RICHARD HAKLUYT 



gave him their help, were led to think on the topics 

 he had broached, and thought nothing further of the 

 questioner. He acknowledges his obligations to many His friends, 

 * virtuous gentlemen,' who, partly from their private 

 affection to himself, but chiefly from their devotion to 

 the furtherance of his work, had lent him their assist- 

 ance. Sir John Hawkins and Sir Walter Raleigh helped 

 him with the Western voyages. William Burrough, 

 Clerk of her Majesty's Navy, and Anthony Jenkinson, 

 the Russian traveller, gave him the benefit of their 

 experience for the voyages to the North East. The 

 Lord Treasurer, Burghley, let him have access to a 

 cabinet, or museum, of curiosities brought home by 

 travellers. Sir Robert Cecil, in 1597, consulted him 

 concerning the country of Guiana, and whether it were 

 fit to be planted by the English. Sir Philip Sidney, 

 Sir Francis Walsingham, and Lord Howard of Effing- 

 ham, the Lord High Admiral of England, accepted his 

 dedications, approved his purposes, and held converse 

 with him. Mercator, Ortelius, Thevet, and other foreign 

 cosmographers and scholars were his friends and corres- 

 pondents. Yet it is vain to look for traces of him 

 among the works and memorials of the brilliant com- 

 pany that knew him in life. He is the silent man, His character, 

 seated in the dark corner, who is content to listen and 

 remember, and whose questions, interpolated from time 

 to time, divert attention from himself, and direct it to 

 the moving tales that come in answer to them. 



His own allusions to himself, though they are not 

 infrequent, bear curious witness to his complete absorp- 

 tion in his theme. Where he mentions himself it is 

 to give authenticity to the remarks and memories which 



75 



