wedded to his own will. Such a one
was my man, who, besides his own report,
hath many times showed me divers mariners
and merchants whom he had known in that
voyage. So am I pleased with his information
that I never inquire what cosmographers
say of it. We had need of topographers
to make us particularly narrations of the
places they have been in. For some of them,
if they have the advantage of us that they
have seen Palestine, will challenge
>> note 14 a
privilege to tell us news of all the world
besides. I would have every man write what
he knows, and no more: not only in that,
but in all other subjects. For one may
have particular knowledge of the nature
of one river and experience of the quality
of one fountain, that in other things knows
no more than another man: who nevertheless,
to publish this little scantling,
>> note 15 will
undertake to write of all the physics.
>> note 16 From
which vice proceed divers great inconveniences.
Now (to
return to my purpose) I find (as far as I
have been informed) there is nothing in that
nation
>> note 17 that
is either barbarous or savage, unless men
call that barbarism which is not common
to them. As indeed we have no other aim
>> note 18 of
truth and reason than the example and idea
of the opinions and customs of the country
we live in. There
>> note 19 is
ever perfect religion, perfect policy,
perfect and complete use of all things.
They
>> note 20 are
even savage, as we call those fruits wild
which nature of herself and of her ordinary
progress hath produced; whereas indeed
they are those which ourselves have altered
by our artificial devices and diverted
from their common order, we should rather
term savage. In those
>> note 21 are
the true and most profitable virtues, and
natural properties most lively and vigorous,
which in these we have bastardized, applying
them to the pleasure of our corrupted taste.
And if, notwithstanding, in divers fruits
of those countries that were never tilled,
we shall find that in respect of ours they
are most excellent and as delicate unto
our taste, there is no reason art should
gain the point of honor of our great and
puissant mother Nature. We have so much
by our inventions surcharged
>> note 22 the
beauties and riches of her works that we
have altogether overchoked
>> note 23 her.
Yet wherever her purity shineth she makes
our vain and frivolous exercises wonderfully
ashamed.
>> note 24
Ivies spring better of their own accord,
Unhaunted
>> note 25 plots
much fairer trees afford,
Birds by no art much sweeter notes record.
Propertius,
>> note 26 Elegies I.ii.10–12
All our endeavor or wit cannot so much as
reach to represent the nest of the least
birdlet, its contexture, beauty, profit,
and use, no nor the web of a silly
>> note 27 spider. "All
things," saith Plato, "are produced
either by nature, by fortune, or by art:
the greatest and fairest by one or other
of the two first, the least and imperfect
by the last" [Laws X]. Those
nations seem, therefore, so barbarous unto
me, because they have received very little
fashion from human wit and are yet near
their original naturality. The laws of
nature do yet command them, which are but
little bastardized by ours; and that with
such purity as I am sometime grieved the
knowledge of it came no sooner to light,
at what time there were men that better
than we could have judged of it. I am sorry
Lycurgus
>> note 28 and
Plato had it not: for meseemeth that what in those nations we see by experience
doth not only exceed all the pictures wherewith licentious poesy
>> note 29 hath
proudly embellished the Golden Age, and all her quaint inventions to feign
a happy condition of man, but also the conception and desire of philosophy.
They could not imagine a genuity
>> note 30 so
pure and simple as we see it by experience, nor ever believe our society
might be maintained with so little art and human combination. It is a nation,
would I answer Plato, that hath no kind of traffic,
>> note 31 no
knowledge of letters, no intelligence
>> note 32 of
numbers, no name of magistrate nor of politic superiority, no use of service,
of riches or of poverty, no contracts, no successions, no partitions, no
occupation but idle, no respect of kindred but common, no apparel but natural,
no manuring
>> note 33 of
lands, no use of wine, corn,
>> note 34 or
metal. The very words that import lying, falsehood, treason, dissimulations,
covetousness, envy, detraction, and pardon, were never heard of amongst them.
How dissonant would he find his imaginary commonwealth from this perfection!
Nature at first uprise,
These manners did devise.
Virgil, Georgics II.20
Furthermore, they live in a country of so
exceeding pleasant and temperate situation
that, as my testimonies have told me, it
is very rare to see a sick body amongst them;
and they have further assured me they never
saw any man there either shaking with the
palsy, toothless, with eyes dropping, or
crooked and stooping through age. They are
seated alongst the seacoast, encompassed
toward the land with huge and steepy mountains,
having between both a hundred leagues or
thereabout of open and champain
>> note 35 ground.
They have great abundance of fish and flesh
that have no resemblance at all with ours,
and eat them without any sauces or skill
of cookery, but plain boiled or broiled.
The first man that brought a horse thither,
although he had in many other voyages conversed
>> note 36 with
them, bred so great a horror in the land
that before they could take notice of him
they slew him with arrows.
Their buildings are very long, and able
to contain two or three hundred souls, covered
with barks of great trees, fastened in the
ground at one end, interlaced and joined
close together by the tops, after the manner
of some of our granges;
>> note 37 the
covering whereof hangs down to the ground,
and steadeth them as a flank.
>> note 38 They
have a kind of wood so hard that, riving
and cleaving the same, they make blades,
swords, and gridirons to broil their meat
with. Their beds are of a kind of cotton
cloth, fastened to the house roof, as our
ship cabins. Everyone hath his several
>> note 39 couch;
for the women lie from
>> note 40 their
husbands.
They rise with the sun, and feed for all
day as soon as they are up, and make no more
meals after that. They drink not at meat
(as Suidas
>> note 41 reporteth
of some other people of the East which
drank after meals), but drink many times
a day, and are much given to pledge carouses.
Their drink is made of a certain root,
and much of the color of our claret wines,
which lasteth but two or three days. They
drink it warm. It hath somewhat a sharp
taste, wholesome for the stomach, nothing
heady, but laxative for such as are not
used unto it, yet very pleasing to such
as are accustomed to it. Instead of bread,
they use a certain white composition, like
unto corianders confected. I have eaten
some, the taste whereof is somewhat sweet
and wallowish.
>> note 42
They spend the whole day in dancing. Their
young men go ahunting after wild beasts with
bows and arrows. Their women busy themselves
therewhilst with warming of their drink,
which is their chiefest office.
>> note 43 Some
of their old men, in the morning before
they go to eating, preach in common to
all the household, walking from one end
of the house to the other, repeating one
selfsame sentence many times, till he have
ended his turn (for the buildings are a
hundred paces in length). He commends but
two things unto his auditory: first, valor
against their enemies; then lovingness
unto their wives. They never miss (for
their restraint
>> note 44)
to put men in mind of this duty, that it
is their wives which keep their drink lukewarm
and well-seasoned. The form of their beds,
cords, swords, blades, and wooden bracelets
(wherewith they cover their hand-wrists
when they fight), and great canes, open
at one end (by the sound of which they
keep time and cadence in their dancing),
are in many places to be seen, and namely
in mine own house. They are shaven all
over, much more close and cleaner than
we are, with no other razors than of wood
or stone. They believe their souls to be
eternal, and those that have deserved well
of their gods to be placed in that part
of heaven where the sun riseth, and the
cursed toward the west, in opposition.
They have certain prophets and priests,
which commonly abide in the mountains,
and very seldom show themselves unto the
people. But when they come down, there
is a great feast prepared and a solemn
assembly of many townships together. (Each
grange as I have described maketh a village,
and they are about a French league one
from another.) The prophet speaks to the
people in public, exhorting them to embrace
virtue and follow their duty. All their
moral discipline containeth but these two
articles: first, an undismayed resolution
in war; then an inviolable affection to
their wives. He doth also prognosticate
of things to come, and what success they
shall hope for in their enterprises. He
either persuadeth or dissuadeth them from
war; but if he chance to miss of his divination,
and that it succeed
>> note 45 otherwise
than he foretold them, if he be taken he
is hewn in a thousand pieces, and condemned
for a false prophet. And therefore he that
hath once misreckoned himself is never
seen again.
Divination is the gift of God, the abusing
whereof should be a punishable imposture.
When the divines amongst the Scythians
>> note 46 had
foretold an untruth, they were couched
along upon hurdles
>> note 47 full
of heath or brushwood, drawn by oxen, and
so, manacled hand and foot, burned to death.
Those which manage matter subject to the
conduct of men's sufficiency
>> note 48 are
excusable, although they show the utmost of their skill. But those that gull
and cony-catch
>> note 49 us
with the assurance of an extraordinary faculty, and which is beyond our knowledge,
ought to be double punished: first, because they perform not the effect of
their promise; then for the rashness of their imposture and unadvisedness
of their fraud.
They war against the nations that lie beyond
their mountains, to which they go naked,
having no other weapons than bows or wooden
swords, sharp at one end as our broaches
>> note 50 are.
It is an admirable
>> note 51 thing
to see the constant resolution of their
combats, which never end but by effusion
of blood and murder: for they know not
what fear or routs are. Every victor brings
home the head of the enemy he hath slain
as a trophy of his victory, and fasteneth
the same at the entrance of his dwelling
place. After they have long time used and
treated their prisoners well, and with
all commodities
>> note 52 they
can devise, he that is the master of them,
summoning a great assembly of his acquaintance,
tieth a cord to one of the prisoner's
arms, by the end whereof he holds him fast,
with some distance from him, for fear he
might offend
>> note 53 him,
and giveth the other arm, bound in like manner, to the dearest friend he
hath, and both in the presence of all the assembly kill him with swords:
which done, they roast and then eat him in common, and send some slices of
him to such of their friends as are absent. It is not, as some imagine, to
nourish themselves with it (as anciently the Scythians
>> note 54 wont
to do), but to represent an extreme and inexpiable revenge.
Which we prove thus: Some of them perceiving
the Portugals, who had confederated themselves
with their adversaries, to use another kind
of death when they took them prisoners — which
was to bury them up to the middle, and against
the upper part of the body to shoot arrows,
and then being almost dead, to hang them
up — they supposed that these people
of the other world (as they who had sowed
the knowledge of many vices among their neighbors,
and were much more cunning in all kinds of
evils and mischief than they) undertook not
this manner of revenge without cause, and
that consequently it was more smartful
>> note 55 and
cruel than theirs, and thereupon began to leave their old fashion to follow
this.
I am not sorry we note the barbarous horror
of such an action, but grieved that, prying
so narrowly into their faults, we are so
blinded in ours. I think there is more barbarism
in eating men alive than to feed upon them
being dead; to mangle by tortures and torments
a body full of lively sense, to roast him
in pieces, to make dogs and swine to gnaw
and tear him in mammocks
>> note 56 (as
we have not only read but seen very lately,
>> note 57 yea
and in our own memory, not amongst ancient
enemies but our neighbors and fellow-citizens;
and, which is worse, under pretense of
piety and religion), than to roast and
eat him after he is dead.
Chrysippus
>> note 58 and
Zeno, archpillars of the Stoic sect, have
supposed that it was no hurt at all, in
time of need and to what end soever, to
make use of our carrion bodies and to feed
upon them, as did our forefathers, who,
being besieged by Caesar in the city of
Alexia, resolved to sustain the famine
of the siege with the bodies of old men,
women, and other persons unserviceable
and unfit to fight.
Gascons
>> note 59 (as
fame reports)
Lived with meats of such sorts.
Juvenal, Satires XV.93–94
And physicians
>> note 60 fear
not, in all kinds of compositions availful
for our health, to make use of it, be it
for outward or inward applications. But
there was never any opinion found so unnatural
and immodest that would excuse treason,
treachery, disloyalty, tyranny, cruelty,
and suchlike, which are our ordinary faults.
We may then well call them barbarous in
regard of reason's rules, but not in
respect of us that exceed them in all kind
of barbarism. Their wars are noble and generous,
and have as much excuse and beauty as this
human infirmity may admit: they aim at nought
so much, and have no other foundation amongst
them, but the mere jealousy of virtue.
>> note 61 They
contend not for the gaining of new lands;
for to this day they yet enjoy that natural
uberty
>> note 62 and
fruitfulness which without laboring toil
doth in such plenteous abundance furnish
them with all necessary things that they
need not enlarge their limits. They are
yet in that happy estate as they desire
no more than what their natural necessities
direct them: whatsoever is beyond it, is
to them superfluous. Those that are much
about one age do generally inter-call one
another brethren, and such as are younger
they call children, and the aged are esteemed
as fathers to all the rest. These leave
this full possession of goods in common
and without division to their heirs, without
other claim or title but that which nature
doth plainly impart unto all creatures,
even as she brings them into the world.
If their neighbors chance to come over
the mountains to assail or invade them,
and that they get the victory over them,
the victors' conquest is glory, and
the advantage to be and remain superior
in valor and virtue; else they have nothing
to do with the goods and spoils of the
vanquished, and so return into their country,
where they neither want any necessary thing
nor lack this great portion,
>> note 63 to
know how to enjoy their condition happily, and are contented with what nature
affordeth them. So do these when their turn cometh. They require no other
ransom of their prisoners but an acknowledgment and confession that they
are vanquished. And in a whole age a man shall not find one that doth not
rather embrace death than either by word or countenance remissly to yield
one jot of an invincible courage. There is none seen that would not rather
be slain and devoured than sue for life or show any fear. They use their
prisoners with all liberty, that they may so much the more hold their lives
dear and precious, and commonly entertain them with threats of future death,
with the torments they shall endure, with the preparations intended for that
purpose, with mangling and slicing of their members, and with the feast that
shall be kept at their charge.
>> note 64 All
which is done to wrest some remiss
>> note 65 and
exact some faint-yielding speech of submission from them, or to possess them
with a desire to escape and run away; that so they may have the advantage
to have daunted and made them afraid, and to have forced
>> note 66 their
constancy. For certainly true victory consisteth in that only point.
No conquest such, as to suppress
Foes' hearts, the conquest to confess.
Claudian, Panegyric on the Sixth Consulate
of Honorius, 248–49
>> note 67
These prisoners, howsoever they are dealt
withal, are so far from yielding that, contrariwise,
during two or three months that they are
kept, they ever carry a cheeerful countenance,
and urge their keepers to hasten their trial;
they outrageously defy and injure
>> note 68 them.
They upbraid them with their cowardliness,
and with the number of battles they have
lost against theirs. I have a song made
by a prisoner, wherein is this clause: "Let
them boldly come all together and flock
in multitudes to feed on him; for with
him they shall feed upon their fathers
and grandfathers, that heretofore have
served his body for food and nourishment.
These muscles (saith he), this flesh, and
these veins, are your own; fond
>> note 69 men
as you are, know you not that the substance of your forefathers' limbs
is yet tied unto ours? Taste them well, for in them you shall find the relish
of your own flesh." An invention that hath no show of barbarism. Those
that paint them dying, and that represent this action when they are put to
execution, delineate the prisoners spitting in their executioners' faces
and making mows
>> note 70 at
them. Verily, so long as breath is in their body, they never cease to brave
and defy them, both in speech and countenance. Surely, in respect of us these
are very savage men: for either they must be so in good sooth,
>> note 71 or
we must be so indeed. There is a wondrous distance between their form and
ours.
Their men have many wives, and by how much
more they are reputed valiant, so much the
greater is their number. The manner and beauty
in their marriages is wondrous strange and
remarkable: for the same jealousy our wives
have to keep us from the love and affection
of other women, the same have theirs to procure
it. Being more careful for their husbands' honor
and content than of anything else, they endeavor
and apply all their industry to have as many
rivals as possibly they can, forasmuch as
it is a testimony of their husbands' virtue.
>> note 72 Our
women would count it a wonder, but it is not so. It is a virtue properly
matrimonial, but of the highest kind. And in the Bible, Leah, Rachel, Sarah,
>> note 73 and
Jacob's wives brought their fairest maiden-servants unto their husbands' beds.
And Livia seconded the lustful appetites of Augustus, to her great prejudice.
And Stratonice, the wife of King Deiotarus, did not only bring a most beauteous
chambermaid, that served her, to her husband's bed, but very carefully
brought up the children he begot on her, and by all possible means aided
and furthered them to succeed in their father's royalty. And lest a man
should think that all this is done by a simple and servile or awful
>> note 74 duty
unto their custom, and by the impression of their ancient custom's authority,
without discourse or judgment, and because they are so blockish and dull-spirited
that they can take no other resolution, it is not amiss we allege some evidence
of their sufficiency.
>> note 75 Besides
what I have said of one of their warlike songs, I have another amorous canzonet,
>> note 76 which
beginneth in this sense: "Adder, stay; stay, good adder, that my sister
may by the pattern of thy parti-colored coat draw the fashion and work of
a rich lace for me to give unto my love; so may thy beauty, thy nimbleness
or disposition be ever preferred before all other serpents." The first
couplet is the burden
>> note 77 of
the song. I am so conversant with poesy that I may judge this invention hath
no barbarism at all in it, but is altogether Anacreontic.
>> note 78 Their
language is a kind of pleasant speech, and hath a pleasing sound, and some
affinity with the Greek terminations.
>> note 79
Three of that nation, ignorant how dear
the knowledge of our corruptions will one
day cost their repose, security, and happiness,
and how their ruin shall proceed from this
commerce, which I imagine is already well
advanced (miserable as they are to have suffered
themselves to be so cozened by a desire of
newfangled novelties, and to have quit the
calmness of their climate to come and see
ours), were at Rouen in the time of our late
King Charles the Ninth, who talked with them
a great while. They were showed our fashions,
our pomp, and the form of a fair city. Afterward
some demanded their advice,
>> note 80 and
would needs know of them what things of
note and admirable they had observed amongst
us. They answered three things, the last
of which I have forgotten, and am very
sorry for it; the other two I yet remember.
They said, first, they found it very strange
that so many tall men with long beards,
strong and well-armed, as it were about
the king's person (it is very likely
they meant the Switzers
>> note 81 of
his guard), would submit themselves to obey a beardless child, and that we
did not rather choose one amongst them to command the rest. Secondly (they
have a manner of phrase whereby they call men but a moiety
>> note 82 one
of another), they had perceived there were men amongst us full-gorged with
all sorts of commodities, and others which, hunger-starved and bare with
need and poverty, begged at their gates; and found it strange these moieties
so needy could endure such an injustice, and that they took not the others
by the throat, or set fire on their houses.
I talked a good while with one of them,
but I had so bad an interpreter, and who
did so ill apprehend my meaning, and who
through his foolishness was so troubled to
conceive my imaginations, that I could draw
no great matter from him. Touching that point
wherein I demanded of him what good he received
by the superiority he had amongst his countrymen
(for he was a captain and our mariners called
him king), he told me it was to march foremost
in any charge of war. Further, I asked him,
how many men did follow him. He showed me
a distance of place, to signify they were
as many as might be contained in so much
ground, which I guessed to be about four
or five thousand men. Moreover, I demanded
if, when wars were ended, all his authority
expired; he answered that he had only this
left him, which was that when he went on
progress
>> note 83 and
visited the villages depending of him,
the inhabitants prepared paths and highways
athwart the hedges
>> note 84 of
their woods, for him to pass through at
ease.
All that is not very ill;
>> note 85 but
what of that? They wear no kind of breeches
nor hosen.
>> note 86