Dizes la verdad y tienes razon,

El uno es puto, el otro ladron.

Englished thus: -

Beneath the Sun ther's no such man
As is the Spaniard and Italian.

The Frenchman answers:

Thou tell'st the truth, and reason hast,

The first's a Theef, a Buggerer the last.

Touching their women, nature hath made a more visible distinction twixt the two sexes here, then else where; for the men for the most part are swarthy and rough, but the women are made of a far finer mould, they are commonly little; and whereas there is a saying that to make a compleat woman, let her be English to the neck, French to the wast, and Dutch below; I may adde for hands and feet let her be Spanish, for they have the least of any. They have another saying, a Frenchwoman in a dance, a Dutchwoman in the kitchin, an Italian in a window, an Englishwoman at board, and the Spanish abed. When they are maried they have a priviledge to wear high shooes, and to paint, which is generally practised here, and the Queen useth it her self. They are coy enough, but not so froward as our English, for if a Lady goe along the street, (and all women going here vaild and their habit so generally like, one can hardly distinguish a Countesse from a coblers wife) if one should cast out an odde ill sounding word, and aske her a favor, she will not take it ill, but put it off and answer you with some witty retort. After 30. they are commonly past child-bearing, and I have seen women in England look as youthfull at 50. as here at 25. Money will do miracles here in purchasing the favor of Ladies, or anything els, though this be the Countrey of money, for it furnisheth well-near all the world besides, yea their very enemies, as the Turk and Hollander; insomuch that one may say the Coyn of Spain is as Catholic as her King. Yet though he be the greatest King of gold and silver Mines in the world, (I think) yet the common currant Coyn here is copper, and herein I beleeve the Hollander hath done him more mischief by counterfeiting his copper coins, then by their arms, bringing it in by strange surreptitious wayes, as in hollow sows of tin and lead, hollow masts, in pitch buckets under water and other wayes. But I fear to be

injurious to this great King to speak of him in so narrow a compasse, a great King indeed, though the French in a slighting way compare his Monarchy to a Beggars cloak made up of patches; they are patches indeed, but such as he hath not the like: The East Indies is a patch embroyderd with Pearl, Rubies, and Diamonds: Peru is a patch embroyderd with massy gold, Mexico with silver, Naples & Milan are patches of cloth of Tissue, and if these patches were in one peece, what would become of his cloak embroyderd with Flower deluces?

So desiring your Lopp. to pardon this poor imperfect paper, considering the high quality of the subject, I rest

Your Lopps. most humble Servitor,

J. H.

WISHES.

TO HIS SUPPOSED MISTRESS.

BY RICHARD CRASHAW,

[RICHARD CRASHAW, English poet, and high-churchman ending as Catholic, was born at London in 1613 of an acridly Puritan family (compare the curiously similar case of Newman). He graduated at Pembroke College, Cambridge, in 1634, but became fellow of Peterhouse in 1637; meantime (1634) publishing a volume of Latin religious verses, "Epigrammatium Sacrorum Liber." He became a close friend of Cowley; but when the latter fled to Oxford for safety in 1643. Crashaw remained, refused to take the Covenant imposed on account of the Scotch alliance, and was deprived of his fellowship. Escaping to France, he joined the Roman Church, went to Italy, and through Henrietta Maria's influence was made secretary to Cardinal Palotta; but denouncing the scandalous behavior of the Cardinal's retinue, drew such prospect of vengeance on himself that the Cardinal made him in 1650 a canon at Loretto, where he "died" in less than three weeks. His poems had been collected during his exile as "Steps to the Temple" (religious) and "The Delights of the Muses" (secular); and after his death the later ones were collected as "Carmen Deo Nostro." Crashaw was nearly as all-accomplished as Suckling: artist, musician, engraver, and a master of Greek, Latin, Italian, and Spanish.]

WHOE'ER she be,

That not impossible she

That shall command my heart and me;

Where'er she lie,

Locked up from mortal eye,

In shady leaves of Destiny;

Till that ripe birth

Of studied Fate stand forth,

And teach her fair steps tread our Earth;

Tresses, that wear

Jewels, but to declare

How much themselves more precious are..

Days, that need borrow

No part of their good morrow,

From a forespent night of sorrow.

Days, that in spite

Of darkness, by the light

Of a clear mind are day all night.

Life, that dares send

A challenge to his end,

And when it comes say, Welcome, friend!..

Poet and Saint! to thee alone are given

The two most sacred names of earth and Heaven,

The hard and rarest union which can be,

Next that of godhead with humanity.

Long did the muses banished slaves abide,

And built vain pyramids to mortal pride;

Like Moses thou (though spells and charms withstand) Hast brought them nobly home back to their Holy Land.

Ah wretched we, poets of earth! but thou
Wert living the same poet which thou'rt now.
Whilst angels sing to thee their airs divine,
And joy in an applause so great as thine,
Equal society with them to hold,

Thou need'st not make new songs, but say the old.
And they (kind spirits!) shall all rejoice to see
How little less than they, exalted man may be.

Thy spotless muse, like Mary, did contain
The boundless godhead; she did well disdain
That her eternal verse employed should be
On a less subject than eternity;

And for a sacred mistress scorned to take

But her whom God himself scorned not his spouse to make It (in a kind) her miracle did do;

A fruitful mother was, and virgin too.

How well, blest swan, did fate contrive thy death;

And make thee render up thy tuneful breath

In thy great mistress' arms, thou most divine
And richest offering of Lorretto's shrine
Where like some holy sacrifice t' expire

A fever burns thee, and love lights the fire.
Angels (they say) brought the famed chapel there,
And bore the sacred load in triumph through the air.
"Tis surer much they brought thee there, and they,
And thou, their charge, went singing all the way.
Pardon, my mother church, if I consent
That angels led him when from thee he went,
For even in error sure no danger is

When joined with so much piety as his.

Ah, mighty God, with shame I speak't, and grief,
Ah that our greatest faults were in belief!
And our weak reason were even weaker yet,
Rather than thus our wills too strong for it.
His faith perhaps in some nice tenets might
Be wrong; his life, I'm sure, was in the right.
And I myself a Catholic will be.

So far at least, great saint, to pray to thee.