a weaken'd and decay'd life, let your own imaginations place before your eyes a true picture, in that of a hand trembling in almoft iis lateft hour, of a body emaciated with pains, yet struggling for your entertainment; and let this affecting picture open each tender heart, and call forth a melting tear, to blot out whatever failings may be found in a work begun in pain, and finished almoft at the fame period with life.

It was thought proper, by the friends of the deceased, that this little piece fhould come into your hands as it came from the hands of the author; it being judged that you would be better pleased to have an opportunity of observing the fainteft traces of a genius you have long admired, than have it patched by a different hand; by which means the marks of its true author might have been effaced.

That the success of this laft written, tho' first published volume, of the author's pofthumous pieces, may be attended with fome convenience to those innocents he hath left behind, will, no doubt, be a motive to encourage its circulation through the kingdom, which will engage every future genius to exert itself for your pleasure.

THE

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HERE would not, perhaps, be a more pleafant, or profitable study, among those which have their principal end in amufement, than that of travels or voyages, if they were writ, as they might be, and ought to be, with a joint view to the entertainment and information of mankind. If the converfation of travellers be fo eagerly fought after as it is, we may believe their books will be still more agreeable company, as they will, in general, be more instructive and more entertaining.

But when I fay the converfation of travellers is ufually fo welcome, I muit be understood to mean that only of fuch as have had good fenfe enough to apply their peregrinations to a proper ufe, fo as to acquire from them a real and valuable knowledge of men and things; both. which are best known by comparifon. If the customs and manners of men were every where the fame, there would be no office fo dull as that of a traveller; for the difference of hills, valleys, rivers; in hort, the various views in which we may fee the face of the earth, would fcarce afford him a pleasure worthy of his la bour; and furely it would give him very little opportunity of communicating any kind of entertainment or improvement to others.

To make a traveller an agreeable companion to a man of fenfe, it is neceffary, not only that he fhould have feen much, but that he should have overlooked much of what he hath feen. Nature is not, any more than a great genius, always admirable in her productions, and therefore the traveller, who may be called her commentator, fhould not expect to find every where fubjects worthy of his notice.

It is certain, indeed, that one may be guilty of omiflion as well as of the oppofite extreme : but a fault on that fide will be more eafily pardoned, as it is better to be hungry than furfeited, and to mifs your deffert at the table of a man whofe gardens abound with the choiceft fruits, than to have your tafte affronted with every fort of trash that can be picked up at the green-ftall, or the wheel-barrow.

If we should carry on the analogy between the traveller and the commentator, it is impoffible to keep one's eye a moment off from the laborious much read doctor Zachary Grey, of whose redundant notes on Hudibras I fhall only fay, that it is, I am confident, the fingle book extant in which above five hundred authors are quoted, not one of which could be found in the collection of the late doctor Mead.

As there are few things which a traveller is to record, there are fewer on which he is to offer his obfervations: this is the office of the reader, and it is fo pleafant a one, that he feldom chufes to have it taken from him, under the pretence of lending him affiftance. Some occafions, indeed, there are, when proper obfervations are pertinent, and others when they are neceffary; but good fenfe alone must point them

at

out, I fhall lay down only one general rule, which I believe to be of univerfal truth between d relator and hearer, as it is between author and " reader; this is, that the latter never forgive any obfervation or the former which doth not convey fome knowledge that they are fenfible they could not poffibly have attained to themselves.

But all his pains in collecting knowledge, alf his judgment in felecting, and all his art in communicating it, will not fuffice, unless he can make himfelf, in fome degree, an agreeable, as well as an inftru&tive companion. The highest inftruction we can derive from the tedious tale of a dull fellow scarce ever pays us for our at tention. There is nothing, I think, half fo valuable as knowledge, and yet there is nothing which men will give themselves fo little trouble to attain; unless it be, perhaps, that loweft degree of it which is the object of curiofity, and which hath therefore that active paffion conftantly employed in its fervice. This, indeed, it is in the power of every traveller to gratify; but it is the leading principle in weak minds only.

To render his relation agreeable to the man of fenfe, it is therefore neceffary that the voyager fhould poffefs feveral eminent and rare talents; fo rare, indeed, that it is almoft wonderful to fee them ever united in the fame perfon.

And if all thefe talents must concur in the relator, they are certainly in a more eminent degree neceffary to the writer: for here the narration admits of higher ornaments of ftile, and every fact and fentiment offers itself to the fulleft and moft deliberate examination.

It would appear therefore, I think, "fomewhat

A

frange, if fuch writers as thefe fhould be found extremely common; fince nature hath been a moft parfimonious diftributer of her richest talents, and hath feldom beftowed many on the fame perfon. But on the other hand, why there should fcarce exift a fingle writer of this kind, worthy our regard; and whilft there is no other branch of history (for this is hiftory) which hath not exercifed the greatest pens, why this alone should be overlooked by all men of great genius and erudition, and delivered up to the Goths and Vandals as their lawful property, is altogether as difficult to determine.

And yet that this is the cafe, with fome very few exceptions, is moft manifeft. Of thefe I thall willingly admit Burnet and Addifon; if the former was not perhaps to be confidered as a political effayift, and the latter as a commentator on the claffics, rather than as a writer of travels; which laft title perhaps they would both of them have been least ambitious to affect.

Indeed if these two, and two or three more, should be removed from the maffe, there would remain fuch a heap of dulnefs behind, that the appellation of voyage-writer would not appear very defirable.

I am not here unapprized that old Homer himfelf is by fome confidered as a voyage-writer; and indeed the beginning of his Odyffy may be urged to countenance that opinion, which I shall not controvert. But whatever fpecies of writing the Odyffy is of, it is furely at the head of that fpecies, as much as the Iliad is of another; and fo far the excellent Longinus would allow, I believe, at this day.

But, in reality, the Odyffy, the Telemachus,