When I Am Playing With My Cat, How Do I Know That She Is Not Playing With Me? Part 3

In a sense, therefore, Montaigne continues in the very essence of humanism translating and extending our linguistic capacities but keeps going, beyond Latin and Greek, into Dog, Horse, and Partridge, pus.h.i.+ng at the very boundaries of linguistic exchange 'rattling', as he says elsewhere, 'the last fences and barriers of knowledge'.

As a result, animals should never be patronized. Montaigne relates Plutarch's story about how a barber's magpie could imitate anything anyone said. Then one day some trumpeters stopped and blew a fanfare in front of the shop, after which the magpie was 'pensive, mute and melancholy' to the extent that everyone thought the sound had humbled her and made her dumb. All this time, however, she was studying the score in her head, as was seen when she broke forth 'expressing perfectly their melodies, pitches, and variations'. Elephants, Montaigne wonders, may have religion, as after many 'ablutions and purifications' we see them raising their trunks towards the rising sun and 'standing still a long time in meditation and contemplation'.

And some animals may be not only articulate, but numerate: the oxen at the palace of Susa in Persia had been trained to draw up water with a hundred turns a day, but in a bovine work-to-rule refused to work a minute's overturn. We are in our adolescence, Montaigne notes, before we can count this high. And even on the lowest level, creatures have negotiating skills that any Renaissance diplomat would admire. The philosopher Cleanthes patiently puzzled over a parley between two groups of ants, until a worm was paid in ransom and the body of the dead ant in question was chivalrously brought out.

Watching swallows, Montaigne admires their knowledge of raw materials, but also their gentleness in gathering moss for their nests so that 'the tender limbs of their young will lie there more softly and comfortably'. Is there a better ordered society than that of honey bees, asks Montaigne? Spiders know how to slacken and draw in their webs. He notes how animals go to war and tells of how the siege of Tamly was lifted after the besieging army was routed by bees. Moreover, 'upon their return from combat not a bee was missing'. Animals also know how to minister to themselves, notes the hypochondriac Montaigne. Tortoises purge themselves with marjoram. Storks dose themselves with sea-water enemas. Elephants pluck arrows and javelins from not only themselves but the limbs of their masters. To say that this is simply done from nature is to deny them 'science and wisdom'.

But the lesson for Montaigne is that our habitual species arrogance that we think ourselves better than animals could equally well be a symptom of our ignorance: The defect that prevents communication between them and us, why can't it be ours as much as theirs? It is still unknown whose fault it is that we don't understand each other for we understand them no more than they do us. For by the same reason they may think us as brutish as we think them.

And with this, our a.s.sumed moral ascendancy over animals is put into question. According to Democritus, we have learned many of our abilities from animals: the spider to weave and sew, the swallow to build, the swan and the nightingale to sing (one genuinely wonders whether, if birds had not existed, man would have ever have imagined that he could fly). Fish in their iridescent beauty and symmetry are more attractive than ourselves. It is thus a result of the 'vanity' of his imagination that man: attributes divine qualities to himself, withdraws and separates himself from the ma.s.s of other creatures, distributes the shares of the animals, his fellows and companions, and allocates to them such portions of faculties as he himself thinks fit. How does he know, by the efforts of his intelligence, the secret and internal motions of animals? From what comparison between them and us does he conclude the stupidity he attributes to them?

For in many ways, animals seem to be better adapted to life than ourselves, nature 'accompanying and leading them by the hand'. The Greek sceptic Pyrrho was stuck aboard a small boat during a storm, his fellow travellers terrified by the wind and the waves and the thought of death. But Pyrrho noticed a pig on board that was sitting out the tempest with porcine equanimity, pointing him out to his fellow men as an example to follow. 'What good is the knowledge of things,' asks Montaigne, 'if it puts us into a worse condition than Pyrrho's pig?'

And yet against the Cartesian charge that animals lack 'inner' sentience, Montaigne tells how, just as he is able conjure up an image of Paris by the power of his imagination, the same privilege, I say, seems clearly evident in animals: for a horse accustomed to trumpets, arquebuses, and warfare, we see twitching, and trembling in his sleep, as he lies on his straw, even as if he were in the midst of things. It is clear that he conceives in his mind the sound of a drum without noise, an army without arms or body...The hare that a greyhound imagines in a dream, after which we see him panting, stretching out his tail, twitching his thighs, and perfectly representing the movements of the chase: it is a hare without fur, without bones.

In their dreams, their hopes, their desires and unconscious fears, animals are no different from ourselves, if only we bothered to look. He relates an episode that occurred during the conquest of Mexico: When the Spaniards first arrived among the newly discovered people of the Indies, the Mexicans had such an opinion of them and their horses, that they saw them as G.o.ds and animals enn.o.bled above their nature. Some, after they were conquered, and coming to ask for peace and forgiveness, bearing gold and provisions, did not fail to offer the same to the horses, with the same language they had used to the men, and interpreting their neighing for a language of conciliation and truce.

It is a complex moment of cultural and zoological translation. A less interested writer would view the actions of the Aztecs as stupidly mistaken, and make a joke. But Montaigne doesn't. What he notices is that, free of 'civilized' a.s.sumptions, the Aztecs saw something that the Spaniards hadn't that their horses might be sophisticated creatures with the ability to communicate. But what is interesting is the way Montaigne leaves the Spaniards out of the discussion, in which a truce of friends.h.i.+p and trust is sealed, not between themselves and the Aztecs, but between the Aztecs and the horses. In a moment of conquest the Spaniards are kept in the dark, and in triumph are outwitted, without even knowing it.

Animals thus offer a chastening reminder of our place in creation, and Montaigne recognizes 'a certain commerce, between them and us, and a certain mutual obligation': 'We live, both them and us, under the same roof and inhale the same air: there is, save for more or less, a perpetual resemblance between us.' He thus confesses to a nature so childishly tender that he 'cannot easily refuse my dog when he offers to play with me, even at an inopportune moment'. Moreover, humanity has a 'duty' not only to animals but also 'to trees and plants'; he notes how the immoderation of our appet.i.te has outstripped 'all the inventions by which we attempt to satisfy it'. All this he says in order 'to bring us back and join in the great ma.s.s of creation' and see 'the resemblance there is in all living things'.

But what is equally important for Montaigne is what animals reveal about ourselves. And here they serve not simply as a check on our presumption, but as a guide to the trail that leads out of our sceptical enclosure: that there might be another answer to the question Que scais-je? Que scais-je? but one to which we have almost become blind. but one to which we have almost become blind.

For as Montaigne annotated his final edition of the Essays Essays in the years before his death, he added to his disquisition on animals a livelier image, but one that perhaps helps to sum up his att.i.tude as a whole: in the years before his death, he added to his disquisition on animals a livelier image, but one that perhaps helps to sum up his att.i.tude as a whole: When I am playing with my cat, how do I know she is not playing with me?

The phrase has become famous as an expression of Montaignean scepticism i.e. we don't know whether pets are playing with us or not; we are too ignorant to ever really know (and here one might emphasize the literal sense of the original French: 'qui scait si elle pa.s.se son temps de moy plus que je ne fay d'elle?' / 'who knows if she pa.s.ses her time more with me than I do with her?'). That is to say, rather than her being his his pet, is he pet, is he hers hers? (Or, as the seventeenth-century writer Samuel Butler cynically quipped: 'As Montaigne, playing with his cat, / Complains she thought him but an a.s.s ...') But Montaigne then goes on to make another addition to his essay, one that survives in the posthumously published 1595 edition: We ourselves entertain with similar apish tricks. If I have my hour to begin or refuse, also she has hers.

And here it is clear that Montaigne is saying that he does does know she is playing with him, as he is able to see his own experience (of wanting or refusing to play) reflected in her actions. Once he overcomes his 'natural presumption' of species superiority, he is able to read and understand her movements and gestures, as she can his. And significant here is the s.h.i.+ft from the 'I' and the 'she' to the reflexive 'we' ('Nous nous entretenons ...'). From a position of separation and distance, of two separate ident.i.ties, two different species, Montaigne and his cat become, in their mutual playfulness, one. Not exactly one soul in two bodies, but two bodies sharing the same movements, gestures, and thoughts. know she is playing with him, as he is able to see his own experience (of wanting or refusing to play) reflected in her actions. Once he overcomes his 'natural presumption' of species superiority, he is able to read and understand her movements and gestures, as she can his. And significant here is the s.h.i.+ft from the 'I' and the 'she' to the reflexive 'we' ('Nous nous entretenons ...'). From a position of separation and distance, of two separate ident.i.ties, two different species, Montaigne and his cat become, in their mutual playfulness, one. Not exactly one soul in two bodies, but two bodies sharing the same movements, gestures, and thoughts.

But the important point is that this reciprocal awareness is achieved not despite their lack of linguistic exchange, but because of it: because of it: it is a proximate language of touch and gesture, of caresses and playful taps that brings about a mutual understanding. And in his additions to the Bordeaux edition he goes on to expand: it is a proximate language of touch and gesture, of caresses and playful taps that brings about a mutual understanding. And in his additions to the Bordeaux edition he goes on to expand: Plato, in his picture of the golden age under Saturn, considered among the princ.i.p.al advantages of man during that time was his communication with animals; by inquiring and receiving instruction from them, he knew the true qualities and differences of each of them, acquiring as a result a greater understanding and wisdom and conducting his life far more happily than we are able to do now.

Animals, themselves in touch with the 'necessary, tangible and palpable' benefits of nature, can thus serve to instruct man. And whilst we think we cannot communicate with them, the truth is that we once could, and in fact still can: 'They fawn on us, threaten us, demand of us, and we them.' He tells how horses form 'a certain acquaintance with one another' and greet each other 'with joy and demonstrations of goodwill'. Moreover, this free and frank communication is shared not only within 'the same species, but also of different species'. He goes on to note examples of affection flouris.h.i.+ng between animals and humans, such as Plutarch's reluctance to sell an old and faithful ox; or the elephant who courted an Alexandrian flower-girl with fruit before slipping his trunk into her blouse in order to 'tastoit les tettins', as Montaigne puts it.

But what is most important for Montaigne is how this recognition of animal communication is a springboard to a new conception of the human: how despite their sectarian divisions where there seems to be 'more difference between one man and another than between some animals and some men' this divisiveness might be able to be overcome. And what is also significant is that it is a restoration that flies in the face of Montaigne's entire humanist education. He therefore observes how deaf mutes: dispute, argue, and tell stories by signs. I have seen some so supple and practised in it that in truth they were not short of perfection in their ability to make themselves understood. Lovers grow angry, become reconciled, beg, give thanks, make a.s.signations, and in short, say everything with their eyes.

He quotes Torquato Ta.s.so on the capacity of silence itself to entreat and talk, and speculates that speech is not necessarily natural or essential. And then, in a lengthy comment added to his final edition, Montaigne completes the circle from animal-to-human to human-to-human again, concluding that we cannot help but communicate ourselves in some way, that our own our own movements ' movements 'converse and discourse' even if it is something to which we are habitually blind: even if it is something to which we are habitually blind: What of the hands? We request, we promise, call, dismiss, menace, pray, supplicate, deny, refuse, interrogate, admire, count, confess, repent, fear, are ashamed, doubt, instruct, command, incite, encourage, swear, testify, accuse, condemn, absolve, insult, despise, challenge, taunt, flatter, applaud, bless, humiliate, mock, reconcile, recommend, exalt, congratulate, rejoice, complain, grieve, despair, depress, are astonished, exclaim, keep quiet and with a manifold variation that is the envy of the tongue. With the head we invite, dismiss, avow, disavow, contradict, welcome, honour, revere, disdain, demand, spurn, enliven, lament, caress, rebuke, submit, defy, exhort, menace, a.s.sure, inquire. What of the eyebrows? What of the shoulders? There is not a movement that does not speak, and in a language intelligible without instruction, a language that is common to all. From which it follows, seeing the variety and differences between other languages, that this one ought to be judged the true language of human nature.

The true language of human nature of course we would be wrong to take it as a serious proposition that we should use gestures instead of words. But what is interesting about Montaigne's list is that it incorporates friends.h.i.+p but also enmity: we flatter, honour and welcome, but also menace, rebuke and defy. Even when we think we are severing human relations we are forging them. And this opens the way to a cautious optimism: that despite the rifts and divisions opened up by civil war, people retain the ability to communicate with each other. Our bodies are engaged in a form of commerce that ties us together, despite the differences in our thoughts as Montaigne, inspired by the example of animals observes: of course we would be wrong to take it as a serious proposition that we should use gestures instead of words. But what is interesting about Montaigne's list is that it incorporates friends.h.i.+p but also enmity: we flatter, honour and welcome, but also menace, rebuke and defy. Even when we think we are severing human relations we are forging them. And this opens the way to a cautious optimism: that despite the rifts and divisions opened up by civil war, people retain the ability to communicate with each other. Our bodies are engaged in a form of commerce that ties us together, despite the differences in our thoughts as Montaigne, inspired by the example of animals observes: There are certain inclinations of affection that are sometimes born in us without the advice of reason, coming from an accident of fortune which others call sympathy; of this animals are as capable as ourselves.

Despite our political and religious differences, men have an inbuilt disposition towards communication, and the recognition of this will allow truth or rather trust to find a way through.

Montaigne's fascination with animals is, of course, built up out of a piebald congregation of fact and half-fact, anecdote, fable and s.h.a.ggy-dog tales. And although we cannot really learn anything in detail about animals from Montaigne, about their real behaviour, or whether they are or are not 'conscious' (although whether such issues should be seen as the basis of our actions towards them is a moot point), what we can learn is that it is sometimes useful to let our minds off the leash for a moment. Unlike Descartes and many later thinkers, Montaigne doesn't erect a fence between ourselves and animals, but sees human beings as part of the greater chain of creation what we would now call evolution a fact that makes him more humane than many writers before or since.

And perhaps this belief that animals can tell us something about ourselves, even in terms of what we lack, was maybe Wittgenstein's motive in reading Black Beauty Black Beauty as he lay dying of throat cancer in Cambridge in 1951. Wittgenstein had a keen interest in the worldview of other creatures. His as he lay dying of throat cancer in Cambridge in 1951. Wittgenstein had a keen interest in the worldview of other creatures. His Philosophical Investigations Philosophical Investigations features a duck-rabbit, a goose, a cow, a lion and a hypocritical dog. Whilst staying in a remote cottage in Connemara on the west coast of Ireland, he would tame robins and chaffinches to eat from his hand. It was said that he cla.s.sified his Cambridge colleagues in terms of the animals they most resembled. He may also, it has been claimed, have suffered from Asperger's syndrome manifested in his craving for order and predictability and a difficulty in dealing with the complexity of normal human affairs. features a duck-rabbit, a goose, a cow, a lion and a hypocritical dog. Whilst staying in a remote cottage in Connemara on the west coast of Ireland, he would tame robins and chaffinches to eat from his hand. It was said that he cla.s.sified his Cambridge colleagues in terms of the animals they most resembled. He may also, it has been claimed, have suffered from Asperger's syndrome manifested in his craving for order and predictability and a difficulty in dealing with the complexity of normal human affairs.

Hence, perhaps, his interest in Black Beauty: The Autobiography of a Horse Black Beauty: The Autobiography of a Horse, written by the invalided Anna Sewell in 1877 to educate people in the suffering experienced by horses. Sewell's brave innovation was to narrate the story purely from the horse's point of view, announcing on the t.i.tle page: 'translated from the equine'. We thus hear of Beauty's working life and his dealings with his sometimes kind, but often cruel, human owners. But at the end of the book he is put out to pasture, and here, on the last page, finally recovers his natural equanimity: Willie always speaks to me when he can, and treats me as his special friend. My ladies have promised that I shall never be sold, and so I have nothing to fear; and here my story ends. My troubles are all over, and I am at home; and often before I am quite awake, I fancy I am still in the orchard at Birtwick, standing with my old friends under the apple-trees.

Wittgenstein had spent much of his life philosophizing about how one might give up philosophy. Here, as he lay at the end of his brilliant but somewhat lonely life, might he have glimpsed such a vision in Beauty's last days: a moment of tranquillity, with friends near to hand, untroubled by the squalls and hurricanes of philosophical doubt: finally, philosophically, 'at home'?

For Montaigne, like Wittgenstein, animals are interesting because they help us to think about such things. For Montaigne, his cat similarly allows him think about stepping outside himself, to think about what it is to be her, and therefore to think what it is to be himself. And here, although there are no firm conclusions, he seems to imply that we can learn as much from comparing as we can by contrasting ourselves to other creatures as Charles Darwin was to do three centuries later in his Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals of 1872. of 1872.

But here we are back with catus: catus: the cat-like cunning that the Romans recognized in what is now for us simply a noun. Did this linguistic overlap between animal and human result from an intellectual simplicity but also a maturity, as manifested in their belief in satyrs and centaurs and fauns? And was this perhaps the reason for Laetus' inclusion of the cat on his daughter's gravestone: to give a more meaningful account of her essence, an essence that wasn't an essence, but a babbling menagerie of her gestures and actions an unfinished symphony of animal, human, female, feline, playful, c.o.c.kerel, the cat-like cunning that the Romans recognized in what is now for us simply a noun. Did this linguistic overlap between animal and human result from an intellectual simplicity but also a maturity, as manifested in their belief in satyrs and centaurs and fauns? And was this perhaps the reason for Laetus' inclusion of the cat on his daughter's gravestone: to give a more meaningful account of her essence, an essence that wasn't an essence, but a babbling menagerie of her gestures and actions an unfinished symphony of animal, human, female, feline, playful, c.o.c.kerel, catus catus?

We will never know. The cat maintains its marble-eyed constancy. But perhaps, as Montaigne says, there is sometimes wisdom in not speaking, a thing that we do well to remember. He tells how the amba.s.sador of Abdera spoke to King Agis of Sparta at great length, then asked what answer he should take back to his citizens. The King replied: 'That I let you say whatever you wanted, for as long as you wanted, without even saying a word.'

'Wasn't that an intelligent and eloquent silence?' remarks Montaigne.

7.

To Rub and Polish Our Brains with Others

Route of Montaigne's trip to Italy, 158081 (ill.u.s.trations credit 7.1) (ill.u.s.trations credit 7.1)

With the 'Apology for Raymond Sebond' as its intellectual centrepiece, Montaigne put the finis.h.i.+ng touches to what would be the first edition of his work, bought paper laid with a heart-shaped watermark, and took his ma.n.u.script downstream to the printing house of Simon Millanges in Bordeaux. He was forty-seven, and recorded the date as 1 March 1580, at the end of the address 'To the Reader' that he placed at the front of his book: You have here a book of good faith, reader. It tells you at the outset that I have here proposed to myself no other aim but a domestic and private one. I have here had no consideration for your service or my glory. My powers are not capable of such a design. I have dedicated it to the particular commodity of my family and friends, so that when they have lost me (which they must do soon), they will here retrieve some traits of my conditions and humours, and by that nourish entirely and vividly the knowledge they had of me. Had my intention been to seek the world's favour, I should have adorned myself with borrowed beauties, or have strained to draw myself up into my best posture. I want to be seen here in my simple, natural, and ordinary manner, without exertion or artifice: for it is myself I paint. My defects are there to be read to the life, and my natural form, so far as public decency permits me. If I had been placed among those nations which they say still live under the sweet liberty of the laws of nature, I a.s.sure you I would have most willingly have painted myself entirely and fully naked.

The final months had been a terrible scramble to get the text ready, with the pirated publication of La Boetie's On Voluntary Servitude On Voluntary Servitude ruining his plans to include it in his text, and the loss of an essay to a pilfering lackey. Montaigne needed a break. ruining his plans to include it in his text, and the loss of an essay to a pilfering lackey. Montaigne needed a break.

And so a couple of months later, on 22 June, Montaigne loaded up horses and cart with food and clothing, copies of the Essays Essays and barrels of wine, and set off on a seventeen-month trip through Switzerland, Germany, Austria, and Italy to Rome. Rome was the spiritual heartland of the Renaissance, yet his secretary writes that Montaigne would just as easily have gone off the beaten track to Poland, Greece or someplace else. However, the opinions of his travelling companions prevailed; these were his youngest brother Bertrand de Mattecoulon, his brother-in-law Bernard de Cazalis, young Charles d'Estissac and a Monsieur du Hautoy, as well as a number of servants. Nonetheless, they often criticized Montaigne for leading them astray, to which he would testily reply that he 'was not going anywhere except where he found himself, and that he could not lose or go off his way, since he had no plan but to travel in unknown places'. and barrels of wine, and set off on a seventeen-month trip through Switzerland, Germany, Austria, and Italy to Rome. Rome was the spiritual heartland of the Renaissance, yet his secretary writes that Montaigne would just as easily have gone off the beaten track to Poland, Greece or someplace else. However, the opinions of his travelling companions prevailed; these were his youngest brother Bertrand de Mattecoulon, his brother-in-law Bernard de Cazalis, young Charles d'Estissac and a Monsieur du Hautoy, as well as a number of servants. Nonetheless, they often criticized Montaigne for leading them astray, to which he would testily reply that he 'was not going anywhere except where he found himself, and that he could not lose or go off his way, since he had no plan but to travel in unknown places'.

Our knowledge of the trip comes from the Travel Journal Travel Journal that Montaigne wrote on the way, a large part of which he dictated to a secretary, who transcribed it in the third person, the remainder of which he penned himself, writing in Italian in Italy and in French when returning home. Later he used his that Montaigne wrote on the way, a large part of which he dictated to a secretary, who transcribed it in the third person, the remainder of which he penned himself, writing in Italian in Italy and in French when returning home. Later he used his Travel Journal Travel Journal to augment the subsequent editions of the to augment the subsequent editions of the Essays Essays adding details about the bathhouses of Italy, the cruelty of public executions, and the madness of the Italian poet Torquato Ta.s.so, whom he visited in Ferrara. But for the next two hundred years the ma.n.u.script was lost. It was eventually found by a local historian in a trunk at the chateau and published in 1774, only for its pages to be then scattered in the whirlwind of the French Revolution. Our knowledge of the adding details about the bathhouses of Italy, the cruelty of public executions, and the madness of the Italian poet Torquato Ta.s.so, whom he visited in Ferrara. But for the next two hundred years the ma.n.u.script was lost. It was eventually found by a local historian in a trunk at the chateau and published in 1774, only for its pages to be then scattered in the whirlwind of the French Revolution. Our knowledge of the Travel Journal Travel Journal thus goes back to this eighteenth-century edition, which records the missing first two pages of the ma.n.u.script in an opening worthy of Gabriel Garcia Marquez: thus goes back to this eighteenth-century edition, which records the missing first two pages of the ma.n.u.script in an opening worthy of Gabriel Garcia Marquez: ...Monsieur de Montaigne dispatched Monsieur de Mattecoulon post-haste with the said groom to visit the said Count, and found that his wounds were not fatal.

We therefore never discover the ident.i.ty of the Count visited by Montaigne's brother, the nature of his injuries, nor, more generally, Montaigne's reasons for setting off in the first place.

The most likely explanations are to do with getting away from France and its religious wars and his sense of frustration at the responsibilities of household management. He may also have been feeling flush as a result of the growth of his estate. But he had other more personal reasons, too. Since the spring of 1578 Montaigne had been suffering increasingly from kidneys stones, and at the end of his first edition of the Essays Essays we learn how he had tried the mineral baths of Chaudes-Aigues and Bagneres as a possible cure. The we learn how he had tried the mineral baths of Chaudes-Aigues and Bagneres as a possible cure. The Travel Journal Travel Journal shows his desire to pursue the same cure in the mineral baths of Italy, especially the famous baths at Bagni di Lucca. Montaigne's journey thus becomes a voyage round his own body, as he plots the path of kidney stones through it, the movement of food and water into and out of it, to such an extent that nineteenth-century editors were so offended that they cut the riper sections out. shows his desire to pursue the same cure in the mineral baths of Italy, especially the famous baths at Bagni di Lucca. Montaigne's journey thus becomes a voyage round his own body, as he plots the path of kidney stones through it, the movement of food and water into and out of it, to such an extent that nineteenth-century editors were so offended that they cut the riper sections out.

The other reason for Montaigne's trip was simply to travel: 'My object is only to keep in motion so long as the motion pleases me.' Travelling at the time was seen as a necessary evil, an uncomfortable and often dangerous activity. But Montaigne sees the benefits as outweighing the irritations 'travelling does me no injury except in regard to the expense'. He had not seen the world through military service as had his father (who had also written his own journal of his travels to Italy). And there is a sense of him attempting to recapture his lost youth: at the time of setting off he was forty-seven and his companions were all at least twenty years younger. Travel thus became a way of restoring his own vitality: Travel is in my opinion a profitable exercise. The soul is there continually exercised in noticing new and unknown things, and I do not know a better school...in which to model life than by constantly suggesting to it the diversity of so many other lives, fancies and customs, and by allowing it to taste the perpetual variety of forms of our nature.

His secretary writes of the 'pleasure he took in visiting strange countries' which made him forget 'the weakness of his health and his age'. By travelling, Montaigne declares, one can 'rub and polish one's brain' through contact with others. And he displays an almost anthropological awareness of the body language and customs of other cultures as well as a backpacker's obsession with them not ripping him off.

In the first section of his journey, Montaigne travels from his home to Paris, stopping off to present Henry III with a copy of the Essays Essays. He then goes on to witness the siege of the Protestant-held La Fere, seventy miles to the north, before setting off along the banks of the Marne, down through eastern France and into Switzerland and Germany.

As Montaigne gets into his stride what emerges is his sense of the contrasts to his own country. In Germany he describes the variations in the time-keeping in the towns he visits how in Germany the clocks strike the quarter hours, even the minutes (in Italy, clocks were much more uncommon, much to his chagrin). He records the price of horses, the size of loaves, the shape of hats, the types of wood available and how the villagers of Remiremont pay their yearly rent in snow. And if he doesn't understand, he asks. At the entrance to Lindau he notices an old wall, lacking any inscription, and upon asking around finds that its name in German means simply 'Old Wall'.

But what is also interesting is Montaigne's taste for the extraordinary, an intellectual disposition which is characteristic of the pre-scientific belief that Nature is understood not through the a.s.sembling of commonplaces but through the surprises that it has in store. He notes the echoes of the horses' hooves as he rides through the mountains, surrounding the traveller with a constant drumming. And at the baths of Plombieres he meets the seigneur of d'Andelot, whose mourning for his brother had left a physical mark: Some of his beard was totally white, and a part of one eyebrow; and he told Monsieur de Montaigne that the change had come upon him in an instant, one day that he was at home full of grief at the death of one of his brothers, whom the Duke of Alva had put to death...his head was resting on his hand in that place and in such a way that those who were present thought it was some flour which had somehow fallen on it. It has remained so ever since.

He meets a Cremona merchant with dementia who cannot finish his Paternoster 'never aware at the end that he had started, nor at the beginning that he had come to the end' and who, somehow appropriately, wears a wide feather-brimmed hat. He visits the stables of the Duke of Florence, where he sees a strange sheep, a camel, and something 'the size of a very large mastiff in the shape of a cat, all patterned in black and white, which they call a tiger'.

Montaigne also exhibits an eager practical and technological interest, the mindset that was to become properly a.s.sembled in the scientific revolution. He learns from a carpenter how the number of rings on a tree are equal to its age, and sees the lathe and woodworking tools of the Duke of Poggio ('a very great mechanic' in his spare time). He visits a silver mine, a playing card factory and describes the workings of a water pump, a siphon, and a clockwork spit. He is called upon by Doctor Burro, of the University of Rome, who presents him with his book on the ebb and flow of the sea.

Some of his greatest wonderment is reserved for plumbing. In the ornamental gardens of Pratolino, he records how spouts drench the unwary tourist and water seeps from a marble washerwoman's laundry. At the Villa di Castello in Florence he sees a statue of the Apennines in the shape of an old man, 'from whose beard, forehead and hair water is constantly flowing, drop by drop, in order to represent sweat and tears'. He is tickled by the hydraulic horseplay of the gardens of the Fuggers in Augsburg, where 'thin, hard jets of water, to the height of man's head, fill the petticoats and thighs of the ladies with this coolness', taking them by surprise.

And he relaxes. He laughs at some comedians. He sends some actresses some fish. He enters a raffle (comes second), and rates the beauty of the famous prost.i.tutes of Florence ('nothing special'). He goes shopping for souvenirs, buying a hooped silver barrel, an Indian cane, a vase and some Indian nut (good for the spleen). He visits the Vatican library and inspects Aristotle's untidy handwriting. He goes sledging down Mont Cenis: 'a pleasant bit of sport, without much risk'.

The quality of the hotels also provides a diversion: the Post at Piacenza is the best, the Falcon at Pavia the worst, and the Bear in Rome is very good (it still survives as an expensive restaurant). Here he was well treated, 'with three fine bedrooms, a dining-room, a larder, stable, kitchen, for twenty crowns a month, for which the landlord provided a cook and fire for the kitchen'.

And throughout, Montaigne remains constantly mindful of his n.o.bility. He presents his favourite lodgings with a plaque bearing his coat of arms (azure powdered with trefoils). At Sterzing he dismisses the local schoolmaster as nothing but 'a fool'. In Rome he is so eager to salute another gentleman that he pokes himself in the eye (although from this incident he manages to salvage a joke, about the right thumb becoming left (sinistre = left/evil). But he can be deliberately vague about his status, in order that he might be mistaken for a baron or a knight, the equivalent of being upgraded to first cla.s.s. Yet faced with an impertinent Italian coach-driver he returns to form, delivering him a box around the ears, thus proving the old saw that a true gentleman never hesitates before acting ungentlemanly. = left/evil). But he can be deliberately vague about his status, in order that he might be mistaken for a baron or a knight, the equivalent of being upgraded to first cla.s.s. Yet faced with an impertinent Italian coach-driver he returns to form, delivering him a box around the ears, thus proving the old saw that a true gentleman never hesitates before acting ungentlemanly.

But what makes Montaigne one of the most interesting travellers of the age is his genuine interest in the historical forces that were sweeping across Europe. As he enters Germany he moves into foreign territory, not only politically, but religiously, as the homeland of the Reformation. Here Montaigne attempts to put his own beliefs on hold and inquire about the progress of reform on the ground. At Isny, he goes and seeks out the local minister, and gets into a theological discussion over dinner. Here he plays devil's advocate, relaying the Calvinist criticism that Luther's teaching implies that G.o.d is not only in the host, but everywhere. At this things get a little heated, and 'this doctor denied with loud words this imputation, and defended himself from it as from a calumny' (something that he did not do 'very well', Montaigne snorts to his journal). But at least he has the decency to escort Montaigne and d'Estissac to ma.s.s at a local monastery, where he stands aside and watches them at their prayers, albeit with his hat firmly on his head.

In Augsburg, perhaps the finest town in Germany, Montaigne sees Protestantism on the make. He visits a new Lutheran church which looks like a great college hall, bare of images, organs or crosses, the walls instead covered with verses from the Bible. And he notes the congregation is two or three times the size of the Catholic one. In Kempen he asks the minister whether dancing is allowed ('Of course'), and why the newly constructed organ has images of Christ painted on it when the old images on the church had been erased. This the minister blames on the Zwinglians' iconoclastic zeal, having no objection to images himself, provided they are not mistaken for the real thing. Warming to this inquisitive French n.o.bleman, the minister, a Johannes Tilia.n.u.s from Augsburg, invites him to his home and shows him his library 'a handsome one, and well kitted-out'.

Elsewhere, pockets of the old Catholic superst.i.tion remain. At the Church of the Holy Cross in Augsburg Montaigne sees displayed a host that had turned into flesh, describing it as a little morsel 'with the redness of skin'. In Seefeld, the town is still in awe of the man who was swallowed up to his neck by the ground after greedily asking for a piece of the priest's larger Eucharist. You could still see the hole into which he plummeted, now covered with a grating, and the impression on the altar where he had desperately clung on.

Yet the Counter-Reformation's attempt to reform these superst.i.tions is also under way. In Landsberg he goes to see the Jesuits, who are busy building a fine new church. If anyone here even dreams of any religion other than the Catholic, remarks Montaigne, 'he had better keep it quiet'. In Augsburg he also visits the Jesuits, finding some 'very learned'. But reform is rarely straightforward. In Icking the Jesuits have caused a commotion by forcing the priests to give up their concubines, who now complain so bitterly to the Duke that you would think what was merely tolerated 'was practised as if it was legitimate'.

But in traversing these religious boundaries Montaigne is quick to see the ironies and inconsistencies of religious zeal. The irascible Lutheran at Isny says brazenly over supper that he would 'rather hear a hundred ma.s.ses than partic.i.p.ate in the Calvinist communion'. In Italy, particularly in Rome, many of the churches have few images, and some old churches none at all. Moreover, raw from the French civil wars, Montaigne records optimistically the places where the two faiths peacefully cohabit. In Augsburg marriages of Lutherans and Catholics are common, 'the keener party submitting to the rules of the other'. Indeed the landlord of his inn, The Linden-Tree, is Catholic and his wife Lutheran. And a good ec.u.menical team they make too, with their G.o.dly-clean house with its washed staircase covered in linen, and no sign of cobwebs or dirt.

South of Augsburg there is no more talk of Protestantism, and the Italian language starts about two leagues (about six miles) along the road to Trent. But as he pa.s.ses into Italy, a slightly disapproving tone enters Montaigne's journal. He visits the Jesuates of St Jerome, a sort of religious order, the majority of whom he describes as 'ignorant', dressed in brown robes and little white hats, who spend their time distilling an orange liqueur. In Verona the men chat during ma.s.s with their hats on, only pausing during the elevation of the host. And again in Rome it 'seems strange' to Montaigne to see the Pope and his cardinals gossiping during the service. On Maundy Thursday he watches the Pope standing on the steps of St Peter's excommunicating 'an infinite number of people', including 'the Huguenots by that very name', and any princes who had seized Church lands at the mention of whose names the cardinals de Medici and Caraffa 'laughed very heartily'. And in St Giovanni he again observes the slightly relaxed conduct of Catholicism as the Cardinal of San Sisto, sitting in the place usually taken by a penitent, taps the congregation on the head with a long wand as they pa.s.s, but courteously and smilingly so, and all the more 'according to their status and beauty'.

In Pisa theological standards plummet to a new low when the priests of the Cathedral and the friars of St Francesco get into a fight. It starts with an argument about who should conduct the funeral of a wealthy paris.h.i.+oner, but like a rookie reporter Montaigne gets down there as fast as he can, and constructs a blow-by-blow account: A priest, approaching the high altar, tried to take hold of the marble table. A friar attempted to drag him away. To whom the vicar, patron of this church of priests, gave a slap. Little by little, one thing led to another, and they came to fisticuffs, using sticks, candlesticks, torches and suchlike they used everything.

Needless to say, the rich man's funeral ma.s.s went unsaid.

But Montaigne also witnesses a more sinister side to theological power. During Holy Week in Rome a priest displays the shroud, the cloth bearing Christ's image used by St Veronica to wipe his face: 'a repulsive face', Montaigne observes, 'in dark and sombre colours'. On seeing it the crowd become ecstatic, one woman stretched out, raving and screaming, 'said to be possessed'. And when Montaigne comes across an exorcist treating another demoniac a melancholic, 'who seemed half dead' a sinister religious puppetry seems to be at work: They were holding him on his knees in front of the altar, with some kind of cloth around his neck by which they held him tight. The priest read from his breviary a number of prayers and exorcisms in his presence, commanding the Devil to leave his body. After this he directed his remarks to the patient, now speaking to him, now to the Devil in person, and then abusing him, hitting him hard with his fist, and spitting in his face. The patient responded to his demands with a few inept replies: now for himself, saying how he felt the stirrings of his affliction; now for the Devil, saying how he feared G.o.d, and how these exorcisms were effective against him.

After taking the pyx, the container in which the Eucharist is carried, and burning some candles by turning them upside down, the priest's imprecations reach a crescendo. He then unties the man and gives him back to his people to take home. He explains to the a.s.sembled spectators that this was one of the worst sort of obstinate devils, who took a great deal of work to cast out. Only the day before he had exorcized a woman, who had spat out nails, pins and tufts of hair. But when someone objects that she has still not recovered, he replies that she was now possessed by a lighter devil, 'for he knew their names, their divisions and particular distinctions'. Noting the absence of nails and hair in the present case, Montaigne's final observation seems sceptical, and perhaps, as a fellow lawyer (and fellow human being), his possessive 'my' shows he was touched with compa.s.sion: My man made no sign except to grind his teeth and twist his mouth when they presented the Corpus Domini Corpus Domini to him, and occasionally mouthed these words: to him, and occasionally mouthed these words: Si fata volent Si fata volent [If the fates will]; for he was a notary, and knew a little Latin. [If the fates will]; for he was a notary, and knew a little Latin.

Such moments are useful in balancing our view of Montaigne, who in the Essays Essays professes an ostensibly conservative Catholicism, but who in his professes an ostensibly conservative Catholicism, but who in his Travel Journal Travel Journal a book not intended for publication displays a more complex response: a questioning, slightly dissatisfied att.i.tude towards the Church, even if, in the end, he is prepared to give it the benefit of the doubt. a book not intended for publication displays a more complex response: a questioning, slightly dissatisfied att.i.tude towards the Church, even if, in the end, he is prepared to give it the benefit of the doubt.

For Montaigne still finds much to admire in Catholicism. The a.s.sembled devotion of the people moves him, especially in Holy Week when at night 'the whole city seemed to be in flames...every man bearing a torch, and almost always of white wax'. And he witnesses how the Pope's absolute power also encompa.s.ses forgiveness. On Palm Sunday he finds a boy sitting by the altar of the church, dressed in blue taffeta with a crown of olive branches and a lighted torch: 'He was a boy of fifteen or thereabouts, who, by the Pope's order had that day been liberated from prison. He had killed another boy.'

But in terms of the grandeur of Rome, the terminus ad quem terminus ad quem of many Renaissance travellers, Montaigne seems equivocal. The humanistic impulse to travel saw the goal of the Grand Tour in terms of an exposure to cla.s.sical civilization: where all roads cultural, intellectual and moral led to Rome, and with it a universal model of human perfection. But in his journal, Montaigne strikes a sceptical note, emphasizing the distance and irretrievability of antiquity, seeing it as a Renaissance or rebirth that will never reach full term, in a peroration that his secretary scrambles to take down: of many Renaissance travellers, Montaigne seems equivocal. The humanistic impulse to travel saw the goal of the Grand Tour in terms of an exposure to cla.s.sical civilization: where all roads cultural, intellectual and moral led to Rome, and with it a universal model of human perfection. But in his journal, Montaigne strikes a sceptical note, emphasizing the distance and irretrievability of antiquity, seeing it as a Renaissance or rebirth that will never reach full term, in a peroration that his secretary scrambles to take down: He said 'that one saw nothing of Rome but the sky under which it had been founded and the outline of its form; that the knowledge he had of it was abstract and contemplative, and founded on nothing perceptible to the senses...It often happened that after digging a long way down into the ground, they would only find the head of a very high column, which was still standing on its feet down below...It is easy to see that many streets are more than thirty feet below those of the present day.'

It is a speech that might be said to represent the end of the Renaissance and the beginning of modernity: where scepticism dislodges humanism from the driving seat of intellectual life.

But in its place Montaigne also ushers in a new sense of the importance of travel, one that places less emphasis on history and antiquity and more on the here and now. In his essay 'Of the Education of Children' Montaigne thus explores the idea that life is an education in itself, of which travel provides one of the most important lessons: but not in the fas.h.i.+on of our French n.o.bles, simply to report on the length of Pantheon, or the sumptuousness of Signora Livia's drawers, or, like some others, how much longer or fatter the face of Nero is on some old ruin rather than on some medal; but to report mainly on the humours and manners of those nations, and to rub and polish our brains with others.

And in his 1580 edition of the Essays Essays he emphasizes the sociable nature of travel: 'the pleasure of visiting many kinsmen and friends whom I have on the way, of the society which resorts there'. And this is borne out in the he emphasizes the sociable nature of travel: 'the pleasure of visiting many kinsmen and friends whom I have on the way, of the society which resorts there'. And this is borne out in the Travel Journal Travel Journal, where he displays a more ethnological outlook, an interest in the rituals and habits, movements and gestures of everyday life. And here, despite Montaigne's effort to fit in, speaking and writing in Italian when in Italy, his foreignness also bestows a certain privilege: silencing the distracting chatter of language, and allowing him to observe the grammar of human behaviour close at hand.

In Tuscany and Urbino he notes how the women curtsey in the French fas.h.i.+on, bending at the knees. In Baden you salute the ladies by kissing your hand and offering to touch their hand. They will simply stand still, as is their custom, or if you are lucky, slightly incline their head. In Germany, out of deference, you pa.s.s to the left of a man, leaving him free to put his hand to his weapon. And in Kempen Montaigne witnesses a modest wedding, but does not say so at first, leaving the simple actions and movements of the parties to speak for themselves: After the sermon the other minister went and placed himself at the altar with his face turned towards the people, having a book in his hand; a young woman presented herself to him, her head bare and her hair loose, who made a little curtsey, in the fas.h.i.+on of the country, and stood there alone. Soon a young man, who was an artisan, with a sword at his side, also came up and placed himself by the side of the woman. The minister said some words into their ear, and then told each of them to say the Paternoster, and then began to read out of a book. They were certain rules for those getting married; and he made them touch hands, one to the other, without kissing.

Even the most ancient rituals, he notes, are moulded by locals customs, some receiving the Eucharist into their mouths and others reaching out to take it in their hands.

The poor also have their own conventions and customs. In Florence he is struck by the forwardness of the beggars, not only for their aggressiveness, but their hauteur: 'Give me alms, won't you!', or 'Give me something, do you hear!'; a Roman beggar similarly accosts Montaigne's conscience: 'Do good, for your own sake!' (It is whilst giving out money that Montaigne loses his wallet, dropping it through the vents in his breeches.) In Bagni di Lucca the locals display their local affiliation to the local French and Spanish factions by wearing flowers. In an attempt to fit in, Montaigne puts a flower in his left ear only to upset the French coterie as a result.

And in terms of Montaigne's tactile, sensory awareness, things just feel feel different abroad. At the Dove in Markdorf, they fill their mattresses with leaves, finding it lasts better than straw. Montaigne tries sleeping with a feather quilt 'as is their custom' and finds it very pleasant, 'both warm and light'. He likes the stoves that they use in southern Germany, in not scorching one's face or boots, and being free from the smoke produced by fireplaces (which tend to offend Montaigne's sensitive nose). different abroad. At the Dove in Markdorf, they fill their mattresses with leaves, finding it lasts better than straw. Montaigne tries sleeping with a feather quilt 'as is their custom' and finds it very pleasant, 'both warm and light'. He likes the stoves that they use in southern Germany, in not scorching one's face or boots, and being free from the smoke produced by fireplaces (which tend to offend Montaigne's sensitive nose).

And cultural differences are most clearly tasted in food, not only in what is eaten, but in terms of table manners and etiquette. In Lindau they chop up cabbage with a special implement to make sauerkraut, which they put in salted tubs for the winter. They mix up plum and pear and apple tarts with the meat course and sometimes serve the roast before the soup. This he eats in the dining room of the Crown, listening to the birds in a cage that stretches the whole length of the room. In Icking he drinks from wooden goblets ribbed and ringed like barrels; in Kempen he dines on white hare. At Innsbruck the preparations are so elaborate that the diners sit a little distance from the table, which is then lifted up and carried to them. He immerses himself in these differences without complaint, but his personal tastes strike one as rather modern for a seigneur. He likes fresh fruit, oranges, lemons and particularly melons. And he has a cultivated taste for the lightness of Italian cuisine. At Pontremoli he has 'olives without stones, dressed with oil and vinegar, like in a salad' 'very good'.

This is not to say that Montaigne is incapable of prejudice. He cites the landlord of the Eagle in Constance as 'an example of the barbaric insolence and arrogance of the Teutonic character, over the quarrel of one of our footmen with our guide from Basel'. Appropriately, the quarrel is settled when the local provost, an Italian, displays a different national trait: he decides in Montaigne's favour if he dismisses his men, whilst allowing that he can immediately take them back into his service. 'This was a remarkable piece of subtlety,' admires Montaigne.

And Montaigne, like most of us, cannot help using what he knows to gauge the unknown. He sees life in Germany as more expensive than at home, and French walnut as superior to their pine. And he had heard rumours about how the Alps were 'full of difficulties, the strange manners of the people, the roads inaccessible, the inns savage'. Yet a little way into his trip, at Bressanone, he stops to reflect on the reality that travelling abroad is not necessarily more hazardous than travelling at home. The climate was mild, they had only had about one hour's rain, and 'in every other respect, if he wished to take his daughter, a girl only eight years old, on a journey, he would just as soon take her on this road as along one of the walks in his garden'. Moreover, Montaigne throws himself into the experience of difference, in stark contrast to the att.i.tude of his companions who most of the time 'only wanted to go home'. He gets up 'with eagerness and alacrity' at the prospect of a new destination. He is constantly 'on the lookout for what he might encounter, and seeks every occasion for conversing with strangers'. He is annoyed in Rome to come across so many Frenchmen, and goes out of his way to melt into the background. He 'lets himself be served everywhere in the manner of each country'; in Augsburg he dresses plainly, puts on a fur hat in the manner of the locals and walks around town incognito. He is therefore somewhat distressed to find that he has blown his cover by blowing his nose (handkerchiefs were somewhat of a novelty at the time).

But Montaigne also uses travel to put his own culture into perspective. In Lindau he praises the 'well favoured' inn food, remarking 'that the kitchens of our French n.o.bility would hardly appear to compare'. There they serve an abundance of fish, game, woodc.o.c.k, and leveret, 'which they season in a manner very different to ours, but equally as good'. In Basel the metalworkers surpa.s.s their French counterparts, 'and no matter how small the church, they have a magnificent clock and sundial'. In Italy they sieve their flour with wheels, so that the baker does 'more work in an hour than we do in four'. And soon there emerges a slight disdain for his own country: 'against which he had a hatred and aversion for other reasons' (because of its religious wars), throwing himself wholeheartedly into foreign manners, even going 'so far as to drink his wine without water'. He concludes that the things he wished he had brought with him were: 'a cook, to be taught in their ways, and to be able to show proof of it at home'; secondly, a German valet, so that he wouldn't be swindled; and thirdly a proper guide book, such as Sebastian Munster's Cosmographie Universelle Cosmographie Universelle of 1544, a copy of which he acquires when he gets home. of 1544, a copy of which he acquires when he gets home.

Montaigne's interest in other cultures also extends beyond the sh.o.r.es of Europe. In Rome he becomes friendly with 'an old patriarch of Antioch, an Arab', who impresses him with his knowledge of 'five or six languages of those beyond' i.e. from the Middle East. He gives Montaigne a medicine for his kidney stone in a 'little earthenware pot', Montaigne using his journal to record the prescription: after a light supper 'take about the size two peas, diluted in warm water, having crumbled it with your fingers first'.

And Montaigne's open-mindedness is also to the fore when he visits a house in Rome to witness what he describes as 'the most ancient religious ceremony in existence among men' the circ.u.mcision of a young Jewish boy. Here Montaigne's interest is palpable. His mother was possibly of Jewish descent, and he had earlier visited the synagogue in Verona 'and had a long talk with them about their ceremonies'. Whether Montaigne, a devout Catholic, is sympathetic to Judaism because of his mother's background is difficult to say. But what comes across is an even-handedness and an objectivity of description that is similar to his earlier description of a Lutheran wedding leaving theology on the page and letting the actual practice of religion speak for itself: They pay no more attention to their prayers than we do to ours, talking of other matters at the same time, and not bringing much reverence to their mysteries...After dinner the doctors, in turn, give a lesson on the pa.s.sage of the Bible for that day, doing it in Italian. After the lesson, some other doctor present selects one of the hearers, or sometimes two or three in succession, to argue against the one who has just been reading, on what he has said. The one we listened to seemed to have much eloquence and much wit in his argument.

He goes on to describe the circ.u.mcision, comparing it to aspects of Catholic ritual. The boy receives a G.o.dfather and a G.o.dmother 'as we do', and is swaddled 'after our fas.h.i.+on'. He describes how the mohel mohel warms his hands, before cutting off the foreskin, and sucking the blood from the wound. There is 'a great deal of effort' in the procedure 'and some pain', records Montaigne. But he does not seem to pa.s.s judgement. The boy cries, but 'as ours do when they are baptized', but is soothed by being allowed to suck a finger dipped in wine. warms his hands, before cutting off the foreskin, and sucking the blood from the wound. There is 'a great deal of effort' in the procedure 'and some pain', records Montaigne. But he does not seem to pa.s.s judgement. The boy cries, but 'as ours do when they are baptized', but is soothed by being allowed to suck a finger dipped in wine.

But perhaps the most interesting example of Montaigne 'rubbing and polis.h.i.+ng our brains with others' comes in his essay 'Of Cannibals', which he writes in the two years before he travels to Italy, but subsequently adds to in the years up to his death.

The sixteenth century saw a huge expansion of Atlantic trade, with s.h.i.+ps setting off from France and Spain for the six-week voyage to the Americas, returning laden with silver, brazilwood and spices, and tales of unknown people, animals and natural phenomena, such as the yellow fruit called paco paco (bananas) and the toucan. (bananas) and the toucan.

But this geographic expansion still represented a shock to European culture, which from antiquity had believed that G.o.d had ordained that there were only three continents Europe, Africa and Asia in line with the Father the Son and the Holy Ghost. Montaigne registers this shock and awe, but also uses it to take his mind off the beaten track, to see how 'we should guard against holding on to vulgar opinions, and judge things by the light of reason, and not by common hearsay'.

(ill.u.s.trations credit 7.2) Montaigne never travelled to the New World but he tells how he employed a man who had lived for ten or twelve years in what was called 'Antarctic France', or Brazil. The name would seem to presuppose a colonial arrogance, but Montaigne goes on to speculate presciently about the changes geology and oceanography have made to the face of the earth cutting Sicily off from Italy, but perhaps also severing the ancient unity of Europe and the Americas, a view he supports by citing the changes in the course of the Dordogne during his own lifetime, and the sea's reclaiming of his brother's estate in the Medoc.

Aristotle too, he notes, relates how the Carthaginians discovered a large island in the Atlantic, 'all clothed in woods and watered by large, deep rivers', but were prohibited from settling by their rulers, who feared that Carthage would become depopulated, and that this new world would supplant and replace them as a result. Like the philosophical conundrum of the s.h.i.+p of Theseus where Theseus progressively replaces the rotten boards of his s.h.i.+p, to the extent that one might ask, is it the same s.h.i.+p as it was before? Montaigne asks: if we are all in fact descended from the same land ma.s.s and are in fact all related (as palaeobiology now shows that we are), who is to say, therefore, who is civilized and who is not? Or who will be the civilized and uncivilized in ages to come?

Montaigne turns to his ex-servant, who unlike Aristotle 'was a simple and ignorant fellow' and much more likely to tell the truth, and who over the years had brought several traders and sailors to his house. And from what he hears, Montaigne flies in the face of popular opinion which sees the inhabitants of the New World as barbaric and charts his own point of view: I can see nothing barbarous or savage about that nation, from what I have heard, other than that we call barbaric whatever does not fit in with our custom. Indeed, it seems that we have no other measure of truth and reason than the examples and ideas of the opinions and customs of the country in which we live. Here is always the perfect religion, the perfect government, the perfect and accomplished manner of all things. These men are wild in the same way in which we call wild the fruits that nature has produced by herself and in her ordinary course; whereas in truth it is those we have altered by our artifice and diverted from the common order that we should rather call wild.

It is therefore ourselves who are really barbaric, in corrupting and smothering Nature's beauty with clothing and decoration. By contrast, he remarks upon the uncultivated fruits of this new Eden: 'which possess a delicacy of flavour that is excellent to the taste and to the envy of our own'. Montaigne thus turns the tables, and inaugurates a tradition that culminates in Rousseau's idea of the n.o.ble savage a prelapsarian state of nature more to be esteemed than artificial poise. And in his later essay 'Of Coaches', Montaigne places himself in the minds of the Amerindians, and looks back on himself and his own kind: For, take away from those who subjugated them the tricks and artifices which they used to dec