enterprising. He had read, if not studied, the histories of the various countries through which he afterward travelled; and there were few dangers which he was not ready cheerfully to encounter for the gratification of his curiosity. Gibbon complains of his insupportable vanity and prolixity. With his vanity I should never quarrel, as it only tends to render him the more agreeable: but his prolixity is sometimes exceedingly tedious, particularly in those rhetorical exordiums to his long letters, containing the praises of his friend Schipano, and lamentations over the delays of the Asiatic post-office. Nevertheless, it is impossible to peruse his works without great instruction and delight; for his active, and vigorous, and observant mind continually gives birth to sagacious and profound remarks; and his adventures, though undoubtedly true, are full of interest and the spirit of romance.
JEAN BAPTISTE TAVERNIER.
Born 1602.—Died 1685 or 1686.
The father of Tavernier was a map and chart
maker of Antwerp in Brabant, who removed with
his family into France while our traveller was still
in his childhood. Though born of Protestant parents,
some of his biographers have imagined that
Tavernier must have been a Catholic, at least in the
early part of his life, before his intercourse with the
English and Dutch had sapped the foundations of
his faith, and left him without any! But the truth
appears to be, that although educated in the dominions
of a Catholic king, surrounded by priests, and
within the hearing of the mass-bells, he, as well as
the rest of the family, one graceless nephew ex-
