grees sowtherly of the said river mowth : or els, that you shall trend about the very northen and most easterly poynt of all Asia, passing by the province Ania, and then in the latitude of 46, keping still the land in vewe on your right hand (as nere as you may with safety) you may enter into Quinsay haven, being the chief city in the northen China, as I terme yt, for distinction sake, from the other better known.

And in, or about eyther, or both of these two warme places, you may (to great good purpose) be occupyed the whole wynter after your aryvall in those quarters: as, sometyme by sea, sometyme in notable fresh ryvers, sometymes in discrete vew, and noting down the situation of cities within land, &c.: and ever assaying to come by some chartes, or maps, of the cuntry, made and printed in Cathay or China; and by some of their bookes likewise, for language, &c.

You may have opportunity allso to sayle over to Japan Iland, where you shall fynde Christen men, Jesuites of many cuntries of Christendom, and perhaps some Englishemen; at whose hands you may have great instruction and advise for our affayres in hand. God be favorable to these attempts, greatly tending to his glory, and the great honour of this kingdome! Amen”.

Anno 1580. A. Maij. 15.
By me John DEE.

STEPHEN POWLE TO MR. WEST.

[MS. Lansd. No. 100. Art. 19.]

The coppie of my letter to Mr. West whearin is the tower and fabricke of the horologe in Strasbourg described.

Right worshipfull Sir, and my moste especiall good frend; Whereas it pleased you in your letter dated the 8, of November, moste courteously to request that of me which your manifowld desertes of right might have commaunded, I have endeavored, accordinge to the utmoste of my power, which doth shewe the smalnes of my skill, to satisfie your request therein, and have noted the particular poinctes of the tower and clocke of Strasbourge; wherein, because I finde many thinges farr to exceed the reporte, therefore I feare to undertake this bould enterprice, to send them put downe in writinge. For as Allexander, which was the only monarch was

never pourtracted in table but of Apelles, never graven in brasse but of Lisippus, nor at any tyme praised in assembles but of Ephestion, least by the unskilfulnes of any other the glory of his renoune might be empaired; so of right this tower, which is the only wonder I heare of, shoold never be described but of sutche exquisit men in paintinge, carvinge and speach, as weare those forenamed persons; and myself ought rather to be silent (beinge acquainted with mine owne simplicitie in that behalf), then by endeavoringe to describe the workmanshipp detract from the wonder and mervaile that all menn have so justly thereof conceaved. But as those that had the vewe of the pyramides in Egipt weare rather astonid with the sight, then able to decypher those hidden misteries covered with the shoe of hieroglificall beastes, and therefore they presented the formes and models thereof only unto there frendes at there retoorne, toprocure therein also ther delight. In like sorte my self, in behouldinge theise German pyramides with an admiringe mynde, following there example, have sent you heer enclosed theise two sheetes of paper, which doe figure foorth, although obscurely, the shininge excellencye of that they represent; wishinge there all that the painters cunninge had been aunswerable to ther curious rarnes, for then your pleasure should have been in every respect equall with your desyre. But this want of his must be supplied with your judgement, which like the skilful geometrician, cann by one smale part proportionably gather the whoale boddie, or by measuringe only the shadowe discerne the heyth of the tower; and like unto Pithagoras that findinge in ludis Olympiacis but one stadium, which contayned three hundred feet, therbie conceive the huge monstrous stature of the geant Hercules the measurer thereof. But yeat least you, by behouldinge theis dumme, silent and mute pictures, finde more to amaze your minde, then to delight your eye, I present myself unto you as a bashfull trushman to unfould there meaninge. Yf I interpret there wordes amis attribut that fault to my unskilfulnes of there speech, because they be Germans by nature, and myself am not perfectly acquainted with there tounge, by reason of the smalnes of my continuaunce: I might also add this for a more juste excuse, that I am not a professour of there arte, and therefore unfitt to be an expressour of there misteries. But that which embouldeneth me is this, that though I aunswere not there worthines, yet I shall after a sort observe decorum, in beinge as farr of from presentinge the veary truth by my o as the painter is from describinge the lively vew thereof y the draught of his pensell. The citie of Strasbourge is called in Latin Argentina, for

the nomber of silver mynes which be founde in the contry of Alsatia, wherein it is seated. The which, as it hath the walles fortified with moste artificiall bulwarkes for to defend them without from the force of enemies, so the houses be adorned with moste curious paintings to delight within the behoulders: for the excellencie of both which it is placed emongest the cheef cities in theise partes of Germany, and renounid through all Europe for the workmanshipp of the tower, and the artificiall mocions, morall figures and astronomicall instruments inclosed in the fabricke of a clocke. The tower is moste spoken of for the arte in rearinge up a heape of so many stones, almost contrary to nature, six hundred foote highe in the aire, so geometrically that it seameth rather to hange therein then lean on any sure fondation, and that it hath continewed almost this four hundred yeares. I assure you, sir, to behoulde the same, beinge in the topp thereof, it seameth to have threatmed ruine ever since the first hower it was built, passadge lying open through every stone thereof to the winde and the weather in sutch sorte that I scarcely remember my beinge on the heith thereof without a tremblinge terrour, consideringe that I might have fallen to the grownde every moment throwghe the same. There is added to this rare heith a mervelous sensible deceipt of the behoulder, for it seameth not to be by the half so high, to take the vewe thereof from the foundation. I attribute this to the smale hould the beames of the eyes can have on the stones of this buildinge, beinge everie waie (as I before have mencioned) perflatiles, and the force of the sight beinge divided into so many and sundry partes (by the ineanes of those chiones it lighteth on when any man looketh up to the tower,) is made more weake and feable, and, therefore, cannot by reflection bringe backe to the eyes the perfect forme of the object; for the sence of seinge beinge the servaunt of the mynde, dooth represent by the eyes (which be, as Plato termeth them, ad animam perforatae fenestra,) the trew shape of that thinge it was commaunded to behould, sendinge forthe his beames, as bailifs, to arest the object to appeare before reason that keapeth his coort in man's mynde ; which, beinge vearye swifte, escapeth, and is not attayned to by pursute; and by that reason, lookinge on a whirlinge wheele, wee discerne not the spookes thereof, nor on birdes flyinge wee see no fethers; or yf the object be veary farr of, as out of his bailiwike, he retoorneth non est inventus; and therefore we attaine not by sight the grasse that groweth on mountaines farr of, nor discern branches though wee behould the trees; or if they be

but informed by others, then they reporte falsly; and therefore men behouldinge the moone in the horizon, through and by the meane of the moist and vaperous aier, the eies reporte to the minde the moone to be bigger then it is 2 howers after : and an ower to be broken in the waves that is whole : a penny in a boule of water to be a grote for bignes: or, if theise ballifes meet with an artificiall object, then as with a suptill sophister, beinge deluded, they err in there arrant likewise; and that is the reason why Zeuxis’ painted grapes dasled the sighte of the birdes, and whye Parrhasius coortine deceaved Zeuxis the painter; that Pigmalion’s handes, in beinge in love with his owne picture, deceaved his eyes; and to applie it to this present example, this seameth to me the reason why this artificiall tower deceaveth the behoulder.

In the fabricke of the clocke which standeth in the church, nature for geavinge sutch an excellent subject to woork on, the will of the devisor for his invention and disposition, and the handes of the artificers for there exquisitenes in gravinge, carvinge and paintinge, and all three for the consent they had in the perfettinge this rare devise, are so much to be wondered at, that the behoulder remaineth douptfull to which he shoold geave the glory or praise, for it should seem they all contended for the highest point of wonderfull admiration. Nature hath geaven a kinde of woode, called Zilly, which hardly can be discerned from stone. The devisor hath placed in this, besides divers incredible motions, the best instruments of astronomy; and the painters hath bestowed thereon the summe of their cunninge and the perfection of there arte. To retoorne to the devise, therein is to be seen a shoe of eternitie; the beginninge of Tyme and a vewe of Age; the periods of the planetes; the yearly and dailie motion of the soonne in the zodiake; the convertion of the moone in her cycle, and a more particular distinction of tyme by motions artificiall of weakes, daies, howers, quarters and minutes: adorned also it is with beautifull pictures of holly and prophane stories, and with admirable motions of men, beastes and birdes. To entreat of theis partes in order doth cause me to be preposterous, for first I must describe the heele and after, last of all, the heade. Eternitie is partly figured by the begininge, and partly also by the laste parte of the fabricke. The pellican that supporteth the globe dooth represent the poet's Atlas, whome they fained to beare the woorld on his shouldiers; but Christians do resemble it to our Saviour, by whome all thinges have there life, as the globe hath hir motion by the instrumentes conveyed in the belly of the pellican. Tyme is figured

by the heavenly globe; for as by the one wee knowe the revolution of the moveable yeare, so by the other wee discerne the distinction of all motion, for the philosophers define tyme to be mensura motus. Before the heavens weare created there was no naturall motion, and, by that reason, there wold be no mensura motus. That estate of beinge which was before the creacion of the woorld was called therefore eternitie; because therefore the pellican is placed firste, out of which proceedeth the cause of the motion of the globe which representeth the woorld, therefore the pellican figureth forth etermitie, and the globe representeth the begininge of tyme. The globe is moved every daie by a circular and violent motion, and therein the soone in his naturall coorse kepeth the eclipticall line, whoe, although he be likewise whirled about by the violence of primum mobile everie daie from the east to the weast, yeat in his zodiake he finissheth his naturall coorce from the weast to the easte every yeare; which tyme is said to be his period, as that also of the moone in twentie eight daies and eight minutes; that of Saturne in thirtie yeare; Jubiter in five yeare and eight dayes, and so likwise of the reste; and that of the eighth spher (which is tearmed caelum stellatum), where the fixed starres remayne in six and thirtie thowsand yeares, which is the period of the spher, and it is called magnus annus Platonis, because he held opinion that then all thinges should beginne anew. The third yallowe great compas (that resembleth after a sorte a wheele, by reason of the forme and read lines that be like spookes,) setteth forth a callander for one hundred yeares (in the 4 corners of which be described the 4 monarchies), which was called of the poetes the age of man, and therefore they fained that Nestor lived three men’s lives, because he was three hundred yeares owld, and this callander doth morally signifie age, and particular describeth the daies of the moneth, the letter Dominicall, the Epact, and the goulden number, all which be shewed by the arrowe of Apollo, there painted in the left hand of the table, and by the finger of Diana on the right side thereof. The great circompherence of this circle that is coloured yalow finisheth his cours in a yeare, the inwarde part that is coloured blewe in a hundred yeares retourneth to his period. Over which be motions of the planetes, as they geave the denomination to the daies, as on sunday the sonne presenteth him self, drawen in a chariot with towe white horses, with his strength Leo. The moone of munday, drawen in chariot by twoe redd hartes, her strength Cancer. Mars on tewsdaie, drawen in his coach by twoe tigers, assisted with his strength Aries and Scorpio. Mercury on wednesday, drawen by twoe