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The Surprising Adventures of Baron Munchausen by Rudolf Erich Raspe
page 98 of 166 (59%)
and his exploits to the spirit of the times, and recounts what he thinks
should be most interesting to his auditors.

I do not say that the Baron, in the following stories, means a satire on
any political matters whatever. No; but if the reader understands them
so, I cannot help it.

If the Baron meets with a parcel of negro ships carrying whites into
slavery to work upon their plantations in a cold climate, should we
therefore imagine that he intends a reflection on the present traffic in
human flesh? And that, if the negroes should do so, it would be simple
justice, as retaliation is the law of God! If we were to think this a
reflection on any present commercial or political matter, we should
be tempted to imagine, perhaps, some political ideas conveyed in every
page, in every sentence of the whole. Whether such things are or are not
the intentions of the Baron the reader must judge.

We have had not only wonderful travellers in this vile world, but
splenetic travellers, and of these not a few, and also conspicuous
enough. It is a pity, therefore, that the Baron has not endeavoured to
surpass them also in this species of story-telling. Who is it can read
the travels of Smellfungus, as Sterne calls him, without admiration?
To think that a person from the North of Scotland should travel through
some of the finest countries in Europe, and find fault with everything
he meets--nothing to please him! And therefore, methinks, the Tour to
the Hebrides is more excusable, and also perhaps Mr. Twiss's Tour in
Ireland. Dr. Johnson, bred in the luxuriance of London, with more reason
should become cross and splenetic in the bleak and dreary regions of the
Hebrides.

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