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monarch before Tournay. He travels to Munster in Germany, where he falls in with John of Leyden the famous fanatic, and is present at his defeat by the Imperialists; here he meets Lord Henry Howard, Earl of Surry, and accompanies him to Venice, passing through Wittenberg, where he has an interview with Luther and Carlostadius; from thence he repairs to Rome, where he relates a series of strange adventures, by which he is thrown into the hands of a Jew named Zadock, physician to Pope Clement VIII. and having forfeited his life to him by the law, the Jew gets the person of Jack Wilton in limbo with an intent to anatomize him, and whilst he is dieting and bleeding him for that purpose, the Marchioness of Mantua, the Pope's mistress, spies him out from her balcony, and being smitten with his appearance, contrives to get him out of Zadock's hands, by perfuading his holiness to banish all the Jews from Rome and confiscate their effects, upon a charge she sets up against them.

With this intelligence Zadock is accosted by a brother Jew called Zachary, "who comes "running to him in sackcloth and ashes, pre"sently after his goods were confiscated, and "tells him how he is served and what decree

" is coming out againft them all."

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I have made an extract of this interview be. tween Zadock and Zachary, which the reader will observe by the date was published before Shakespear wrote his Merchant of Venice, and as the critics seem agreed that he was conversant in other works of Nashe, it is highly probable that this history of Jacke Wilton had also been in his hands: I do not mean to infer that Shakespear took his character of Shylock from this of Nashe's Zadock, for there is nothing that can warrant such an inference; but I shall submit the following dialogue as an extraordinary specimen of strong empaffioned writing, which, though it will not stand by Shakespear's scene between Shylock and Tubal in dramatic terseness, has nevertheless a force of expression, that will bear a comparison with that or any other passage in our old dramatic writers.

Zachary having made his report as above, the author thus proceeds to the introduction of his chief speaker-"Descriptions stand by! here is " to be expressed the fury of Lucifer, when he " was turned over heaven's bar for a wrangler: "There is a toad-fish, which taken out of the "water swells more than one would think his "skin could hold, and bursts in his face that "touches him; so swelled Zadock, and was "ready to burst out of his skin, and shoot his "bowels

" bowels like chain-shot full in Zachary's face, " for bringing him fuch baleful tidings; his eyes " glared and burned blue like brimstone and aqua "vitæ set on fire in an egg-shell; his very nose "lightened glow-worms; his teeth cracked and "grated together like the joints of a high build"ing rocking like a cradle, when as a tempest " takes her full-butt against her broadfide: He "swore and curst, and faid

"These be they that worship that crucified "God of Nazareth; here is the fruits of their "new-found gospel; fulphur and gunpowder

carry them all quick to Gehennah! I would " spend my foul willingly to have this triple" headed Pope, with all his fin-absolved whores, " and oil-greased priests, born like a black saint " on the devil's backes in proceffion to the pit " of perdition. Would I might fink presently " into the earth, so I might blow up this Rome, " this whore of Babylon into the air with my "breath! If I must be banished, if these heathen " dogs will needs rob me of my goods, I will "poifon their springs and conduit-heads, whence "they receive their water all about the city. " I will 'tice all the young children into my *" house, that I can get, and cutting their throats, " barrel them up in powdering beef tubs, and fo "send them to victual the Pope's gallies. Ere

" the

"the officers come to extend, I will bestow an "hundred pounds on a dole of bread, which I "will cause to be kneaded with scorpion's oil, "that may kill more than the plague. I will "hire them that make their wafers, or facra

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mentary Gods, to mix them after the fame "fort, so in the zeal of their superftitious re"ligion shall they languish and drop like car"rion. If there be ever a blafphemous con"jurer, that can call the winds from their bra"zen caves, and make the clouds travel before "their time, I will give him the other hundred "pounds to disturb the heavens a whole week "together with thunder and lightning, if it be "for nothing but to fower all the wines in "Rome, and turn them to vinegar: As long as "they have either oil or wine, this plague feeds "but pinchingly upon them.'

"Zadock, Zadock,' faid Zachary, cutting "him off, 'thou threatenest the air, whilst we " perish here on earth: It is the countess Juli"ana, the Marquis of Mantua's wife, and no "other, that hath complotted our confufion; "afk not how, but insist on my words, and affift " in revenge."

"As how, as how?' faid Zadock, shrugging " and shrubbing; 'More happy than the patri"archs were I, if crufht to death with the "greatest " greatest torments Rome's tyrants have tried, "there might be quintessenced out of me one "quart of precious poison. I have a leg with

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an issue, shall I cut it off, and from this fount " of corruption extract a venom worse than any " serpent's? If thou wilt, I will go to a houfe "that is infected, where catching the plague, "and having got a running fore upon me, I " will come and deliver her a fupplication, and "breathe upon her, when I am perfected with

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Zadock in conclusion is taken up and executed, and the description of his tortures is terrible in the extreme; every circumstance attending them is minutely delineated in colours full as ftrong as the above,

I perfuade myself the reader will not be difpleafed, if I lay before him one extract more, in which he ridicules the affected dress and manners of the travelled gentlemen of his day: If we contemplate it as a painting of two hundred years ftanding, I think it must be allowed to be a very curious sketch.

"What is there in France to be learned "more than in England, but faisehood in friend"ship, perfect slovenry and to love no man, but " for my pleasure? I have known some that have " continued there by the space of half a dozen " years,

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