It is in connection with the waterways of North Italy that one of the debated questions of Shakespeare's life has arisen: as to how much, or how little, he knew of Italy first hand. But hitherto the commentators have been contented with so little evidence that his references to them have been misinterpreted and the accuracy of the impression that they give, and would give still more distinctly had his editors done him justice, has been denied. A recent writer[38] has set out the facts and some evidence so clearly that there is no need to add to the latter further than has already been done by the few instances just mentioned: a few out of an almost indefinite number which are to be found in the writings of these tourists contemporary with Shakespeare, who are surely the most satisfactory witnesses in a case like this, wholly concerned with what he, if a tourist, would have seen. What they show is that in practically every North Italian town passenger traffic by water formed part of the daily life, and that is the impression clearly shared by Shakespeare. When he represents the passenger traffic in an Italian river being dependent on the tide, it must be remembered that he lived near old London Bridge, where the tidal rush was tremendous; and that for his purpose in writing accuracy did not matter in the very least. Neither is any mistake of his over routes to be compared with one of the careful Villamont, who asserts that he reached Este from Padua by the Brenta and that the Brenta is navigable no farther than Este. Now Este is southwest of Padua and the Brenta reaches the latter from northwest and never gets within seventeen miles of Este; but what is more particularly to be noted is that Villamont's "Voyages" was the book of European travel most frequently reprinted in Shakespeare's lifetime and that the error was never corrected. At the same time, it is, perhaps, worth while laying stress on the fact that no deduction can be made from all this as to whether Shakespeare ever left England or the reverse, because his capacity for using second-hand knowledge was so unique that it may be said of him as can be said of probably no other writer, that it is impossible to make a reasonable guess as to when his knowledge is first-hand and when it is not.