though very various. You may
smoke, you may doze, you may go to the Italian comedy, as good an
amusement as either of the former. This entertainment always brings
in Harlequin, who is generally a magician, and in consequence of his
diabolical art performs a thousand tricks on the rest of the persons
of the drama, who are all fools. I have seen the pit in a roar of
laughter at this humour, when with his sword he touches the glass
from which another was drinking. 'Twas not his face they laughed at,
for that was masked. They must have seen something vastly queer in the
wooden sword, that neither I, nor you, sir, were you there, could see.

"In winter, when their canals are frozen, every house is forsaken,
and all people are on the ice; sleds drawn by horses, and skating,
are at that time the reigning amusements. They have boats here that
slide on the ice, and are driven by the winds. When they spread all
their sails they go more than a mile and a half a minute, and their
motion is so rapid the eye can scarcely accompany them. Their ordinary
manner of travelling is very cheap and very convenient: they sail
in covered boats drawn by horses; and in these you are sure to meet
people of all nations. Here the Dutch slumber, the French chatter, and
the English play at cards. Any man who likes company may have them to
his taste. For my part I generally detached myself from all society,
and was wholly taken up in observing the face of the country. Nothing
can equal its beauty; wherever I turn my eye, fine houses, elegant
gardens, statues, grottos, vistas, presented themselves; but when
you enter their towns you are charmed beyond description. No misery
is to be seen here; every one is usefully employed.

"Scotland and this country bear the highest contrast. There hills and
rocks intercept every prospect: here 'tis all a continued plain. There
you might see a well-dressed duchess issuing from a dirty close;
and here a dirty Dutchman inhabiting a palace. The Scotch may be
compared to a tulip planted in dung; but I never see a Dutchman in
his own house but I think of a magnificent Egyptian temple dedicated
to an ox. Physic is by no means here taught so well as in Edinburgh:
and in all Leyden there are but four British students, owing to all
necessaries being so extremely dear and the professors so very lazy
(the chemical professor excepted) that we don't much care to come
hither."

When the time came to make the "Inquiry into the S