Translation (continued). 



discomposes me, yet the expectation of another good, that is of your 

 humanity, in which quality you shine far beyond other men, restores and 

 buoys me up. That gentle and excellent hope commands and exhorts me 

 to produce some specimen or token of my duty, however small, with 

 alacrity. By these inducements conquered, I proposed free interpreta- 

 tion into English of the treatise on British dogs, and have dedicated it to 

 you rather than to anyone else as my one patron, and unique Majcenas. 

 Not because I supposed that the unmeasurable sea of your merits could 

 be gaged by so jejune and poor a gift; not because I was anxious to 

 weary your sacred and religious years with the explanation of a profane 

 page ; nor because I supposed that you would be delighted with idle and 

 frivolous matter, occupied as you are entirely in divine lucubrations, but 

 rather (if I may be believed) because that egregious and noble prince of 

 the liberal arts, and more especially of the faculty of medicine, who 

 composed this work, so flourished while he lived, and obtained so 

 brilliant a fame, that I know not honestly to confess what I feel, if after 

 his death, he has left any like him. Lastly because he had sent this 

 little book to Conrad Gesuer, elaborated with the utmost industry into 

 lands beyond the sea, to a man remarkable for his knowledge of all kinds 

 of literature, and especially for his acquaintance with occult matters, 

 which is settled in the inmost bowels and marrows of Nature (0 talent 

 worthy of a white stone !), whose difiBculties, entangled by Labyrinthian 

 windings and tortuous flexuosities I have investigated (0 good God ! how 

 great a labour and how infinite a travail ! ) which raised such favour and 

 conciliation in the breast of Conrad Gesner, that he not only received it 

 with a friendly kiss, but also read it studiously, and used it accurately, 

 with the inexhausted strength by which the dragon guards the fleece of 

 gold, and kept it with more vigilant eyes than the eagle. Lastly, since 

 we have heard that this epitome was written by a truly learned man to a 

 man adorned with the highest celebrity of fame, so the epitome, in 

 English speech, however inelegant, is yet common and popular to your 

 hands. most erudite Sir, I beseech you to command, that under 

 your patronage, it may boldly go forth into all parts of our coun- 

 try, and I solemnly pray you to receive from me this book bearing 

 a humble and obscure inscription, but embracing an argument new 

 and as yet unheard of ; as well as entirely free from any Sybaritic 



obscenity. 



The most bounden to your service, 



(Signed) Abraham Fleming. 



