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THE SECOND BOOKE 107
Epigrams, than all the sharpe quips and witty girds
wherewith Martiall doth whet and embellish the conclusions
of his. It is the same reason I spake of
erewhile, as Martiall of himselfe. Minns illi ingenio
laborandum fuit, in cuius locum materia successerat : l
'He needed the lesse worke with his wit, in place
whereof matter came in supply.' The former without
being moved or pricked cause themselves to be heard
lowd enough: they have matter to laugh at every
where, and need not tickle themselves; where as these
must have foraine helpe : according as they have lesse
spirit, they must have more body. They leape on
horse-backe, because they are not sufficiently strong in
their legs to march on foot. Even as in our dances,
those base conditioned men that keepe dancing-schooles,
because they are unfit to represent the port and decencie
of our nobilitie, endevour to get commendation by
dangerous lofty trickes, and other strange tumbler-like
friskes and motions. And some Ladies make a better
shew of their countenances in those dances, wherein
are divers changes, cuttings, turnings, and agitations of
the body, than in some dances of state and gravity,
where they need but simply to tread a naturall measure,
represent an unaffected cariage, and their ordinary
grace; And as I have also seene some excellent
Lourdans, or Clownes, attired in their ordinary workyday
clothes, and with a common homely countenance,
affoord us all the pleasure that may be had from their
art: but prentises and learners that are not of so high
a forme, besmeare their faces, to disguise themselves,
and in motions counterfeit strange visages and antickes,
to enduce us to laughter. This my conception is no
where better discerned than in the comparison betweene
Virgils AEneidos and Orlando Furioso. The first is
seene to soare aloft with full-spread wings, and with so
high and strong a pitch, ever following his point; the
other faintly to hover and flutter from tale to tale, and
as it were skipping from bough to bough, alwayes
distrusting his owne wings, except it be for some short
1 MART. Pregf. 1. viii.