We have thus the advantage
over Simpson's method, that our theory will be confirmed from other
sources.
Montaigne's 'Essais' were a work which made a strong mark, and created
a deep sensation, in his own country. There, it had already gone through
twelve editions before it was introduced in England--eleven years after
the death of its author--by means of a translation. Here it found its
first admirers among the highest aristocracy and the patrons of
literature and art. Under such august auspices it penetrated into
the English public at large. The translator was a well-known teacher
of the Italian language, John Florio.
From the preface of the first book of the 'Essais' we learn that,
at the request of Sir Edward Wotton, Florio had first Englished one
chapter, doing it in the house of Lady Bedford, a great lover of art.
In that preface, Florio, in most extravagant and euphuistic style,
describes how this noblewoman, after having 'dayned to read it (the
first chapter) without pitty of my fasting, my fainting, my
laboring, my langishing, my gasping for some breath ... yet commaunded
me on'--namely, to turn the whole work into English. It was a heavy
task for the poor schoolmaster. He says:--'I sweat, I wept, and I went
on sea-tosst, weather-beaten ... shippe-wrackt--almost drowned.'
'I say not,' the polite maestro adds, 'you took pleasure at shore'
(as those in this author, iii.
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