My answer was, that
I thought we were already overstocked with books of travels; that
nothing could now pass which was not extraordinary; wherein I doubted
some authors less consulted truth than their own vanity, or interest, or
the diversion of ignorant readers, that my story could contain little
besides common events, without those ornamental descriptions of strange
plants, trees, birds, and other animals; or of the barbarous customs and
idolatry of savage people, with which most writers abound. However, I
thanked him for his good opinion, and promised to take the matter into
my thoughts.
He said he wondered at one thing very much, which was, to hear me speak
so loud, asking me whether the king or queen of that country were thick
of hearing. I told him it was what I had been used to for above two
years past, and that I wondered as much at the voices of him and his
men, who seemed to me only to whisper, and yet I could hear them well
enough. But when I spoke in that country, it was like a man talking in
the street to another looking out from the top of a steeple, unless when
I was placed on a table, or held in any person's hand. I told him I had
likewise observed another thing, that when I first got into the ship,
and the sailors stood all about me, I thought they were the most
contemptible little creatures I had ever beheld.
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