Sir, I must ever own myself to be Possess'd with human curiosity Of seeing all that might the sense invite By those two baits of profit and delight: And since I had the wit to understand The terms of native or of foreign land; I have had strong and oft desires to tread Some of those voyages which I have read. Yet still so fruitless have my wishes prov'd, That from my Country's smoke I never mov'd: 10 Nor ever had the fortune (though design'd) To satisfy the wand'rings of my mind. Therefore at last I did with some content, Beguile myself in time, which others spent; Whose art to provinces small lines allots, And represents large kingdoms but in spots. Thus by Ortelius and Mercator's aid Through most of the discover'd world I stray'd. I could with ease double the Southern Cape, And in my passage Afric's wonders take: 20 Then with a speed proportion'd to the scale Northward again, as high as Zemla sail. Oft hath the travel of my eye outrun (Though I sat still) the journey of the Sun: Yet made an end, ere his declining beams Did nightly quench themselves in Thetis' streams. Oft have I gone through Egypt in a day, Not hinder'd by the droughts of Lybia; In which, for lack of water, tides of sand By a dry deluge overflow the land. 30 There I the Pyramids and Cairo see, Still famous for the wars of Tomombee, And its own greatness; whose immured sense Takes forty miles in the circumference. Then without guide, or stronger caravan Which might secure the wild Arabian, Back through the scorched deserts pass, to seek Once the world's Lord, now the beslaved Greek, Made by a Turkish yoke and fortune's hate In language as in mind, degenerate. 40 And here all wrapp'd in pity and amaze I stand, whilst I upon the Sultan gaze; To think how he with pride and rapine fir'd So vast a territory hath acquir'd; And by what daring steps he did become The Asian fear, and scourge of Christendom: How he achiev'd, and kept, and by what arts He did concentre those divided parts; And how he holds that monstrous bulk in awe, By settled rules of tyranny, not Law: 50 So rivers large and rapid streams began, Swelling from drops into an Ocean.