258 NEW ATLANTIS 



ars reproved and censured. So likewise direction is 

 given touching marriages, and the courses of life which 

 any of them should take, with divers other the like 

 orders and advices. The Governor assisteth, to the end 

 to put in execution, by his public authority, the decrees 

 and orders of the Tirsan, if they should be disobeyed, 

 though that seldom needeth ; such reverence and 

 obedience they give to the order of Nature. The Tirsan 

 doth also then ever choose one man from amongst his 

 sons, to live in house with him ; who is called ever after 

 the Son of the Vine. The reason will hereafter appear. 



On the feast day, the father or Tirsan cometh forth 

 after divine service into a large room where the feast 

 is celebrated ; which room hath an half-pace at the 

 upper end. Against the wall, in the middle of the half- 

 pace, is a chair placed for him, with a table and carpet 

 before it. Over the chair is a state, made round or 

 oval, and it is of ivy ; an ivy somewhat whiter than 

 ours, like the leaf of a silver asp, but more shining ; for 

 it is green all winter. And the state is curiously wrought 

 ■with silver and silk of divers colours, broiding or binding 

 in the ivy ; and is ever of the work of some of the daugh- 

 ters of the family, and veiled over at the top, with a fine 

 net of silk and silver. But the substance of it is true 

 ivy ; whereof, after it is taken down, the friends of the 

 family are desirous to have some leaf or sprig to keep. 



The Tirsan cometh forth with all his generation or 

 lineage, the males before him, and the females following 

 him ; and if there be a mother from whose body the 

 whole lineage is descended, there is a traverse placed 

 in a loft above, on the right hand of the chair, with 

 a privy door, and a carved window of glass, leaded with 

 gold and blue ; where she sitteth, but is not seen. 

 When the Tirsan is come forth, he sitteth down in the 

 chair ; and all the lineage place themselves against the 

 wall, both at his back, and upon the return of the half- 

 pace, in order of their years, without difference of sex, 

 and stand upon their feet. When he is set, the room 

 being always full of company, but well kept and without 

 disorder, after some pause there cometh in from the 



