Perhaps the work of Roxas served, also, as a hint for the “Pasagero,” or Traveller, of Suarez de Figueroa. At any rate, the well-known author of the “Amarillis,” published in 1617, a half-narrative, half-didactic work with this title, containing ten long discussions, on a great variety of subjects, held by four persons, as they journey from Madrid to Barcelona, in order to embark for Italy;--the discussions themselves being called _alivios_, or rests by the way. The chief conversation is in the hands of Figueroa, the principal person in his own drama; and so far as he is concerned, and so far as the discussions relate to the men of letters of his own time, the Pasagero is somewhat cynical. His autobiography, which is contained in the eighth dialogue, is interesting, and so are the ninth and tenth dialogues, in which he gives his view of the state of Spain at the time he wrote, and the means of leading an honest and honorable life there. But the most important conversations are the third, which relates to the theatre, and the fourth, which is on the popular and courtly mode of preaching. The whole work is too diffuse in its style, though less declamatory than much in the didactic prose of the period.[242] [242] “El Pasagero, Advertencias utilíssimas á la Vida Humana, por el Doctor Christ. Suarez de Figueroa,” Madrid, 1617, 12mo, ff. 492. Figueroa also published (Madrid, 1621, 4to) a volume of five hundred pages, entitled, “Varias Noticias importantes á la Humana Comunicacion,” which he divides into twenty essays, entitled “Variedades.” It is less well written than the Pasagero, falling more into the faults of the time. The seventeenth Essay, however, which is on Domestic Life, with illustrations from Spanish history, is pleasant. His “Plaza Universal de las Ciencias,” first printed at Madrid, in 1615, 4to, and reprinted in folio, with large changes and additions, in 1737, is an attempt at a compendium of human knowledge, curious in the first edition, as showing the state of knowledge and opinion at that time in Spain, but of little value in either. A more serious book of travels might here have been added; that of Pedro Ordoñez de Cevallos, entitled “Viage del Mundo,” and first printed at Madrid, 1614, 4to. It is an agreeable and often interesting autobiography of its author, beginning with his birth at Jaen and his education at Seville, and giving his travels, for thirty-nine years, all over the world, including China, America, many parts of Africa, and the northern kingdoms of Europe. Its spirit is eminently national, and its style simple and Castilian.