r and
are like the leaves of a pear tree. About these islands are
certain flitting islands, which have been oftentimes seen; and
when men approach near them, they vanished: as the like hath been
of these now known (by the report of the inhabitants) which were
not found but of a long time, one after the other; and,
therefore, it should seem he is not yet born, to whom God hath
appointed the finding of them.

"In this island of Teneriff, there is a hill called the Pike,
because it is piked; which is, in height, by their report, twenty
leagues: having, both winter and summer, abundance of snow on the
top of it. This Pike may be seen, in a clear day, fifty leagues
off; but it sheweth as though it were a black cloud a great
height in the element. I have heard of none to be compared with
this in height; but in the Indies I have seen many, and, in my
judgment, not inferior to the Pike: and so the Spaniards write."

One of the most remarkable developments of English prose at the time, and
one which has until very recently been almost inaccessible, except in a few
examples, to the student who has not the command of large libraries, while
even by such students it has seldom been thoroughly examined, is the
abundant and very miscellaneous collection of what are called, for want of
a better name, Pamphlets. The term is not too happy, but there is no other
(except the still less happy Miscellany) which describes the thing. It
consists of a vast mass of purely popular literature, seldom written with
any other aim than that of the modern journalist. That is to say, it was
written to meet a current demand, to deal with subjects for one reason or
other interesting at the moment, and, as a matter of course, to bring in
some profit to the writer. These pamphlets are thus as destitute of any
logical community of subject as the articles which compose a modern
newspaper--a production the absence of which they no doubt supplied, and of
which they were in a way the forerunners. Attempts to classify their
subjects could only end in a hopeless cross division. They are religious
very often; political very seldom (for the fate of the luckless Stubbes in
his dealings with the French marriage was not suited to attract);
politico-religious in at least the instance of one famous group, the
so-called Martin Marprelate Controversy; moral constantly; in very many,
especially the