Page:In the dozy hours, and other papers.djvu/20

 6 angry turbulence of men all bent on pulling the world in their own narrow paths. What wonder that Thackeray forgave him many sins for the sake of his leisurely charm and wise philosophy! In fact, James Howell, the "priggish little clerk," was not withheld by his priggishness from relating a host of things which are hardly fit to hear. Those were not reticent days, and men wrote freely about matters which it is perhaps as healthy and as agreeable to let alone. But Howell was nevertheless a sincere Churchman as well as a sincere Royalist. He was sound throughout; and if he lacked the genius and the philosophy of Montaigne, he was his equal in worldly knowledge and in tolerant good temper. He heard, enjoyed, and repeated all the gossip of foreign courts, all the "severe jests" which passed from lip to lip. He loved the beauty of Italy, the wit of France, the spirit of the Netherlands, and the valor of Spain. The first handsome woman that earth ever saw, he tells us, was made of Venice glass, as beautiful and as brittle as are her descendants to-day. Moreover, "Eve spake Italian, when Adam was seduced;" for in that beguiling tongue, in those soft,