re each man, God knows why,
thinks his foggy island superior to any other part of the world: and though
his door is never free from some dun or other coming for a tax, and if he
steps out of it he is sure to be knocked down or to have his pocket picked,
yet he has the insolence to think every foreigner a miserable slave, and
his country the seat of everything wretched. They may talk of liberty as
they please, but Spain or Turkey for my money: barring the bowstring and
the inquisition, they are the most comfortable countries under heaven, and
you need not be afraid of either, if you do not talk of religion and
politics. I do not see much difference too in this respect in England, for
when I was there, one of their most eminent men for learning was put in
prison for a couple of years, and got his death for translating one of
AEsop's fables into English, which every child in Spain and Turkey is
taught, as soon as he comes out of his leading strings. Here all the
company unanimously cried out against the Swede, that it was {216}
impossible: for in England, the land of liberty, the only thing its worst
enemies could say against it, was, that they paid for their liberty a much
greater price than it was worth.--Every man there had a fair trial
according to laws, which everybody could understand; and the judges were
cool, patient, discerning men, who never took the part of the crown against
the prisoner, but gave him every assistance possible for his defense.

"The Swede was borne down, but not convinced; and he seemed determined to
spit out all his venom. Well, says he, at any rate you will not deny that
the English have not got a language of their own, and that they came by it
in a very odd way. Of this at least I am certain, for the whole history was
related to me by a witch in Lapland, whilst I was bargaining for a wind.
Here the company were all in unison again for the story.

"In ancient times, said the old hag, the English occupied a spot in
Tartary, where they lived sulkily by themselves, unknowing and unknown. By
a great convulsion that took place in China, the inhabitants of that and
the adjoining parts of Tartary were driven from their seats, and after
various wanderings took up their abode in Germany. During this time nobody
could understand the English, for they did not talk, but hissed like so
many snakes. The poor people felt uneasy under this circumstance, and in
one of their parliaments, or rather hissing meetin