Beside Ortelius is his friend and fellow-laborer Gerard, also a learned geographer, and one of the luminaries of the day.

The only one whose dress indicates his Italian birth is Louis Guicciardini, a Florentine gentleman, who is here for the purpose of collecting materials for an extensive work on the Low Countries, and particularly on the powerful commercial city of Antwerp.
The gentleman plainly dressed, with a black beard, holding a book in his hand, is Christopher Plantin; he is engaged in establishing at Antwerp a printing-press of great importance.

Its dimensions are so large that it will occupy the ground on which several spacious houses now stand; hundreds of workmen will be employed all day in composing, correcting, and printing books in every civilized tongue.

You must not fail, signor, to visit the building; even in its unfinished state it will cause you astonishment." "The Netherlands is a favored country," said the old Deodati.

"If the climate is not as mild as in our own beautiful Italy, the men are bold, active, intelligent, industrious, and learned, and they possess all the qualifications requisite for the material prosperity and moral progress of a nation.