 their cloaths; and in the evening our
travellers were conducted to the house of their new friend, who, with a view of
making his invitation the more agreeable, had assembled to the number of twenty
or thirty Englishmen, of all ranks and degrees, from the merchant to the
periwig-maker's prentice.
    In the midst of this congregation stood a chafing-dish with livecoals, for
the convenience of lighting their pipes, and every individual was accommodated
with a spitting-box. There was not a mouth in the apartment unfurnished with a
tube, so that they resembled a convocation of Chimeras breathing fire and smoke;
and our gentlemen were fain to imitate their example in their own defence. It is
not to be supposed that the conversation was either very sprightly or polite;
the whole entertainment was of the Dutch cast, that is, frowzy and phlegmatic:
and our adventurer, as he returned to his lodging, tortured with the head-ache,
and disgusted with every circumstance of his treatment, cursed the hour in which
the doctor had saddled them with such troublesome companions.
    Next morning, by eight o'clock, these polite Hollanders returned the visit,
and after breakfast, attended their English friends to the house of a person
that possessed a very curious cabinet of curiosities, to which they had secured
our company's admission. The owner of this collection was a cheesemonger, who
received them in a woollen night-cap, with straps buttoned under his chin. As he
understood no language but his own, he told them, by the canal of one of their
conductors, that he did not make a practice of shewing his curiosities; but
understanding that they were Englishmen, and recommended to his friends, he was
content to submit them to their perusal. So saying, he led them up a dark stair,
into a small room, decorated with a few paltry figures in plaister of Paris, two
or three miserable landschapes, the skins of an otter, seal, and some fishes
stuffed; and in one corner stood a glass-case, furnished with newts, frogs,
lizzards and serpents, preserved in spirits; a human foetus, a calf with two
heads, and about two dozen of butterflies pinned upon paper.
    The virtuoso having exhibited these particulars, eyed the strangers with a
look solliciting admiration and applause; and as he could not perceive any
symptom of either in their gestures or countenances, withdrew a curtain, and
displayed a wainscot chest of drawers, in which, he gave them to understand, was
something that would agreeably amuse the imagination. Our travellers, regaled
with
