tortures, was at length forced to abjure her religion.

In this manner, says the author, was christianity extinguished in the province of Nangasaki. Before this persecution, the number of Christians was very great, but I cannot tell exactly the number who abjured; I can however assert, that in the year 1626 it was stated, that there were above 40,000 men, women, and children, and at present not one is to be seen.

CHAP. XIV.

Of the excessive Prodigality of some Persons.

Ar Padua, in Italy, they have a stone called the Stone of Turpitude: it is placed near the Senate-house. Hither it is that all spendthrifts, and such as disclaim the payment of their debts, are brought; and they are enforced to sit upon this stone, with their hinder parts bare, that, by this note of public infamy and disgrace, others may be terrified from all such vain expences, or borrowing more than they know they are able to pay. Great pity it is there is not such a stone in all the countries of the world, or at least some other happy invention, whereby it might be provided, That there should be fewer followers of such pernicious examples as those that are hereafter related.

1. Cresippus, son to Chabrias, a noble Athenian, was so prodigal, that after he had lavishly consumed all his goods and other estates, he sold also the very stones of his father's tomb, in the building whereof the Athenians had disbursed

one thousand drachms.

2. Paschysirus, King of Crete, after he had spent all that he had, and could otherwise raise, he at length sold his kingdom also, and lived afterwards pri

vately in the city of Amathunta in Cyrus, where he died miserably.

3. Heliogabalus the Emperor, was possessed rather with madness than excess of prodigality. He filled his fishponds with rose-water; he supplied his lamps with the precious balsam that distills from the trees in Arabia; he wore upon his shoes pearls and precious stones, engraven by the hands of the most skilful artists; his dining-room was strewed with saffron, and his porticos with the dust of gold; and he was never known to put on a garment a second time, whether it was of the richest silk or gold.

4. King Demetrius having raised a tax upon the Athenians of two hundred and fifty talents; when he saw all that mass of money laid on a heap before him, he gave it amongst his courtezans to buy them soap.

5. C. Caligula, in less than a year, scattered and consumed those infinite heaps of gold and silver, which Tiberius his predecessor, had heaped up, amounting to no less than seven and twenty hun dred millions of sesterces.

6. Of Vitellius, Josephus yields this testimony, that having reigned but eight months and five days, he was slain in the midst of the city; whose luxury and prodigality, should he have lived longer, the empire could not have satisfied. And Tacitus also saith of him, "That holding it sufficient, and not caring for the future, within the compass of a few months, he is said to have set going nine hundred million of sesterces; which Budæus having cast up, thus pronounces it to be no less than twenty-five hundred thousand crowns."

7. When Nero had given so unreasonable a sum, that his mother Agrippina thought it fit to restrain his boundless prodigality, she caused the whole sum to be laid upon the table, as he was to pass by, that so the sight of it might work him to a sense of his folly; but he (as it seems) suspecting it be his mother's de

1.2.

vice, commands presently so much more to be added to it; and withal was heard to say aloud, "I knew not that I gave 80 little." To Tiridates, during his abode in Italy, for the space of nine months, he allowed daily eight hundred thousand sesterces; and besides, at his parting, for a farewell, he bestowed on him no less than an hundred millions. The rest of his prodigal gifts were not disproportionable thereunto; so that in the whole, he cast away, in prodigal needless gifts, two and twenty hundred millions of sesterces; besides which, Menecrates a fiddler, and Specillus a fencer, he rewarded with the patrimonies, houses, and estates of such men as had been Triumvirs in the city of Rome; he said, they were poor and sordid that could keep account of their expenses.

8. Demades, the Athenian, was a rich and prodigal person; for whereas the Athenians had made a law, that no stranger should dance in their theatre; and in case any should be found so to do, he who set forth the plays should pay a fine of one thousand drachms. Demade, not so much regarding this law as his own pleasure, hired at once an hundred strangers to dance in his plays, and for them paid the fine of one hundred thousand drachms.

9. Agustinus Chiessius, a banker or money merchant at Rome, at the christening of his son, entertained Pope Leo the Tenth upon the river Tiber, and all the foreign ambassadors, and the nobles of the city, with a magnificent entertainment, dished out in costly plate; and upon the changes of every service, the meat, plate and all, was cast away into the river, and new and costlier still supplied in the room of them.

10. Stephen Langton, Archbishop of Canterbury, translated the bones of Thomas à Becket with so great expence at the solemnity, that neither he, nor four of his successors, were able to recover the debt it cast his See and Church into.

11. Poppaa Sabina, the wife of Nero, was at once so proud and prodigal, that her mules had bridles and furniture of gold, were shod with silver, and sometimes with gold; and she kept five hundred female asses always about her court, in whose milk she used to bathe her body, that she might preserve the delicacy of her skin.

12. Caius Julius Cæsar was extremely profuse in his expences, while as yet but a private person; insomuch, that before he was called to any place of magistracy, he had not only consumed his own estate, but had also contracted a debt of no less than three hundred talents; so that when he was sent forth as Prætor into Spain, he wittily said, "That he wanted three hundred talents to be worth nothing."

13. King Henry the Eighth, at the dissolution of abbeys, gave away large shares almost to every one that asked, as appears by a pleasant story. Two or three gentlemen, the King's servants, waited at the door when the King was to come out, with a purpose to beg of his highness a large parcel of abbey-lands. One Mr. John Champeroune, another of his servants, seeing them, was very inquisitive to know their suit, but they would not impart it to him. In the mean time out comes the King: they kneel down, and so doth Mr. Champernoune (having an implicit faith that courtiers would beg nothing hurtful to themselves). They present their petition; the King grants it; and they render him humble thanks, and so does Mr. Champernoune. Afterwards, he requiring his share, they denied it; upon which he appealed to the King. The King avowed his equal meaning in the gift; whereupon his companions were forced to allot him the priory of St. Germain in Cornwall, valued at two hundred and forty-three pounds eight shillings per annnm; so that a dumb beggar met with a blind giver, the one as little knowing what he asked, as the other what he gave.

CHAP.

CHAP. XV.

their Feasting.

Ir is an old saying, Leges bonæ ex malis moribus procreantur, "That good laws. "That good laws have their original from the bad manners and evil way of living in that people for whom they are made." By which we may easily observe, that the Romans were a people exceedingly addicted to all kind of luxury, in that there were so many laws made to repress their proneness to the practice of this vice. There were the Lex Orchia, Fannia, Didia, Licinia, Cornelia, and divers others; yet all these were too little; for, according as their riches increased, so did their inclination grow so forward this way, till at last, in a monstrous sensuality, they had drowned and swallowed up even the last remainders of their primitive virtue. This pernicious example of theirs hath since been followed by all sorts of men, the prelates themselves not excepted; and the luxury of these our days is grown to that height, that we seem to exceed all that have gone before so that we want no instances; only let a Roman have the honour to

us ;

march first.

1. L. Elius Verus made a supper wherein he expended sixty hundred thousand sesterces; and, what enhances the wonder, there were no more than twelve persons who at that time feasted with him. He presented these twelve, at their departure, with silver, gold, chrystalline and myrrhine vessels; for all these sorts of cups had been made use of in that feast. He also gave each of them a mule adorned with the richest trappings, to carry them home to their several houses.

2. Not long since there was a prelate stranger (whose name I will conceal for the honour of his profession) who one day invited to a feast all the nobility of Avignon, as well men as women; where, for a beginning of his pomp, at the very entry into the hall, where the feast was

dressing, stuffed full of little birds, as quails, partridges, larks, pheasants, and the like. But that which made the matter both strange and wonderful was, that all the birds so assembled did roast and turn all alone upon a broach, by a certain compass and conduits, without the help of any man. For the first course, his guests were presented with store of curious pastry, wherein were inclosed many little birds alive, who, as soon as the crust was taken off, began to fly about the hall. There were besides, sundry sorts of silver-plate full of jelly, so subtlely conveyed, that a man might have seen in the bottom a number of little fishes alive, swimming and leaping in sweet water, to the great delight and pleasure of the company. Neither is it less strange, that all the fowls which were served upon the table were larded with lamprey, though it was in a season when they cost half-a-crown a-piece. But that which seals up the pomp of this proud prelate was, that there was reserved as many live birds as he was served with dead fowls at his table; so that if there were a pheasant sent up dressed, there were gentlemen appointed who presented another alive. The consumination of his delights was, that the gentlemen which served him had their faces covered with a veil, lest their breath should offend him or his meat. which I have set down, not for imitation, but rather, that all good Christians should detest this prodigious example of unheard-of luxury.

All

3. Anno Dom. 1470, in the tenth year of King Edward the Fourth, George Nevill, brother to the great Earl of Warwick, at his instalment into his archbishoprick of York, made a prodigious feast to all the nobility, most of the prime clergy, and many of the great gentry; wherein, by his bill of fare, three hundred quarters of wheat, three hundred and thirty tuns of ale, one hundred and four tuns of wine, one pipe of

spiced

spiced wine, eighty fat oxen, six wild bulls, one thousand and four weathers, three hundred hogs, three hundred calves, three thousand geese, three thousand capons, three hundred pigs, one hundred peacocks, two hundred cranes, two hundred kids, two thousand chickens, four thousand pigeons, four thousand rabbets, two hundred and four bitterns, four thousand ducks, two hundred pheasants, five hundred partridges, four thousand woodcocks, four hundred plovers, one hundred curlews, one hundred quails, one thousand egrets, two hundred rees, above four hundred bucks, does, and roebucks, one thousand five hundred and six hot venison pasties, four thousand cold venison pasties, one thousand dishes of jelly parted, four thousand dishes of plain jelly, four thousand cold custards, two thousand hot custards, three hundred pikes, three hundred breams, eight seals, four porpusses, and four hundred tarts. At this feast the Earl of Warwick was steward, the Earl of Bedford treasurer, the Lord Hastings comptroller, with many more noble officers: servitors one thousand, cooks sixty-two, kitcheners five hundred and fifteen. But seven years after the King seized on all the estate of this Archbishop, and sent him over prisoner to Calais in France, where Vinctus jacuit in summâ inopia, "he was kept bound in extreme poverty.' Justice thus punished his former prodigality.

4. A. Vitellius had a famous platter, which, for the huge bigness of it, was called Minerva's Buckler; in this he blended together the livers of giltheads, the brains of pheasants and peacocks, the tongues of phenicopters, and the milts of lampreys, brought from the Spanish and Carpathian seas, by the masters of his ships and galleys. This platter is said to have cost a million of sesterces, all of massy silver, and was long preserved, till Adrian the Emperor caused it to be broken in pieces, and scattered about. This Vitellius-feasted usually three times (sometimes four) a day, every sitting being valued at four

hundred thousand sesterces; and he was able with the more ease to go through all these courses of eating, by a continual custom of vomiting, which, it seems, amongst these belly-gods was a continual practice.

5. L. Lucullus was a great statesman, whom M.Tullius, and Pompey the Great, meeting by chance in the market-place (out of a desire to know what his daily fare might be) they invited themselves to sup with him that night; but upon condition he should give no warning thereof, for that they desired not to put him to charge. He began at first to put them off with excuses for that time, wishing them rather to agree on the next day; but they importuning him for the present, he demanded of them, whether then they would suffer him to give orders in what room they should sup? That they permitted; whereupon he presently dispatched away a messenger in their hearing, that he would that night sup in the Apollo. After some time the guests came, and found all things ready in a pompous and princely manner, but knew not the true reason; all the cunning lying in the word Apollo; for he had so disposed of his rooms, that being distinguished by names, their provision and charge (when he sat in them) was accordingly allotted to them; by which means, his steward and cook, as soon as they heard the room named, knew presently what to provide. Now, among the rest, that which bore the name of Apollo was chiefest; the sum allotted thereunto being (as Plutarch says) fifty thousand drachms, which Budæus makes equal to five thousand crowns.

6. This age of ours hath beheld Petrus Riarius Savonensis, of the order of the Minorites (whom Pope Julius the Fourth made Cardinal) using garments of cloth of gold, though he was at home. Nor did he think it sufficient that his beds were covered with counterpanes of gold, but he also caused the very ticken and pillows to be made of silk and cloth of gold. He did the necessities of nature in silver. When Eleonora of Arragon

was

was married to Hercules, the Duke of Esti, and was departing to Ferrara, he made her a feast at Rome, wherein were an excessive number of dishes, replete with the most precious and delicate meats; betwixt the services there were delightful shews. It lasted for seven hours; and all the servitors, that they might answer the greatness of the feast, changed their garments as oft as they renewed the service. That which was brought off the table was cast among the people. A particular commemoration of the sumptuousness would be too tedious; and lest he should seem to be wanting to the severity of the Order (I mean the contempt of it) he maintained Teresia, his concubine, not only openly, but with such cost, that she went in shoes that were beset with pearls. It is said of this man, that in two years he spent, in luxurious vanity, no less than three hundred thousand crowns.

7. Apicius, a famous belly-god, had laid up ninety millions of sesterces, for no other purpose but only to be sacrificed in his kitchen, besides many great gifts of princes, and a mighty revenue from the Capitol. Being in debt, he began at last (though sore against his will) to look into his reckonings, and take an account of his estate; and found, that (all being cast up) he had yet left unto him clear, the sum of ten millions of sesterces: and thereupon, as if he should have been forced (poer man) to live in a starved condition, to redeem himself from this imaginary poverty, he poisoned himself.

8. Heliogabalus was of that excess in diet, that at one supper he caused to be served in the heads of six hundred ostriches, only for eating of their brains. Being near the sea, he never tasted fish; but in places farthest distant from the sea, all his feeding was upon fish. In the inland countries he fed the country clowns with the melts of lampreys and pikes. To be brief, he exceeded all the suppers of Vitellius and Apicius.

9. "C. Caligula was such a one," says Seneca, "whom nature seems to have brought forth, to shew what effects the greatest vices, joined with the greatest fortune, could produce." "This man," says Suetonius, "in thriftless expences exceeded the wits of all the prodigals that ever were; inventing most monstrous kinds of meats and suppers. The best orient pearls that were to be gotten, he dissolved in vinegar, and swallowed down: he set before his guests bread and victuals of gold, commonly saying, That a man had need be thrifty, or be Cæsar.' Yet, notwithstanding," says Seneca, "being assisted with the inventions of all his companions, he could hardly find the means to spend the tributes of all the provinces at one supper, though it was so much the easier, considering he practised the dissolving and swallowing of pearls."

10. In the days of Claudius the Emperor, Drussillanus, a slave of his, surnamed Rotundus, the Treasurer under him in the higher Spain, had a silver charger of five hundred pounds weight, for the working whereof there was a forge framed beforehand; besides which, he had eight more of a smaller size, weighing fifty pounds a-piece: now how many slaves must there be to carry up these vessels, and what provisions that required such plate?

11. M. Antonious having but twelve guests, provided eight boars, one set to the fire after each other, that whensoever he came in (sooner or later) one, at least, might be served up in its prime. And yet he was exceeded herein: "for one Caranus, as Athenæus says, set before every guest a boar in a particular dish: what the unheard-of magnificence of this Macedonian was, in his provisions and gifts to his guests, in his nuptial feast, is too tedious relate, as it is set down by the same Athe

næus.

12. Two pearls there were, together the fairest and richest that have ever been known in the world, and those possessed

at