But of what nation soever they were at first, they are now almost of all; associating unto them some of every country where they wander: when they will be lost, or whether at all again, is not without some doubt: for unsetled nations have out-lasted others of fixed habitations: and though Gypsies have been banished by most Christian Princes, yet have they found some countenance from the great Turk, who suffereth them to live and maintain publick Stews near the Imperial City in _Pera_ [SN: Bellon. observat. l. 2.], of whom he often maketh a politick advantage, imploying them as spies into other nations, under which title they were banished by _Charles_ the fift. CHAPTER XIV Of some others. We commonly accuse the phancies of elder times in the improper figures of heaven assigned unto Constellations, which do not seem to answer them, either in Greek or Barbarick Spheres: yet equall incongruities have been commonly committed by Geographers and Historians, in the figurall resemblances of several regions on earth; While by _Livy_ and _Julius, Rusticus_ the Island of _Britain_ is made to resemble a long dish or two-edged ax; _Italy_ by _Numatianus_ to be like an Oak-leaf: and _Spain_ an Ox-hide; while the phancy of _Strabo_ makes the habitated earth like a cloak, and _Dionysius Afer_ will have it like a sling: with many others observable in good writers [SN: Tacit. de vita Jul. Agric.], yet not made out from the letter or signification; acquitting Astronomy in their figures of the Zodiack: wherein they are not justified unto strict resemblances, but rather made out from the effects of Sun or Moon in these several portions of heaven, or from peculiar influences of those constellations, which some way make good their names. [SN: Junctin. in Sph. l. de Sacro bosco cap. 2.] Which notwithstanding being now authentick by prescription, may be retained in their naked acceptions, and names translated from substances known on earth. And therefore the learned _Hevelius_ in his accurate Selenography, or description of the Moon, hath well translated the known appellations of Regions, Seas and Mountains, unto the parts of that Luminary: and rather then use invented names or humane denominations, with witty congruity hath placed _Mount Sinai_, _Taurus_, _Mæotis Palus_, the Mediterranean Sea, _Mauritania_, _Sicily_ and _Asia_ Minor in the Moon. More hardly can we find the Hebrew letters in the heavens, made out of the greater and lesser Stars which put together do make up words, wherein Cabalisticall Speculators conceive they read the events of future things [SN: _The Cabala of the Stars._]; and how from the Stars in the head of _Medusa_, to make out the word _Charab_; and thereby desolation presignified unto _Greece_ or _Javan_, numerally characterized in that word, requireth no rigid reader. [SN: Greffarel _out of R._ Chomer.]