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 UNIVERSITY 
 
 LIBRARY 
 

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 UNIVERSITY 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 Treasure %oom 
 
ESSAYS, 
 LETTERS FROM ABROAD, 
 
 See. Si-c. 
 
ESSAYS, 
 LETTERS FROM ABROAD, 
 
 TRANSLATIONS AND FRAGMENTS, 
 
 PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY 
 
 BY MRS. SHELLEY, 
 
 '* The PoiTT, it is true, is the son of his time; but pity for him ifhe io its pupil, or even its 
 ^viiurite ! Let ^onie benefiient Heiiy snatch hiiu when a «iuck1in^ irom the breast of his 
 mother, and nurse him with the milk itf abetter time ; that he may ripen to his full ^tature 
 beneath a distant Grecian sky. And having grnirn to maohnod, let him return, a foreign 
 shape, into his century ; not however tn delight it by his presence, but dreadful, like the sun 
 ©f Agamemmm, to purify it." — Schillbr. 
 
 IN TWO VOLUMES. 
 
 VOL. II. 
 
 LONDON: 
 EDWARD MOXON, DOVER STREET. 
 
 MDCCCXL. 
 
LONDON : 
 BnADIR'RV AND EVANS, PRINTERS, «'HITBFR1ARS 
 
CONTENTS OF VOL. II. 
 
 
 PAGE 
 
 JOURNAL OF A SIX WEEKS' TOUR ... 1 
 
 LETTERS FRO:\I GENEVA 47 
 
 JOURNAL AT GENEVA.— GHOST STORIES . . 96 
 
 JOURNAL.— RETURN TO ENGLAND- . . . . 103 
 
 LETTERS FROM ITALY :— 
 
 LYONS. 
 I. To Leigh Hunt, Esq. . . . .109 
 
 MILAN. 
 
 u. ToT. L. P., Esq. Ill 
 
 HI. To T. L. P., Esq. . 114 
 
 IV. To T. L. P., EiQ 121 
 
 LEGHOBN. 
 V. To T. L. P., Esq 122 
 
 BAGXI DI LUCCA. 
 
 VI. To Mr. and Mrs. Gisborne .... 124 
 
 VII. To William Godwin, Esq. . .... 127 
 
 FLORENCE. 
 VIII. To Mrs. Shelley ..... 130 
 
 VENICE. 
 IX. To Mrs. Shelley . . .... 134 
 
VI CONTENTS. 
 
 LETTERS FROM ITALY (cnnfinmd). 
 
 PADUA. PAGE 
 
 s. To Mrs. Siieli.f.y 139 
 
 ESTE. 
 XI. To T. L. P., Esq 141 
 
 FERRARA. 
 XII. To T. L. P., Esq 145 
 
 BOLOGXA. 
 
 XIII. ToT. L. P., Esq -153 
 
 ROME. 
 
 XIV. ToT. L. P., Esq 163 
 
 NAPLES. 
 
 XV. To T. L. P., Esq IfiS 
 
 XVI. To T. L. P., Esq. 182 
 
 ROME. 
 
 XVII. ToT. L. P., Esq 194 
 
 xviii. To T. L. P., Esq 209 
 
 XIX. To Mr. and Mrs. Gisbohne . . . . 215 
 
 LEGHORN. 
 
 XX. ToT. L. P., Esq 217 
 
 'M.To Leigh Hunt, Esq. . . . . . 220 
 
 xxii. To Leigh Hunt, Esq 223 
 
 XXIII. To Leigh Hunt, Esq. . . ... 226 
 
 FLORENCE. 
 
 XXIV. To Mrs. Oisborne ..... 230 
 XXT. To Henry Revelry, Esq. . .... 235 
 
 XXVI. To Mr. and Mrs. Gisborne .... 238 
 XXVII. To Mr. and Mrs. Gisborne . . . . 239 
 
 xxviii. To Leigh Hunt, Esq. ..... 243 
 
CONTENTS. VU 
 
 LETTERS FROM ITALY (continued). 
 
 FLORENCE. P4GK 
 
 XXIX. To Mrs. Gisborne 
 
 XXX. To John Gisbohne, Esq. 
 
 XXXI. To Henry Reveley, Esq. 
 xxxii. To Lkigh Hunt, Esq. 
 
 xxxiii. To Leigh Hunt, Esq. 
 XXXIV. To Henry Reveley, Esq. 
 
 XXXV. To Mr. and Mrs. Gisbornr 
 
 XXXVI. To John Gisborne, Esq. 
 
 244 
 
 247 
 2.10 
 •253 
 255 
 2.-)8 
 260 
 261 
 
 REMARKS ON SOME OF THE STATUES IN THE 
 GALLERY OF FLORENCE 263 
 
 TMS.\. 
 
 xxxvii. To Mr. and Mrs. Gisborne . . . 271 
 
 xxxviii. To ^Ir. and Mrs. Gisborne . . . . 276 
 
 XXXIX. To .Toun Gisborne, Esq. .... 277 
 
 XL. To Mr. and Mrs. Gisborne . . . . 200 
 
 XLi. To Mrs. Shelley 283 
 
 LEGHORN. 
 XLii. To Mrs. Shelley . . . . . , 285 
 
 PISA. 
 xLiii. To THE Editor of the " Quarterly Review" . 286 
 xLiv. To John Gisborne, Esq. .... 290 
 
 XLV. To Henry Reveley, Esq. . . . . . 291 
 
 XLVi. To Henry Reveley, Esq. .... 292 
 
 BAGNI DI PISA. 
 
 XLVii. To Mr. and Mrs. Gisborne . . . 293 
 
 XLviii. To John Gisborne, Esq. . . . . . 294 
 
 XLix. To Mr. and Mrs. Gisborne .... 297 
 
 L. To Mr. and Mrs. Gisborne . . . . 298 
 
 3 
 
Vlll CONTENTS. 
 
 LETTERS FROM ITALY {continued). 
 
 FLORENCE. PAGE 
 
 LI. To Mrs. Shelley 299 
 
 BOLOGNA. 
 Lii. To Mrs. Shelley 301 
 
 RAVENNA, 
 
 Liii. To Mrs. Shelley 303 
 
 Liv. To Mrs. Shelley 306 
 
 Lv. To i\lRs. Shelley . . . . • .315 
 
 LVT. To JMrs. Shelley . . . . . . 317 
 
 Lvii. To JIrs. Shelley ...... 317 
 
 PISA. 
 Lviii. To Leigh Hunt, Esq. . . . . . 325 
 
 Lix. To Horatio Smith, Esq. ..... 328 
 
 Lx. To John Gisborne, Esq. . . . . . 332 
 
 Lxi. To John Gisborne, Esq. .... 335 
 
 Lxii. To C. T., Esq 341 
 
 LERICr. 
 Lxiii. To Mrs. Shelley ...... 344 
 
 LXiv. To Horatio Smith, Esq. . . . • . . 346 
 
 Lxv. To C. T., Esq 353 
 
 PISA. 
 Lxvi. To Mrs. Williams ... ... 356 
 
 Lxvii. To Mrs. Shelley 358 
 
HISTORY 
 
 A SIX WEEKS' TOUR 
 
 THROUGH A PART OF 
 
 FRANCE, SWITZERLAND, GERMANY, AND HOLLAND 
 
 AYITH LETTERS, 
 
 DKSCini'TIVE OP A SAIL ROCND THE LAKE OF GENEVA, 
 AND OF THE GLACIERS OF CHAMOl'M. 
 
 VOL. H. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 Nothing can be moi-e unpresuming tli;in this 
 little volume. It contains the account of some 
 desultory visits by a party of young people to 
 scenes which are now so familiar to our country- 
 men, that few facts relating to them can be 
 expected to have escaped the many more experi- 
 enced and exact observers, who have sent their 
 journals to the press. In fact, they have done 
 little else than arrange the few materials which an 
 imperfect journal, and two or three letters to their 
 friends in England afforded. They regret, since 
 their little History is to be offered to the public, 
 that these materials were not more copious and 
 complete. This is a just topic of censure to those 
 who are less inclined to be amused than to condemn. 
 Those whose youth has been past as theirs (with 
 what success it imports not) in pursuing, like the 
 swallow, the inconstant summer of delight and 
 beauty which invests this visible world, will perhaps 
 find some entertainment in following the author, 
 fi2 
 
i PREFACE. 
 
 with her husband and friend, on foot, through part 
 of France and Switzerland, and in saihng with her 
 down the castled Rhine, through scenes beautif 
 in themselves, but which, since she visited them, a 
 groat poet has clothed with the freshness of a 
 diviner nature. They will be interested to hear of 
 one who has visited Meillerie, and Clarens, and 
 Chillon, and Vevai — classic ground, peopled with 
 tender and glorious imaginations of the present 
 and the past. 
 
 They have perhaps never talked with one who 
 has beheld, in the enthusiasm of youth, the glaciers, 
 and the lakes, and the forests, and the fountains of 
 the mighty Alps. Such will perhaps forgive the 
 imperfections of their narrative for the sympathy 
 which the adventures and feelings which it re- 
 counts, and a curiosity respecting scenes already 
 rendered interesting and illustrious, may excite. 
 
 The Poem, entitled " Mont Blanc," is written 
 by the author of the two letters from Chamouni 
 and Vevai. It w^as composed under the immediate 
 impression of the deep and powerful feelings 
 excited by the objects which it attempts to 
 describe ; and as an imdisciplined overflowing of 
 the soul, rests its claim to approbation on an 
 attempt to imitate the untameable wildness and 
 inaccessible solemnity from which those feelings 
 sprang. 
 
JOURNAL. 
 
 It is now nearly three years since this journey 
 took place, and the journal I then kept was not 
 very copious ; but I have so often talked over the 
 incidents that bcf'el us, and attempted to describe 
 the scenery through which we passed, that I think 
 few occurrences of any interest will be omitted. 
 
 We left London, July 28th, 1814, on a hotter 
 day than has been known in this climate for many 
 years. I am not a good traveller, and this heat 
 agreed very ill with me, till, on arriving at Dover, 
 I was refreshed by a sea-bath. As we very much 
 wished to cross the Chamiol with all possible speed, 
 we would not wait for the packet of the following 
 day (it being then about four in the afternoon) but 
 hiring a small boat, resolved to make the passage 
 the same evening, the seamen promising us a voyage 
 of two hours. 
 
 The evening was most beautiful ; there was but 
 little wind, and the sails flapped in the flagging 
 breeze : the moon rose, and night came on, and 
 
JOURNAL. 
 
 with tlie night a slow, heavy swell, and a fresh 
 breeze, which soon produced a sea so violent as to 
 toss the boat very much. I was dreadfully sea- 
 sick, and as is usually my custom when thus 
 affected, I slept during the greater part of the 
 night, awaking only from time to time to ask 
 where we were, and to receive the dismal answer 
 each time — " Not quite half way." 
 
 The wind was violent and contrary ; if we could 
 not reach Calais, the sailors proposed making for 
 Boulogne. They promised only two hours' sail 
 from shore, yet hour after hour passed, and we 
 were still far distant, when the moon sunk in the 
 red and stormy horizon, and the fast-flashing 
 lightning became pale in the breaking day. 
 
 We were proceeding slowly against the wind, 
 when suddenly a thunder squall struck the sail, 
 and the waves rushed into the boat : even the 
 sailors acknowledged that our situation was 
 perilous ; but they succeeded in reefing the sail ; — 
 the wind was now changed, and we drove before 
 the gale directly to Calais. As we entered the 
 harbour I awoke from a comfortless sleep, and 
 saw the sun rise broad, red, and cloudless over the 
 pier. 
 
FRANCE. 
 
 Exhausted with sickness and fatigue, I walked 
 over the sand with my companions to the hotel. I 
 heard for the first time the confused buzz of voices 
 speaking a different language from that to which I 
 had been accustomed ; and saw a costume very 
 unlike that worn on the opposite side of the Chan- 
 nel ; the women with high caps and short jackets; 
 the men with ear-rings ; ladies walking about with 
 high bonnets or coiffures lodged on the top of the 
 head, the hair dragged up underneath, without 
 any stray curls to decorate the temples or cheeks. 
 There is, however, something very pleasing in the 
 manners and appearance of the people of Calais, 
 that prepossesses you in their favour. A national 
 reflection might occur, that when Edward III. 
 took Calais, he turned out the old inhabitants, and 
 peopled it almost entirely with our own country- 
 men ; but, unfortunately the manners are not 
 English. 
 
8 HISTORY OF A SIX AYEEKfS*' TOUK. 
 
 A\ e remained during that day and the greater 
 part of the next at Calais : we had been obliged to 
 leave our boxes the night before at the English 
 custom-house, and it was arranged that they should 
 go by the packet of the following day, which, 
 detained by contrary wind, did not arrive until 
 night. S*** and I walked among the fortifications 
 on the outside of the town ; they consisted of fields 
 where the hay was making. The aspect of the 
 country was rural and pleasant. 
 
 On the 30th of July, about three in the after- 
 noon, we left Calais, in a cabriolet drawn by three 
 horses. To persons who had never before seen 
 anything but a spruce English chaise and post-boy, 
 there was something irresistibly ludicrous in our 
 equipage. Our cabriolet was shaped somewhat like a 
 ])ost-chaisc, except that it had only two wheels, and 
 consequently there were no doors at the sides ; the 
 fi'ont was let down to admit the passengers. The 
 three horses were placed abreast, the tallest in the 
 middle, who was rendered more formidable by the 
 addition of an unintelligible article of harness, 
 resembling a pair of wooden wings fastened to his 
 shoulders ; the harness was of rope ; and the 
 postilion, a cpieer, upright little fellow with a long 
 pigtail, craqueed his whip, and clattered on, while 
 an old forlorn shepherd with a cocked hat gazed on 
 us as we passed. 
 
HISTORY OF A SIX WEEKS*' TOUR. 9 
 
 The roads are excellent, but the heat was in- 
 tense, and I suffered greatly from it. We slept at 
 Boulogne the first night, where there was an ugly 
 but remarkably good-tempered femme de chambre. 
 This made us, for the first time, remark the differ- 
 ence which exists between this class of persons in 
 France and in England. In the latter country 
 they are prudish, and if they become in the least 
 degree familiar, they arc impudent. The lower 
 orders in France have the easiness and politeness 
 of the most well-bred P^nglish ; they treat you un- 
 affectedly as their equal, and consequently there is 
 no scope for insolence. 
 
 We had ordered horses to be ready during the 
 night, but we were too fatigued to make use of 
 them. The man insisted on being paid for the 
 whole post. All ! madame, said the fomme-de- 
 chambre, pensez-y ; cest pour dedommager Ics 
 pauvres chevaux d'avoir perdu leur doux sommeil. 
 A joke from an English chamber-maid would have 
 been quite another thing. 
 
 The first appearance that struck our p]nglish 
 eyes was the want of enclosures ; but the fields 
 were flourishing with a plentiful harvest. AV^e ob- 
 served no vines on this side Paris. 
 
 The weather still continued very hot, and travel- 
 ling produced a very bad effect upon my health : 
 nS 
 
10 HISTORY OF A SIX WEEKs' TOUR. 
 
 my companions were induced by this circumstance 
 to hasten the journey as much as possible ; and 
 accordin<rlv \vc did not rest the followinof nigrht, and 
 the next day, about two, arrived in Paris. 
 
 In this city there are no hotels where you can re- 
 side as long or as short a time as you please, and we 
 were obliged to engage apartments at an hotel for 
 a week. They were dear, and not very pleasant. 
 As usual, in France, the principal apartment was 
 a bedchamber ; there was another closet with a bed, 
 and an ante-chamber, which we used as a sitting- 
 room. 
 
 The heat of the weather was excessive, so that 
 we were unable to walk except in the afternoon. 
 On the first evening we walked to the gardens of 
 the Tuileries ; they are formal, and uninteresting, 
 in the French fashion, the trees cut into shapes, 
 and without any grass. I think the Boulevards 
 infinitely more pleasant. This street nearly sur- 
 rounds Paris, and is eight miles in extent ; it is 
 very wide, and planted on either side with trees. 
 At one end is a superb cascade which refreshes the 
 senses by its continual splashing : near this stands 
 the gate of St. Denis, a beautiful piece of sculpture. 
 I do not know how it may at present be disfigured 
 liy the Gothic barbarism of the conquerors of 
 France, who were not contented with retaking the 
 
HISTORY OF A SIX WEEKs' TOUR. 11 
 
 spoils of Napoleon, but, with impotent malice, de- 
 stroyed the monuments of their own defeat. When 
 I saw this gate, it was in its splendour, and made 
 you imagine that the days of Roman greatness 
 were transported to Paris. 
 
 After remaining a week in Paris, we received a 
 small remittance that set us free from a kind of 
 imprisonment there, which we found very irksome. 
 But how should we proceed ? After talking over 
 and rejecting many plans, we fixed on one eccen- 
 tric enough, but which, from its romance, was very 
 pleasing to us. In England we could not have put 
 it in execution without sustaining continual insult 
 and impertinence ; the French are far more tolerant 
 of the vagaries of their neighbours. Wq resolved 
 to walk through France ; but as I was too weak 
 for any considerable distance, and as C*** could 
 not be supposed to be able to walk as far as S*** 
 each day, we determined to purchase an ass, to 
 carry our portmanteau and one of us by turns. 
 
 Early, therefore, on Monday, August 8th, 
 S*** and C*** went to the ass market, and pur- 
 chased an ass, and the rest of the day, until four 
 in the afternoon, was spent in preparations for our 
 departure ; during which, Madame Thotesse paid 
 us a visit, and attempted to dissuade us from our 
 design. She represented to us that a large army 
 
12 HISTORY OF A SIX WEEKs' TOUR. 
 
 had been recently disbanded, that the soldiers and 
 officers wandered idle about the country, and that 
 les dames seroient ccrtainemcnt cnlevees. But we 
 were proof against her arguments, and packing up 
 a few necessaries, leaving the rest to go by the dili- 
 gence, we departed in a fiacre from the door of the 
 hotel, our little ass following. 
 
 ^Ve dismissed the coach at the barrier. It was 
 dusk, and the ass seemed totally unable to bear 
 one of us, appearing to sink under the portmanteau, 
 although it was small and light. We were, how- 
 ever, merry enough, and thought the leagues short. 
 We arrived at Charenton about ten. 
 
 Charenton is prettily situated in a valley, through 
 which the Seine flows, winding among banks varie- 
 gated with trees. On looking at this scene, C*** 
 exclaimed, " Oh ! this is beautiful enough ; let us 
 live here." This was her exclamation on every 
 new scene, and as each surpassed the one before, 
 she cried, " I am glad we did not stay at Charen- 
 ton, but let us live here." 
 
 Finding our ass useless, we sold it before we 
 proceeded on our journey, and bought a mule, for 
 ten napoleons. About nine o"'clock we departed. 
 We were clad in black silk. I rode on the mule, 
 which carried also our portmanteau; S***andC*** 
 followed, bringing a small basket of provisions. At 
 
HISTORY OF A SIX WEEKs' TOUR. IS 
 
 about one we arrned at Gros-Bois, where, under 
 the shade of trees, we ate our bread and fruit, and 
 drank our wine, thinking of Don Quixote and 
 Sancho. 
 
 The country through which we passed was highly 
 cultivated, but uninteresting ; the horizon scarcely 
 ever extended beyond the circumference of a few 
 fields, bright and waving with the golden harvest. 
 We met several travellers ; but our mode, although 
 novel, did not appear to excite any curiosity or 
 remark. This night we slept at Guignes, in the 
 same room and beds in which Napoleon and some 
 of his Generals had rested during the late war. 
 The little old woman of the place was highly grati- 
 fied in having this little story to tell, and spoke 
 in warm praise of the Empress Josephine and 
 Marie Louise, who had at difterent times passed 
 on that road. 
 
 As we continued our route, Provins was the first 
 place that struck us with interest. It was our 
 stage of rest for the night ; we approached it at 
 sunset. After having gained the summit of a hill, 
 the prospect of the town opened upon us as it lay 
 in the valley below ; a rocky hill rose abruptly on 
 one side, on the top of which stood a ruined citadel, 
 with extensive walls and towers ; lower down, but 
 beyond, was the cathedral, and the whole formed a 
 
14 HISTORY OF A SIX WEEKs' TOIIH. 
 
 scene for painting. After having travelled for two 
 days thi'ough a country perfectly without interest, 
 it was a delicious relief for the eye to dwell again 
 on some irregularities and beauty of country. Our 
 fare at Provins was coarse, and our beds uncom- 
 fortable, but the remembrance of this prospect 
 made us contented and happy. 
 
 We now approached scenes that reminded us of 
 what we had nearly forgotten, that France had 
 lately been the country in which great and ex- 
 traordinary events had taken place. Nogent, a 
 town we entered about noon the following day, had 
 been entirely desolated by the Cossacs. Nothing 
 could be more entire than the ruin which these 
 barbarians had spread as they advanced ; perhaps 
 they remembered Moscow and the destruction of 
 the Russian villages ; but we were now in France, 
 and the distress of the inhabitants, whose houses 
 had been burned, their cattle killed, and all their 
 wealth destroyed, has given a sting to my detesta- 
 tion of war, which none can feel who have not 
 travelled through a country pillaged and wasted 
 by this plague, which, in his pride, man inflicts upon 
 his fellow. 
 
 We quitted the great route soon after we had 
 left Nogent, to strike across the country to Troyes. 
 About six in the evening we arrived at St.-Aubin, 
 
HISTORY OF A SIX WEEKs"' TOUR. 15 
 
 a lovely village embosomed in trees; but, on a nearer 
 view, we found the cottages roofless, the rafters 
 black, and the walls dilapidated ; — a few inhabit- 
 ants remained. We asked for milk— they had none 
 to give ; all their cows had been taken by the 
 Cossacs. We had still some leagues to travel that 
 night, but we found that they were not post 
 leagues, but the measurement of the inhabitants, 
 and nearly double the distance. The road lay 
 over a desert plain, and as night advanced, we 
 were often in danger of losing the track of wheels, 
 which was our only guide. Night closed in, and 
 we suddenly lost all trace of the road ; but a few 
 trees, indistinctly seen, seemed to indicate the posi- 
 tion of a village. About ten we arrived at Trois- 
 Maisons, where, after a supper on milk and sour 
 bread, we retired to rest on wretched beds : but 
 sleep is seldom denied, except to the indolent; and 
 after the day's fatigue, although my bed was 
 nothing more than a sheet spread upon straw, I 
 slept soundly until the morning was considerably 
 advanced. 
 
 S*** had hurt his ancle so considerably the pre- 
 ceding evening, that he was obliged, during the 
 whole of the following day's journey, to ride on 
 our mule. Nothing could be more barren and 
 wretched than the tract through which we now 
 
16 HISTORY OF A SIX WEEKs' TOrH. 
 
 passed ; the ground was chalky and uncovered 
 even by grass, and wlicre there had been any 
 attempts made towards cultivation, the straggling 
 oars of corn discovered more plainly the barren 
 nature of the soil. Thousands of insects, which 
 were of the same white colour as the road, infested 
 <jur path ; the sky was cloudless, and the sun darted 
 its rays upon us, reflected back by the earth, until 
 I nearly fainted under the heat. A village appeared 
 at a distance, cheering us with a prospect of rest. 
 It gave us new strength to proceed ; but it was a 
 wretched place, and afforded us but little relief. 
 It had been once large and populous, but now the 
 houses were roofless, and the ruins that lay scat- 
 tered about, the gardens covered with the white 
 dust of the torn cottages, the black burnt beams, 
 and squalid looks of the inhabitants, presented in 
 every direction the melancholy aspect of devasta- 
 tion. One house, a cabaret^ alone remained ; we 
 were here offered plenty of milk, stinking bacon, 
 sour bread, and a few vegetables, which we were 
 to dress for ourselves. 
 
 As we prepared our dinner in a place so filthy, 
 that the sight of it alone was sufficient to destroy 
 our appetite, the people of the village collected 
 around us, squalid with dirt, their countenances 
 expressing everything that is disgusting and brutal. 
 
HISTORY OF A SIX WEEKS TOUR. 1/ 
 
 They seemed, indeed, entirely detached from the 
 rest of the world, and ignorant of all that was 
 passing in it. There is much less communication 
 between the various to^^^ls of France than in Eng- 
 land. The use of passports may easily account for 
 this : these people did not know that Napoleon 
 was deposed ; and when we asked why they did not 
 rebuild their cottages, they replied, that they were 
 afraid that the Cossacs would destroy them again 
 upon their return. Echemine (the name of this 
 village) is in every respect the most disgusting 
 place I ever met with. 
 
 Two leagues beyond, on the same road, we came 
 to the village of Pavilion, — so unlike Echemine, 
 that we might have fancied ourselves in another 
 quarter of the globe; here everything denoted 
 cleanliness and hospitality ; many of the cottages 
 were destroyed, but the inhabitants were era- 
 ployed in repairing them. What could occasion 
 so great a difference ? 
 
 Still our road lay over this tract of uncultivated 
 country, and our eyes were fatigued by observing 
 nothing but a white expanse of ground, where no 
 bramble or stunted shrub adorned its barrenness. 
 Towards evening we reached a small plantation of 
 vines : it appeared like one of those islands of ver- 
 dure that are met with in the midst of the sands 
 
18 HISTORY OF A SIX WEEKs' TOUR, 
 
 of Lybia, but the grapes were not yet ripe. S*** 
 was totally incapable of walking, and C*** and I 
 were very tired before we arrived at Troyes. 
 
 We rested here for the niglit, and devoted the 
 following day to a consideration of the manner in 
 which we should proceed. S***'s sprain rendered 
 our pedestrianism impossible. We accordingly 
 sold our mule, and bought an open voiture, that 
 went on four wheels, for five napoleons, and hired 
 a man with a mule, for eight more, to convey us 
 to Neufchatcl in six days. 
 
 The suburbs of Troyes were destroyed, and the 
 town itself dirty and uninviting. I remained at the 
 inn wi'iting letters, while S*** and C*** arranged 
 this bargain and visited the cathedral of the town; 
 and the next morning we departed in our voiture 
 for Neufchatel. A curious instance of French 
 vanity occurred on leaving this town. Our voiturier 
 pointed to the plain around, and mentioned, that 
 it had been the scene of a battle between the Rus- 
 sians and the French. " In which the Russians 
 gained the victory f — " Ah no, madame," replied 
 the man, " the French are never beaten." " But 
 how was it then,"'"' wo asked, "that the Russians had 
 entered Troyes soon after ?" — " Oh, after having 
 been defeated, they took a circuitous route, and 
 thus entered the town." 
 
HISTORY OF A SIX WEEKs' TOUR. 19 
 
 Vandeuvres is a pleasant town, at which we 
 rested during the hours of noon. ^Ve walked in 
 the grounds of a nobleman, laid out in the English 
 taste, and terminated in a pretty wood ; it was a 
 scene that reminded us of our native country. As 
 we left Vandeuvres the aspect of the country 
 suddenly changed ; abrupt hills, covered with vine- 
 yards, intermixed with trees, enclosed a narrow 
 valley, the channel of the Aubc. The view was 
 interspersed by green meadows, groves of poplar 
 and white willow, and spires of village churches, 
 which the Cossaes had yet spared. Many villages, 
 ruined by the war, occupied the most romantic 
 spots. 
 
 In the evening we arrived at Bar-sur-Aube, a 
 beautiful town, placed at the opening of the vale 
 where the hills terminate abruptly. We climbed 
 the highest of these, but scarce had we reached the 
 top, when a mist descended upon everything, and 
 the rain began to fall : we were wet through before 
 we could reach our inn. It was evening, and the 
 laden clouds made the darkness almost as deep as 
 that of midnight ; but in the west an unusually 
 brilliant and fiery redness occupied an opening in 
 the vapours, and added to the interest of our little 
 expedition : the cottage lights were reflected in the 
 tranquil river, and the dark hills behind, dimly seen, 
 resembled vast and frownino^ mountains. 
 
20 HISTORY OF A SIX WEEKs' TOUR. 
 
 As we quitted Bar-sur-Aube, we at the same 
 time bade a short farewell to hills. Passing through 
 the towns of Chaumont, Langrcs, (which was situ- 
 ated on a hill, and surrounded by ancient fortifi- 
 cations), Champlitte, and Gray, we travelled for 
 nearly three days through plains, where the country 
 gently undulated, and relieved the eye from a per- 
 petual flat, without exciting any peculiar interest. 
 Gentle rivers, their banks ornamented by a few 
 trees, stole through those plains, and a thousand 
 beautiful summer insects skimmed over the streams. 
 The third day was a day of rain, and the first that 
 had taken place during our journey. We were 
 soon wet through, and were glad to stop at a little 
 inn to dry ourselves. The reception we received 
 here was very unprepossessing, the people still kept 
 their seats round the fire, and seemed very unwil- 
 ling to make way for the dripping guests. In the 
 afternoon, however, the weather became fine, and 
 at about six in the evening we entered Besancon. 
 
 Hills had appeared in the distance during the 
 whole day, and we had advanced gradually towards 
 them, but were unprepared for the scene that broke 
 upon us as we passed the gate of this city. On 
 (quitting the walls, the road wound underneath a 
 high precipice ; on the other side, the hills rose 
 more gradually, and the green valley that inter- 
 
HISTORY OF A SIX WEEKs' TOL'R. 21 
 
 vened between them was watered by a pleasant 
 river; before us arose an amphitheatre of hills 
 covered with vines, but irregular and rocky. The 
 last gate of the town was cut through the precipi- 
 tous rock that arose on one side, and in that place 
 jutted into the road. 
 
 Tills approach to mountain scenery filled us with 
 delight ; it was otherwise with our voituricr : he 
 came from the plains of Troyes, and these hills so 
 utterly scared him, that he in some degree lost his 
 reason. After winding through the valley, we be- 
 sran to ascend the mountains which were its bound- 
 ary : we left our voifurc, and walked on, delighted 
 with every new view that broke upon us. 
 
 When we had ascended the hills for about a mile 
 and a half, we found our voiturier at the door of a 
 wretched inn, having taken the mule from the 
 voiture, and obstinately determined to remain for 
 the night at this miserable village of Mort. We 
 could only submit, for he was deaf to all we could 
 urge, and to our remonstrances only replied, Je ne 
 puis j)lus. 
 
 Our beds were too uncomfortable to allow a 
 thought of sleeping in them : we could only procure 
 one room, and our hostess gave us to understand 
 that our voiturier was to occupy the same apart- 
 ment. It was of little consequence, as we had pre- 
 
')9 
 
 HISTORY OF A SIX WEEKS TOUR. 
 
 viously resolved not to enter the beds. The even- 
 ing was fine, and after the rain the air was per- 
 fumed by many deUcious scents. We climbed to a 
 rocky seat on the hill that overlooked the village, 
 where we remained until sunset. The night was 
 passed by the kitchen fire in a wretched manner, 
 striving to catch a few moments of sleep, which 
 were denied to us. At three in the morning we 
 pursued our journey. 
 
 Our road led to the summit of the hills that 
 environ Besan^on. From the top of one of these 
 we saw the whole expanse of the valley filled with 
 a white undulating mist, which was pierced like 
 islands by the piny mountains. The sun had just 
 risen, and a ray of red light lay upon the waves 
 of this fluctuating vapour. To the west, opposite 
 the sun, it seemed driven by the light against the 
 rocks in immense masses of foaming cloud, until 
 it became lost in the distance, mixing its tints with 
 the fleecy sky. 
 
 Our voiturier insisted on remaining two hours at 
 the village of Noe, although we were unable to 
 procure any dinner, and wished to go on to the 
 next stage. I have already said, that the hills 
 scared his senses, and he had become disobliging, 
 sullen, and stupid. While he waited we walked 
 to the neighbouring wood : it was a fine forest, 
 
HISTORY OF A SIX WEEKs' TOUR. 23 
 
 carpeted beautifully with moss, and in various 
 places overhung by rocks, in whose crevices young 
 pines had taken root, and spread their branches 
 for shade to those below ; the noon heat was 
 intense, and we were glad to shelter ourselves from 
 it in the shady retreats of this lovely forest. 
 
 On our return to the village, we found, to our 
 extreme surprise, that the voiturier had departed 
 nearly an hour before, leaving word that he ex- 
 pected to meet us on the road. S***''s sprain 
 rendered liim incapable of much exertion ; but 
 there was no remedy, and we proceeded on foot to 
 Maison-Neuve, an auhcrye, four miles and a half 
 distant. 
 
 At Maison-Xeuve the man had left word that 
 he should proceed to Pontarlier, the frontier town 
 of France, six leagues distant, and that, if we did 
 not arrive that night, he should the next morning 
 leave the voiture at an inn, and return with the 
 mule to Troycs. We were astonished at the im- 
 pudence of this message, but the boy of the inn 
 comforted us by saying, that by going on a horse 
 by a cross-road, where the voiture could not ven- 
 ture, he could easily overtake and intercept the 
 voiturier, and accordingly we despatched him, 
 walking slowly after. W^e waited at the next inn 
 for dinner, and in about two hours the boy 
 returned. The man promised to wait for us at an 
 
24 HISTORY OF A SIX W'EEKs' TOUR. 
 
 auhercjc two leagues further on. S***'s ancle had 
 become very painful, but we could procure no con- 
 veyance, and as the sun was nearly setting, we 
 were obliged to hasten on. The evening was most 
 beautiful, and the scenery lovely enough to beguile 
 us of our fatigue : the horned moon hung in the 
 light of sunset, that threw a glow of unusual depth 
 of redness over the piny mountains, and the dark 
 deep valleys which they enclosed ; at intervals in 
 the woods were beautiful lawns interspersed with 
 picturesque clumps of trees, and dark pines over- 
 shadowed our road. 
 
 In about two hours we arrived at the promised 
 termination of our journey. We found, according 
 to our expectation, that M. le voiturier had pur- 
 sued his journey with the utmost speed. We were 
 enabled, however, to procure here a rude kind of 
 cart, S*** being unable to walk. The moon 
 became yellow, and hung low close to the woody 
 horizon. Every now and then sleep overcame me, 
 but our vehicle was too rude and rough to permit 
 its indulgence. I looked on the stars — and the 
 constellations seemed to weave a wild dance, as the 
 visions of slumber invaded the domains of reality. 
 In this manner we arrived late at Pontarlier, where 
 we found our conductor, who blundered out many 
 falsehoods for excuses ; and thus ended the adven- 
 tures of that day. 
 
SWITZERLAND. 
 
 On passing the French barrier, a surprising dif- 
 ference may be observed between the opposite 
 nations that inhabit either side. The Swiss cot- 
 tages are much cleaner and neater, and the inhabit- 
 ants exhibit the same contrast. The Swiss women 
 wear a great deal of white linen, and their whole 
 dress is always perfectly clean. This superior 
 cleanliness is chiefly produced by the difference of 
 religion : travellers in Germany remark the same 
 contrast between the protestant and catholic towns, 
 although they be but a few leagues separate. 
 
 The scenery of this day's journey was divine, 
 exhibiting piny mountains, barren rocks, and spots 
 of verdure surpassing imagination. After descend- 
 ing for nearly a league between lofty rocks, covered 
 with pines, and interspersed with green glades, 
 where the grass is short, and soft, and beautifully 
 verdant, we arrived at the village of St, Sulpice. 
 
 VOL. 11. c 
 
26 HISTORY OF A SIX WEEKs' TOUR. 
 
 The mule had latterly become very lame, and the 
 man so disobliging, that we determined to engage 
 a horse for the remainder of the way. Our voitu- 
 rier had anticipated us ; without, in the least, inti- 
 mating his intention to us, he had determined to 
 leave us at this village, and taken measures to that 
 effect. The man we now engaged was a Swiss, a 
 cottager of the better class, who was proud of his 
 mountains and his country. Pointing to the glades 
 that were interspersed among the woods, he in- 
 formed us that they were very beautiful, and were 
 excellent pasture ; that the cows thrived there, and 
 consequently produced excellent milk, from which 
 the best cheese and butter in the world were made. 
 
 The mountains after St. Sulpice became loftier 
 and more beautiful. We passed through a narrow 
 valley between two ranges of mountains, clothed 
 with forests, at the bottom of which flowed a river, 
 from whose narrow bed on either side the bound- 
 aries of the vale arose precipitously. The road lay 
 about half way up the mountain, which formed one 
 of the sides, and w^e saw the overhanging rocks 
 above us, and below, enormous pines, and the river, 
 not to be perceived but from its reflection of the 
 light of heaven, far beneath. The mountains of 
 this beautiful ravine are so little asunder, that in 
 time of war with France an iron chain is thrown 
 
HISTORY OF A SIX WEEKS^ TOUR. 27 
 
 across it. Two leagues from Neufchatel we saw 
 the Alps : range after range of black mountains are 
 seen extending one before the other, and far behind 
 all, towering above every feature of the scene, the 
 snowy Alps. They were a hundred miles distant, 
 but reach so high in the heavens that they look 
 like those accumulated clouds of dazzling white that 
 arrange themselves on the horizon during summer. 
 Their immensity staggers the imagination, and so 
 far surpasses all conception that it requires an 
 effort of the understanding to believe that they 
 indeed form a part of the earth. 
 
 From this point we descended to Neufchatel, 
 which is situated in a narrow plain, between the 
 mountains and its immense lake, and presents no 
 additional aspect of peculiar interest. 
 
 We remained the following day at this town, 
 occupied in a consideration of the step it would 
 now be advisable for us to take. The money we 
 had brought with us from Paris was nearly ex- 
 hausted, but we obtained about £38, in silver, upon 
 discount, from one of the. bankers of the city, and 
 with this w3 resolved to journey towards the lake 
 of Uri, and seek, in that romantic and interesting 
 country, some cottage where we might dwell in 
 peace and solitude. Such were our dreams, which 
 we should probably have realized, had it not been 
 2 
 
28 HISTORY OF A SIX WEEKs' TOUR. 
 
 for the deficiency of that indispensable article money, 
 which obliged us to return to England. 
 
 A Swiss, whom S*** met at the post-office, 
 kindly interested himself in our affairs, and assisted 
 us to hire a voiture to convey us to Lucerne, the 
 principal town of the lake of that name, which is 
 connected with the lake of Uri. This man was 
 imbued with the spirit of true politeness, and 
 endeavoured to perform real services, and seemed to 
 regard the mere ceremonies of the affair as things 
 of very little value. On the 21st August, we left 
 Neufchatel, our Swiss friend accompanied us a little 
 way out of the town. The journey to Lucerne 
 occupied rather more than two days. The country 
 was flat and dull, and, excepting that we now and 
 then caught a glimpse of the divine Alps, there 
 was nothing in it to interest us. Lucerne promised 
 better things, and as soon as we arrived (August 
 23d,) we hired a boat, with which we proposed to 
 coast the lake until we should meet with some 
 suitable habitation, or perhaps, even going to 
 Altorf, cross Mont St. Gothard, and seek in the 
 warm climate of the country to the south of the 
 Alps an air more salubrious, and a temperature 
 better fitted for the precarious state of S***'s 
 health, than the bleak region to the north. The 
 lake of Lucerne is encompassed on all sides by 
 
 i 
 
HISTORY OF A SIX WEEKs' TOUR. 29 
 
 high mountains that rise abruptly from the water ; 
 — sometimes their bare fronts descend perpendi- 
 cularly, and cast a black shade upon the waves; — 
 sometimes they are covered with thick wood, whose 
 dark foliage is interspersed by the brown bare 
 crags on which the trees have taken root. In 
 every part where a glade shows itself in the forest 
 it appears cultivated, and cottages peep from 
 among the woods. The most luxuriant islands, 
 rocky, and covered with moss, and bending trees, 
 arc sprinkled over the lake. Most of these are 
 decorated by the figure of a saint in wretched wax- 
 work. 
 
 The direction of this lake extends at first from 
 east to west, then turning a right angle, it lies 
 from north to south ; this latter part is distin- 
 guished in name from the other, and is called the 
 lake of Uri. The former part is also nearly divided 
 midway, where the jutting land almost meets, and 
 its craggy sides cast a deep shadow on the little 
 strait through which you pass. The summits of 
 several of the mountains that enclose the lake to 
 the south are covered by eternal glaciers ; of one 
 of these, opposite Brunen, they tell the story of a 
 priest and his mistress, who, flying from persecu- 
 tion, inhabited a cottage at the foot of the snows. 
 One winter night an avalanche overwhelmed them, 
 
30 HISTORY OF A SIX WEEKS*" TOUR. 
 
 but their plaintive voices are still heard in stormy 
 nights, calling for succour from the peasants. 
 
 Brunen is situated on the northern side of the 
 angle which the lake makes, forming the extremity 
 of the lake of Lucerne. Here we rested for the 
 night, and dismissed our boatmen. Nothing could 
 be more magnificent than the view from this spot. 
 The high mountains encompassed us, darkening 
 the waters ; at a distance on the shores of Uri, 
 we could perceive the chapel of Tell, and this was 
 the village where he matured the conspiracy which 
 was to overthrow the tyrant of his country ; and 
 indeed, this lovely lake, these sublime mountains, 
 and wild forests, seemed a fit cradle for a mind 
 aspiring to high adventure and heroic deeds. Yet 
 we saw no glimpse of his spirit in his present coun- 
 trymen. The Swiss appeared to us then, and ex- 
 perience has confirmed our opinion, a people slow 
 of comprehension and of action ; but habit has 
 made them unfit for slavery, and they would, I have 
 little doubt, make a brave defence against any in- 
 vader of their freedom. 
 
 Such were our reflections, and we remained until 
 late in the evening on the shores of the lake, con- 
 versing, enjoying the rising breeze, and contem- 
 plating with feelings of exquisite delight the divine 
 objects that surrounded us. 
 
HISTORY OF A SIX WEEKS' TOUR. 31 
 
 The following day was spent in a consideration 
 of our circumstances, and in contemplation of the 
 scene around us. A furious vent cTItalie (south 
 wind) tore up the lake, making immense waves, 
 and carrying the water in a whirlwind high in the 
 air, when it fell like heavy rain into the lake. The 
 waves broke with a tremendous noise on the rocky 
 shores. This conflict continued during the whole 
 day, but it became calmer towards the evening. 
 S*** and I walked on the banks, and sitting on a 
 rude pier, S*** read aloud the account of the Siege 
 of Jerusalem from Tacitus. 
 
 In the meantime we endeavoured to find a habi- 
 tation, but could only procure two unfurnished 
 rooms in an ugly big house, called the Chateau. 
 These we hired at a guinea a month, had beds 
 moved into them, and the next day took possession. 
 But it was a wretched place, with no comfort or 
 convenience. It was with difficulty that we could 
 get any food prepared : as it was cold and rainy, 
 we ordered a fire — they lighted an immense stove 
 which occupied a corner of the room ; it was long 
 before it heated, and when hot, the warmth was 
 so unwholesome that we were obliged to throw 
 open our windows to prevent a kind of suffocation ; 
 added to this, there was but one person in Brunen 
 who could speak French, a barbarous kind of 
 
32 HISTORY OF A SIX WEEKS TOUR. 
 
 German being the languagre of this part of Swit- 
 zerland. It was with difficulty, therefore, that we 
 could get our most ordinary wants supplied. Our 
 amusement meanwhile was writing. S*** com- 
 menced a Romance on the subject of the Assassins, 
 and I ^^Tote to his dictation. 
 
 Our immediate inconveniences led us to a more 
 serious consideration of our situation. At one time 
 we proposed crossing Mont St. Gothard into Italy; 
 but the o£'28 which we possessed, was all the money 
 that we could count upon with any certainty, until 
 the following December. S****'s presence in Lon- 
 don was absolutely necessary for the procuring any 
 further supply. What were we to do ? we should 
 soon be reduced to absolute want. Thus, after 
 balancing the various topics that offered them- 
 selves for discussion, we resolved to return to 
 England. 
 
 Having formed this resolution, we had not a 
 moment for delay: our little store was sensibly 
 decreasing, and .£28 could hardly appear sufficient 
 for so long a journey. It had cost us sixty to 
 cross France from Paris to Neufchatel ; but we 
 now resolved on a more economical mode of travel- 
 ling. Water conveyances are always the cheapest, 
 and fortunately we wore so situated, that by taking 
 advantage of the rivers of the Reuss and Rhine, 
 
HISTORY OF A SIX WEEKS*' TOUR. 33 
 
 we could reach England without travelling a league 
 on land. This was our plan ; we should travel 
 eight hundred miles, and was this possible on so 
 small a sum I but there was no other alternative, 
 and indeed S*** only knew how very little we had 
 to depend upon. 
 
 We departed the next morning for the town of 
 Lucerne. It rained violently during the first part 
 of our voyage, but towards its conclusion the sky 
 became clear, and the sun-beams dried and cheered 
 us. We saw again, and for the last time, the rocky 
 shores of this beautiful lake, its verdant isles, and 
 snow-capt mountains. 
 
 We landed at Lucerne, and remained in that 
 town the following night, and the next morning 
 (August 28th) departed in the diliyence par eau for 
 Loffonburgh, a town on the Rhine, where the falls 
 of that river prevented the same vessel from pro- 
 ceeding any further. Our companions in this voyage 
 were of the meanest class, smoked prodigiously, and 
 were exceedingly disgusting. After having landed 
 for refreshment in the middle of the day, we found, 
 on our return to the boat, that our former seats 
 were occupied ; we took others, when the original 
 possessors angrily, and almost with violence, insisted 
 upon our leaving them. Their brutal rudeness to 
 us, who did not understand their language, pro- 
 c 3 
 
34 HISTORY OF A SIX WEEKS' TOUR. 
 
 Yoked S*** to knock one of the foremost clown : 
 lie did not return the blow, but continued his voci- 
 ferations until the boatmen interfered, and provided 
 us with other seats. 
 
 TheRouss is exceedingly rapid, and we descended 
 several falls, one of more than eight feet. Most of 
 the passengers landed at this point, to re-embark 
 when the boat had descended into smooth water — 
 the boatmen advised us to remain on board. There 
 is something very delicious in the sensation, when 
 at one moment you are at the top of a fall of water, 
 and before the second has expired you are at the 
 bottom, still rushing on with the impulse which the 
 descent has given. The waters of the Rhone are 
 blue, those of the Reuss are of a deep green. I 
 should think that there must be something in the 
 beds of these rivers, and that the accidents of the 
 banks and sky cannot alone cause this difference. 
 
 Sleeping at Dettingen, we arrived the next morn- 
 ing at Loffenburgh, where we engaged a small 
 canoe to convey us to Mumph. I give these boats 
 this Indian appellation, as they were of the rudest 
 construction — long, narrow, and flat-bottomed : 
 they consisted merely of straight pieces of deal 
 board, unpainted, and nailed together with so little 
 care, that the water constantly poured in at the 
 crevices, and the boat perpetually required empty- 
 
 I 
 
HISTORY OF A SIX WEEKs' TOUK. 35 
 
 ing. The river was rapid, and sped swiftly, break- 
 ing as it passed on innumerable rocks just covered 
 by the water : it was a sight of some dread to see 
 our frail boat winding among the eddies of the 
 rocks, which it was death to touch, and when the 
 slightest inclination on one side would instantly 
 have overset it. 
 
 We could not procure a boat at JNIumph, and 
 we thought ourselves lucky in meeting with a 
 return cabriolet to Rheinfclden ; but our good for- 
 tune was of short duration : about a league from 
 Mumph the cabriolet broke down, and we were 
 obliged to proceed on foot. Fortunately we were 
 overtaken by some Swiss soldiers, who were dis- 
 charged and returning home ; they carried our box 
 for us as far as Rheinfclden, when we were directed 
 to proceed a league farther to a village where boats 
 were commonly hired. Here, although not with- 
 out some difficulty, we procured a boat for Basle, 
 and proceeded down a swift river, while evening 
 came on, and the air was bleak and comfortless. 
 Our voyage was, however, short, and we arrived at 
 the place of our destination by six in the evening. 
 
GERMANY. 
 
 Before we slept, S*** had made a bargain for 
 a boat to carry us to Mayence, and the next morn- 
 ing, bidding adieu to Switzerland, we embarked in 
 a boat laden with merchandise, but where we had 
 no fellow-passengers to disturb our tranquillity by 
 their vulgarity and rudeness. The wind was vio- 
 lently against us, but the stream, aided by a slight 
 exertion from the rowers, carried us on ; the sun 
 shone pleasantly, S*** read aloud to us Mary 
 Wollstonecraft's Letters from Norway, and we 
 passed our time delightfully. 
 
 The evening was such as to find few parallels in 
 beauty ; as it approached, the banks, which had 
 hitherto been flat and uninteresting, became ex- 
 ceedingly beautiful. Suddenly the river grew 
 narrow, and the boat dashed with inconceivable 
 rapidity round the base of a rocky hill covered with 
 pines ; a ruined tower, with its desolated windows, 
 stood on the summit of another hill that jutted 
 
HISTORY OF A SIX WEEKS* TOUR. 37 
 
 into the river ; beyond, the sunset was illuminating 
 the distant mountains and clouds, casting the re- 
 flection of its rich and purple hues on the agitated 
 river. The brilliance and contrasts of the colours 
 on the circling whirlpools of the stream, was an 
 appearance entirely new and most beautiful ; the 
 shades grew darker as the sun descended below the 
 horizon, and after we had landed, as we walked to 
 our inn round a beautiful bay, the full moon arose 
 with divine splendour, casting its silver light on the 
 before purpled waves. 
 
 : The following morning we pursued our journey 
 in a slight canoe, in which every motion was 
 accompanied with danger ; but the stream had lost 
 much of its rapidity, and was no longer impeded by 
 rocks; the banks were low, and covered with willows. 
 We passed Strasburgh, and the next morning it 
 was proposed to us that we should proceed in the 
 diligence par eau^ as the navigation would become 
 dangerous for our small boat. 
 
 There were only four passengers besides our- 
 selves, three of these wei'o students of the Stras- 
 burgh university : Schwitz, a rather handsome, 
 good-tempered young man ; Hoff, a kind of shape- 
 less animal, with a heavy, ugly, German face ; and 
 Schneider, who was nearly an idiot, and on whom 
 his companions were always playing a thousand 
 
38 HISTORY OF A SIX WEEKs"" TOUR. 
 
 tricks: the remaining passengers were a woman 
 and an infant. 
 
 Tlie country was uninteresting, but v>'e enjoyed 
 fine weather, and slept in the boat in the open 
 air without any inconvenience. We saw on the 
 shores few objects that called forth our attention, 
 if I except the town of Mannheim, which was 
 strikingly neat and clean. It was situated at 
 about a mile from the river, and the road to it 
 was planted on each side wuth beautiful acacias. 
 The last part of this voyage was performed close 
 under land, as the wind was so violently against 
 us, that, even with all the force of a rapid current 
 in our favour, we were hardly permitted to pro- 
 ceed. We were told (and not without reason) 
 that we ought to congratulate ourselves on having 
 exchanged our canoe for this boat, as the river 
 was now of considerable width, and tossed by the 
 wind into large waves. The same morning a boat, 
 containing fifteen persons, in attempting to cross 
 the water, had upset in the middle of the river, 
 and every one in it perished. We saw the boat 
 turned over, floating down the stream. This was 
 a melancholy sight, yet ludicrously commented on 
 by the hatelier ; almost the whole stock of whose 
 French consisted in the word seulement. When 
 we asked him what had happened, he answered, 
 
HISTORY OF A SIX WEEKS TOUR. oy 
 
 laying particular emphasis on this favourite dis- 
 syllable, Cest seulcment un bateau, qui etait seidement 
 renverse, et tons les peuples sont seulement noyes. 
 
 Mayence is one of the best fortified towns in 
 Germany. The river, which is broad and rapid, 
 guards it to the east, and the hills for three leagues 
 around exhibit signs of fortifications. The town 
 itself is old, the streets narrow, and the houses 
 high : the cathedral and towers of the town still 
 bear marks of the bombardment which took place 
 in the revolutionary war. 
 
 We took our place in the diligence par eau for 
 Cologne, and the next morning (September 4th) 
 departed. This conveyance appeared much more 
 like a mercantile English affair than any we had 
 before seen ; it was shaped like a steam-boat, with 
 a cabin and a high deck. Most of our companions 
 chose to remain in the cabin ; this was fortunate 
 for us, since nothing could be more horribly dis- 
 gusting than the lower order of smoking, drink- 
 ing Germans who travelled with us ; they swag- 
 gered and talked, and got tipsy, and, what was 
 hideous to English eyes, kissed one another ; there 
 were, however, two or three merchants of a better 
 class, who appeared well-informed and polite. 
 
 The part of the Rhino down which we now 
 glided, is that so beautifully described by Lord 
 
40 HISTORY OF A SIX WEEKS'" TOUR. 
 
 BjTon in his third canto of Childe Harold. We 
 read these verses with dehght, as they conjured 
 before us these lovely scenes with truth and 
 vividness of painting, and with the exquisite addi- 
 tion of glowing language and a warm imagination. 
 We were carried down by a dangerously rapid cur- 
 rent, and saw on either side of us hills covered with 
 vines and trees, craggy cliffs crowned by desolate 
 towers, and wooded islands, where picturesque 
 ruins peeped from behind the foliage, and cast the 
 shadows of their forms on the troubled waters, 
 which distorted without deforming them. We 
 heard the songs of the vintagers, and if surrounded 
 by disgusting Germans, the sight was not so replete 
 with enjoyment as I now fancy it to have been; yet 
 memory, taking all the dark shades from the pic- 
 ture, presents this part of the Rhine to my remem- 
 brance as the loveliest paradise on earth. 
 
 We had sufficient leisure for the enjoyment of 
 these scenes, for the boat-men, neither rowing nor 
 steering, suffered us to be carried down by the 
 stream, and the boat turned round and round as 
 it descended. 
 
 While I speak with disgust of the Germans who 
 travelled with us, I should, in justice to these 
 borderers, record, that at one of the inns here we 
 saw the only pretty woman we met with in the 
 
HISTORY OF A SIX WEEKs' TOUR. 41 
 
 course of our travels. She is what I should conceive 
 to be a truly German beauty; grey eyes, sHghtly 
 tinged with brown, and expressive of uncommon 
 sweetness and frankness. She had lately recovered 
 from a fever, and this added to the interest of her 
 countenance, by adorning it with an appearance of 
 extreme delicacy. 
 
 On the following day we left the hills of the 
 Rhine, and found that, for the remainder of our 
 journey, we should move sluggishly through the 
 flats of Holland : the river also winds extremely, 
 so that, after calculating our resources, we resolved 
 to finish our journey in a land diligence. Our 
 water conveyance remained that night at Bonn, 
 and that we might lose no time, we proceeded 
 post the same night to Cologne, where we arrived 
 late ; for the rate of travelling in Germany seldom 
 exceeds a mile and a half an hour. 
 
 Cologne appeared an immense town, as we drove 
 through street after street to arrive at our inn. 
 Before we slept, we secured places in the diligence, 
 which was to depart next morning for Cleves. 
 
 Nothing in the world can be more wretched 
 than the travelling in this German diligence : the 
 coach is clumsy and comfortless, and we proceeded 
 so slowly, stopping so often, that it appeared as 
 if we should never arrive at our journey's end- 
 
42 HISTORY OF A SIX WEEKs' TOUR. 
 
 We were allowed two hours for dinner, and two 
 more were wasted in the evening while the coach 
 was being changed. We were then requested, as 
 the diligence had a greater demand for places than 
 it could supply, to proceed in a cabriolet which was 
 provided for us. We readily consented, as we 
 hoped to travel faster than in the heavy diligence; 
 but this was not permitted, and we jogged on all 
 night behind this cumbrous machine. In the 
 morning when we stopped, we for a moment in- 
 dulged a hope that we had arrived at Cleves, 
 which was at the distance of five leagues from our 
 last night''s stage ; but we had only advanced three 
 leagues in seven or eight hours, and had yet eight 
 miles to perform. However, we first rested about 
 three hours at this stage, where we could not 
 obtain breakfast or any convenience, and at about 
 eight o'clock we again departed, and with slow, 
 although far from easy travelling, faint with hunger 
 and fatigue, we arrived by noon at Cleves. 
 
HOLLAND. 
 
 Tired by the slow pace of the dihgence, we 
 resolved to post the remainder of the way. We 
 had now, however, left Germany, and travelled at 
 about the same rate as an Enghsh post-chaise. 
 The country was entirely flat, and the roads so 
 sandy, that the horses proceeded with difficulty. 
 The only ornaments of this country are the turf forti- 
 fications that surround the towns. At Nimeguen we 
 passed the flying bridge, mentioned in the letters of 
 Lady ^lary Wortley Montague. We had intended 
 to travel all night, but at Triel, where we arrived 
 at about ten ©""clock, we were assured that no post- 
 boy was to be found who would proceed at so late 
 an hour, on account of the robbers who infested 
 the roads. This was an obvious imposition ; but 
 as we could procure neither horses nor driver, we 
 were obliged to sleep here. 
 
 During the whole of the following day the road 
 lay between canals, which intersect tliis country in 
 
44 History of a six weeks^ tour. 
 
 every direction. The roads were excellent, but 
 the Dutch have contrived as many inconveniences 
 as possible. In our journey of the day before, we 
 had passed by a \Ninduiill, which was so situated 
 with regard to the road, that it was only by keep- 
 ing close to the opposite side, and passing quickly, 
 that we could avoid the sweep of its sails. 
 
 The roads between the canals were only wide 
 enough to admit of one carriage, so that when we 
 encountered another we were obliged sometimes to 
 back for half a mile, until we should come to one 
 of the drawbridges which led to the fields, on 
 which one of the cabriolets was backed, while the 
 other passed. But they have another practice, 
 which is still more annoying : the flax when cut is 
 put to soak under the mud of the canals, and then 
 placed to dry against the trees which are planted 
 on either side of the road ; the stench that it 
 exhales, when the beams of the sun di'aw out the 
 moisture, is scarcely endurable. We saw many 
 enormous frogs and toads in the canals ; and the 
 only sight which refreshed the eye by its beauty 
 was the delicious verdure of the fields, where the 
 grass was as rich and green as that of England, an 
 appearance not common on the Continent. 
 
 Rotterdam is remarkably clean : the Dutch even 
 wash the outside brickwork of their houses. We 
 
HISTOKY OF A SIX WEEKS TOUR. 45 
 
 remained here one day, and met with a man in a 
 very unfortunate condition : he had been born in 
 Holland, and had spent so much of liis life between 
 England, France, and Germany, that he had ac- 
 quired a slight knowledge of the language of each 
 country, and spoke all very imperfectly. He said 
 that he understood English best, but he was nearly 
 unable to express himself in that. 
 
 On the evening of the 8th of September we sailed 
 from Rotterdam, but contrary winds obliged us to 
 remain nearly two days at Marsluys, a town about 
 two leagues from Rotterdam. Here our last guinea 
 was expended, and we reflected with wonder that 
 we had travelled eight himdred miles for less than 
 thirty pounds, passing through lovely scenes, and 
 enjoying the beauteous Rhine, and all the brilliant 
 shows of earth and sky, perhaps more, travelling as 
 we did, in an open boat, than if we had been shut 
 up in a carriage, and passed on the road under the 
 hills. During our stay at Marsluys, S*** continued 
 his Romance. 
 
 The captain of our vessel was an Englishman, 
 and had been a king's pilot. The bar of the Rhine 
 a little below ISIarsluys is so dangerous, that with- 
 out a very favourable breeze, none of the Dutch 
 vessels dare attempt its passage ; but although the 
 wind was a very few points in our favcui, our 
 
46 HISTORY OF A SIX WEEKS*' TOUR. 
 
 captain resolved to sail, and although half repent- 
 ant before he had accomplished his undertaking, he 
 was glad and proud when, triumphing over the 
 timorous Dutchmen, the bar was crossed, and the 
 vessel safe in the open sea. It was in truth an 
 enterprise of some peril ; a heavy gale had prevailed 
 during the night, and although it had abated since 
 the mornino;, the breakers at the bar were still 
 exceedingly high. Through some delay, which had 
 arisen from the ship having got aground in the 
 harbour, we arrived half an hour after the appointed 
 time. The breakers were tremendous, and we 
 were informed that there was the space of only two 
 feet between the bottom of the vessel and the 
 sands. The waves, which broke against the sides 
 of the ship with a terrible shock, were quite per- 
 pendicular, and even sometimes overhanging in the 
 abrupt smoothness of their sides. Shoals of enor- 
 mous porpoises were sporting with the utmost com- 
 posure amidst the troubled waters. 
 
 We safely passed this danger, and after a naviga- 
 tion unexpectedly short, arrived at Gravesend on 
 the morning of the 13th of September, the third 
 day after our departure from Marsluys. 
 
 M.S. 
 
LETTERS 
 
 DESCKlPTnE Of 
 
 A SAIL ROUND THE LAKE OF GENEVA, 
 
 ANU OF TIIK 
 
 GLACIERS OF CHAMOUNL 
 
LETTERS 
 
 DURING A RESIDENCE OF THREE MONTHS IN THE 
 ENVIRONS OF GENEVA, 
 
 IN THE SUMMER OF THE YEAR 1816. 
 
 LETTER L 
 
 Hotel de Secheron, Geneva, 
 May 17, 18)6. 
 
 We arrived at Paris on the 8th of this month, 
 and were detained two days for the purpose of 
 obtaining the various signatures necessary to our 
 passports, the French government having become 
 much more circumspect since the escape of Lava- 
 lette. We had no letters of introduction, or any 
 friend in that city, and were therefore confined to 
 our hotel, where we were obliged to hire apart- 
 ments for the week, although, when we first 
 arrived, we expected to be detained one night 
 
 VOL. II. D 
 
50 LETTERS FROM GENEVA. 
 
 only ; for in Paris there are no houses where you 
 can be accommodated with apartments by the 
 day. 
 
 The manners of the French are interesting, 
 although less attractive, at least to Englishmen, 
 than before the last invasion of the Allies : the 
 discontent and sullenness of their minds perpetually 
 betrays itself. Nor is it wonderful that they should 
 regard the subjects of a government which fills 
 their country with hostile garrisons, and sustains a 
 detested dynasty on the throne, with an acrimony 
 and indignation of which that government alone is 
 the proper object. This feeling is honourable to 
 the French, and encouraging to all those of every 
 nation in Europe who have a fellow feeling with the 
 oppressed, and who cherish an unconquerable hope 
 that the cause of liberty must at length prevail. 
 
 Our route after Paris, as far as Troyes, lay 
 through the same uninteresting tract of country 
 which we had traversed on foot nearly two years 
 before, but on quitting Troyes we left the road 
 leading to Neufchatel, to follow that which was to 
 conduct us to Geneva. We entered Dijon on the 
 third evening after our departure from Paris, and 
 passing through Dole, arrived at Poligny. This 
 town is built at the foot of Jura, which rises 
 abruptly from a plain of vast extent. The rocks 
 
SECHERON. 51 
 
 of the mountain overhang the houses. Some 
 difficulty in procuring horses detained us here until 
 the evening closed in, when we proceeded, by the 
 light of a stormy moon, to Champagnolles, a little 
 village situated in the depth of the mountains. 
 The road was serpentine and exceedingly steep, 
 and was overhung on one side by half-distinguished 
 precipices, whilst the other was a gulf, filled by 
 the darkness of the driving clouds. The dashinsr 
 of the invisible streams announced to us that we 
 had quitted the plains of France, as we slowly 
 ascended, amidst a violent storm of wind and rain, 
 to Champagnolles, where we arrived at twelve 
 o"'clock, the fourth night after our departure from 
 Paris. 
 
 The next morning we proceeded, still ascending 
 among the ravines and valleys of the mountain. 
 The scenery perpetually grows more wonderful 
 and sublime : pine forests of impenetrable thick- 
 ness and untrodden, nay inaccessible expanse, spread 
 on every side. Sometimes the dark woods descend- 
 ing, follow the route into the valleys, the distorted 
 trees struggling with knotted roots between the 
 most barren clefts ; sometimes the road winds 
 high into the regions of frost, and then the forests 
 become scattered, and the branches of the trees 
 are loaded with snow, and half of the enormous 
 d2 
 
52 LETTERS FROM GENEVA. 
 
 pines themselves buried in the wavy drifts. The 
 spring, as the inhabitants informed us, was un- 
 usually late, and indeed the cold was excessive ; 
 as we ascended the mountains, the same clouds 
 which rained on us in the valleys poured forth 
 large flakes of snow thick and fast. The sun occa- 
 sionally shone through these showers, and illumi- 
 nated the magnificent ravines of the mountains, 
 whose gigantic pines were some laden with snow, 
 some wreathed round by the lines of scattered and 
 lingering vapour ; others darting their spires into 
 the sunny sky, brilliantly clear and azure. 
 
 As the evening advanced, and we ascended 
 higher, the snow which we had beheld whitening 
 the overhanging rocks, now encroached upon our 
 road, and it snowed fast as we entered the village 
 of Les Rousses, where we were threatened by the 
 apparent necessity of passing the night in a bad 
 inn and dirty beds. For, from that place there are 
 two roads to Geneva ; one by Nion, in the Swiss 
 territory, where the mountain route is shorter, and 
 comparatively easy at that time of the year, when 
 the road is for several leagues covered with snow of 
 an enormous depth ; the other road lay through 
 Gex, and was too circuitous and dangerous to be 
 attempted at so late an hour in the day. Our 
 passport, however, was for Gex, and we were told 
 
SECHERON. . 53 
 
 that we could not change its destination ; but all 
 these police laws, so severe in themselves, are to be 
 softened by bribery, and this difficulty was at length 
 overcome. We hired four horses, and ten men to 
 suppoi't the carriage, and depai-ted from Les 
 Rousses at six in the evening, when the sun had 
 already far descended, and the snow pelting against 
 the windows of our carriage, assisted the coming 
 darkness to deprive us of the view of the lake of 
 Geneva and the far distant Alps. 
 
 The prospect around, however, was sufficiently 
 sublime to command our attention — never was 
 scene more awfully desolate. The trees in these 
 regions are incredibly large, and stand in scattered 
 clumps over the white wilderness ; the vast expanse 
 of snow was chequered only by these gigantic pines, 
 and the poles that marked our road : no river nor 
 rock-encircled lawn relieved the eye, by adding the 
 picturesque to the sublime. The natural silence 
 of that uninhabited desert contrasted strangely 
 with the voices of the men who conducted us, who, 
 with animated tones and gestures, called to one 
 another in a patois composed of French and Italian, 
 creating disturbance, where, but for them, there 
 was none. 
 
 To what a different scene are we now arrived ! 
 To the warm sunshine, and to the humming of sun- 
 
54 LETTERS FROM GENEVA. 
 
 loving insects. From the windows of our hotel we 
 see the lovely lake, blue as the heavens which it 
 reflects, and sparkling with golden beams. The 
 opposite shore is sloping, and covered with vines, 
 which, however, do not so early in the season add 
 to the beauty of the prospect. Gentlemen's seats 
 are scattered over these banks, behind which rise 
 the various ridges of black mountains, and towering 
 far above, in the midst of its snowy Alps, the 
 majestic Mont Blanc, highest and queen of all. 
 Such is the view reflected by the lake ; it is a bright 
 summer scene without any of that sacred solitude 
 and deep seclusion that delighted us at Lucerne. 
 
 We have not yet found out any very agreeable 
 walks, but you know our attachment to water ex- 
 cursions. We have hired a boat, and every even- 
 ing, at about six o'clock, we sail on the lake, 
 which is delightful, whether we glide over a glassy 
 surface or are speeded along by a strong wind. 
 The waves of this lake never afflict me with that 
 sickness that deprives me of all enjoyment in a sea 
 voyage ; on the contrary, the tossing of our boat 
 raises my spirits and inspires me with unusual 
 hilarity. Twilight here is of short duration, but 
 we at present enjoy the benefit of an increasing 
 moon, and seldom return until ten o'clock, when, 
 as we approach the shore, we are saluted by the 
 
SECHEROX. 55 
 
 delightful scent of flowers and new-mown grass, and 
 the chirp of the grasshoppers, and the song of the 
 evening birds. 
 
 We do not enter into society here, yet our time 
 passes swiftly and delightfully. We read Latin 
 and Italian during the heats of noon, and when the 
 sun declines we walk in the garden of the hotel, 
 looking at the rabbits, relieving fallen cockchaffers, 
 and watching the motions of a mjTiad of lizards, 
 who inhabit a southern wall of the garden. You 
 know that we have just escaped from the gloom of 
 winter and of London ; and coming to this delight- 
 ful spot during this divine weather, I feel as happy 
 as a new-fledged bird, and hardly care what twig 
 I fly to, so that I may try my new-found wings. A 
 more experienced bird may be more difiicult in its 
 choice of a bower ; but, in my present temper of 
 mind, the budding flowers, the fresh grass of 
 spring, and the happy creatures about me that 
 live and enjoy these pleasures, are quite enough to 
 afford me exquisite delight, even though clouds 
 should shut out Mont Blanc from my sight. Adieu I 
 
 M. S. 
 
LETTER II. 
 
 COLIGNY — GENEVA PLAINPALAIS, 
 
 Campagne Chapins, iiear Coligny, 
 \st June. 
 
 You will perceive from my date that we have 
 changed our residence since my last letter. We 
 now inhabit a little cottage on the opposite shore 
 of the lake, and have exchanged the view of Mont 
 Blanc and her snowy aiguilles for the dark frown- 
 ing Jura, behind whose range we every evening see 
 the sun sink, and darkness approaches our valley 
 from behind the Alps, which are then tinged by 
 that glowing rose-like hue which is observed in 
 England to attend on the clouds of an autumnal 
 sky when day-light is almost gone. The lake is at 
 our feet, and a little harbour contains our boat, in 
 which we still enjoy our evening excursions on the 
 water. Unfortunately we do not now enjoy those 
 brilliant skies that hailed us on our first arrival to 
 this country. An almost perpetual rain confines 
 us principally to the house ; but when the sun 
 bursts forth it is with a splendour and heat un- 
 
COLIGXY. 57 
 
 known in England. The thunder storms that visit 
 us are grander and more terrific than I have ever 
 seen before. We watch them as they approach 
 from the opposite side of the lake, observing the 
 lightning play among the clouds in various parts of 
 the heavens, and dart in jagged figures upon the 
 piny heights of Jura, dark with the shadow of the 
 overhanging cloud, while perhaps the sun is shin- 
 ing cheerily upon us. One night we enjoi/ed a finer 
 storm than I had ever before beheld. The lake 
 was lit up — the pines on Jura made visible, and all 
 the scene illuminated for an instant, when a pitchy 
 blackness succeeded, and the thunder came in 
 frightful bursts over our heads, amid the darkness. 
 But while I still dwell on the country around 
 Geneva, you will expect me to say something of 
 the town itself: there is nothinor, however, in it 
 that can repay you for the trouble of walking over 
 its rough stones. The houses are high, the streets 
 narrow, many of them on the ascent, and no public 
 building of any beauty to attract your eye, or any 
 architecture to gratify your taste. The town is 
 surrounded by a wall, the three gates of which are 
 shut exactly at ten o'clock, when no bribery (as in 
 France) can open them. To the south of the 
 town is the promenade of the Genevese, a grassy 
 plain planted with a few trees, and called Plain- 
 u3 
 
58 LETTERS FROM GENEVA. 
 
 palais. Here a small obelisk is erected to the glory 
 of Rousseau, and here (such is the mutability of 
 human life) the magistrates, the successors of those 
 who exiled him from his native country, were shot 
 by the populace during that revolution, which his 
 writings mainly contributed to mature, and which, 
 notwithstanding the temporary bloodshed and in- 
 justice with which it was polluted, has produced 
 enduring benefits to mankind, which all the chica- 
 nery of statesmen, nor even the great conspiracy 
 of kings, can entirely render vain. From respect 
 to the memory of their predecessors, none of the 
 present magistrates ever walk in Plainpalais. 
 Another Sunday recreation for the citizens is an 
 excursion to the top of Mont Saleve. This hill is 
 within a league of the town, and rises perpendicu- 
 larly from the cultivated plain. It is ascended on 
 the other side, and I should judge from its situa- 
 tion that your toil is rewarded by a delightful view 
 of the course of the Rhone and Arve, and of the 
 shores of the lake. We have not yet visited it. 
 
 There is more equality of classes here than in 
 England. This occasions a greater freedom and 
 refinement of manners among the lower orders than 
 we meet with in our own country. I fancy the 
 haughty English ladies are greatly disgusted with 
 this consequence of republican institutions, for the 
 
COLIGXY. 69 
 
 Genevese servants complain very much of their 
 sculding^ an exercise of the tongue, T believe, per- 
 fectly unknown here. The peasants of Switzerland 
 may not however emulate the vivacity and grace of 
 the French. They are more cleanly, but they are 
 slow and inapt. I know a girl of twenty who, 
 although she had lived all her life among vineyards, 
 could not inform me during what month the vintage 
 took place, and I discovered she was utterly ignorant 
 of the order in which the months succeed one to 
 another. She would not have been surprised if I 
 had talked of the burning sun and delicious fruits 
 of December, or of the frosts of July. Yet she 
 is by no means deficient in understanding. 
 
 The Genevese are also much inclined to puritan- 
 ism. It is true that from habit they dance on a 
 Sunday, but as soon as the French government was 
 abolished in the town, the magistrates ordered the 
 theatre to be closed, and measures were taken to 
 pull down the building. 
 
 We have latterly enjoyed fine weather, and 
 nothing is more pleasant than to listen to the 
 evening song of the vine-dressers. They are all 
 women, and most of them have harmonious 
 although masculine voices. The theme of their 
 ballads consists of shepherds, love, flocks, and the 
 sons of kings who fall in love with beautiful shep- 
 
60 
 
 LETTERS FROM GENEVA. 
 
 herdesses. Their tunes are monotonous, but it is 
 sweet to hear them in the stilhiess of evening, wliile 
 we are enjoying the sight of the setting sun, either 
 from the hill behind our house or from the lake. 
 
 Such ai'e our pleasures here, which would be 
 greatly increased if the season had been more 
 favourable, for they chiefly consist in such enjoy- 
 ments as sunshine and gentle breezes bestow. We 
 have not yet made any excursion in the environs of 
 the town, but we have planned several, when you 
 shall again hear of us ; and we will endeavour, by 
 the magic of words, to transport the ethereal part 
 of you to the neighbourhood of the Alps, and 
 mountain streams, and forests, which, while they 
 clothe the former, darken the latter with their vast 
 shadows. Adieu ! 
 
 ■ M. 
 
LETTER III. 
 
 To T. P. Esa. 
 
 MEILLERIE — CLARENS — CHILLON VEVAI — LAUSANNE. 
 
 Montalegre, near Coligni, Geneca, 
 July Vlth. 
 
 It is nearly a fortnight since I have returned from 
 Vevai. This journey has been on every account 
 dehghtful, but most especially, because then I first 
 knew the divine beauty of Rousseau's imagina- 
 tion, as it exhibits itself in Julie. It is inconceiv- 
 able what an enchantment the scene itself lends to 
 those delineations, from which its own most touch- 
 ing charm arises. But I will give you an abstract 
 of our voyage, which lasted eight days, and if you 
 have a map of Switzerland, you can follow me. 
 
 We left Montalegre at half-past two on the 23d 
 of June. The lake was calm, and after three hours 
 of rowing we arrived at Hermance, a beautiful 
 little village, containing a ruined tower, built, the 
 the villagers say, by Julius Csesar. There were 
 three other towers similar to it, which the Genevese 
 destroyed for their own fortifications in 1560. We 
 
62 LETTERS FROM GENEVA. 
 
 got into the tower by a kind of window. The 
 walls are immensely solid, and the stone of which 
 it is built so hard, that it yet retained the mark of 
 chisels. The boatmen said, that this tower was 
 once three times higher than it is now. Thei'e are 
 two staircases in the thickness of the walls, one of 
 which is entirely demolished, and the other half 
 ruined, and only accessible by a ladder. The town 
 itself, now an inconsiderable village inhabited by a 
 few fishermen, was built by a queen of Burgundy, 
 and reduced to its present state by the inhabitants 
 of Berne, who burnt and ravaged everything they 
 could find. 
 
 Leaving Hermance, we arrived at sunset at the 
 village of Nerni. After looking at our lodgings, 
 which were gloomy and dirty, we walked out by 
 the side of the lake. It was beautiful to see the 
 vast expanse of these purple and misty waters 
 broken by the craggy islets near to its slant and 
 " beached margin." There were many fish sporting 
 in the lake, and multitudes were collected close to 
 the rocks to catch the flies which inhabited them. 
 
 On returning to the village, we sat on a wall 
 beside the lake, looking at some children who were 
 playing at a game like ninepins. The children here 
 appeared in an extraordinary way deformed and 
 diseased. Most of them were crooked, and with 
 
SAIL ROUXn THE LAKE. 63 
 
 enlarged throats; but one little boy had such 
 exquisite grace in his mien and motions, as I never 
 before saw equalled in a child. His countenance 
 was beautiful for the expression with which it 
 overflowed. There was a mixture of pride and 
 gentleness in his eyes and lips, the indications of 
 sensibility, which his education will probably per- 
 vert to misery or seduce to crime : but there was 
 more of gentleness than of pride, and it seemed 
 that the pride was tamed from its original wild- 
 ness by the habitual exercise of milder feelings. 
 My companion gave him a piece of money, which 
 he took without speaking, with a sweet smile of 
 easy thankfulness, and then with an unembarrassed 
 air turned to his play. All this might scarcely 
 be ; but the imagination surely could not forbear 
 to breathe into the most inanimate forms, some 
 likeness of its own visions, on such a serene and 
 glowing evening, in this remote and romantic vil- 
 lage, beside the calm lake that bore us hither. 
 
 On returning to our inn, we found that the 
 servant had arranged our rooms, and deprived 
 them of the greater portion of their former dis- 
 consolate appearance. They reminded my com- 
 panion of Greece : it was five years, he said, since 
 he had slept in such beds. The influence of the 
 recollections excited by this circumstance on our 
 
64 LETTERS FROM GENEVA, 
 
 conversation graJiuiUy faded, and I retired to rest 
 with no unpleasant sensations, thinking of our 
 journey to-raorrow, and of the pleasure of recount- 
 inff the little adventures of it when we return. 
 
 The next morning we passed Yvoire, a scattered 
 village with an ancient castle, whose houses are 
 interspersed with trees, and which stands at a 
 little distance from Nerni, on the promontory 
 which bounds a deep bay, some miles in extent. 
 So soon as we arrived at this promontory, the 
 lake began to assume an aspect of wilder magni- 
 ficence. The mountains of Savoy, whose summits 
 were bright with snow, descended in broken slopes 
 to the lake : on high, the rocks were dark with 
 pine forests, which become deeper and more im- 
 mense, until the ice and snow mingle with the 
 points of naked rock that pierce the blue air ; but 
 below, groves of walnut, chesnut, and oak, with 
 openings of lawny fields, attested the milder cli- 
 mate. 
 
 As soon as we had passed the opposite promon- 
 tory, we saw the river Drance, which descends 
 from between a chasm in the mountains, and 
 makes a plain near the lake, intersected by its 
 divided streams. Thousands of hesolets, beautiful 
 water-birds, like sea-gulls, but smaller, with purple 
 on their backs, take their station on the shallows, 
 
SAIL ROUND THE LAKE. 65 
 
 where its waters mingle with the lake. As we 
 approached Evian, the mountains descended more 
 precipitously to the lake, and masses of inter- 
 mingled wood and rock overhung its shining spire. 
 
 We arrived at this town about seven o'clock, 
 after a day which involved more rapid changes of 
 atmosphere than I ever recollect to have observed 
 before. The morning was cold and wet ; then an 
 easterly wind, and the clouds hard and high ; then 
 thunder showers, and wind shifting to every quarter ; 
 then a warm blast from the south, and summer 
 clouds hanging over the peaks, with bright blue sky 
 between. About half an hour after we had arrived 
 at Evian, a few flashes of lightning came from a 
 dark cloud, directly over head, and continued after 
 the cloud had dispersed. " Diespiter, per pura 
 tonantes egit equos:" a phenomenon which certainly 
 had no influence on mo, corresponding with that 
 which it produced on Horace. 
 
 The appearance of the inhabitants of Evian is 
 more wretched, diseased and poor, than I ever 
 recollect to have seen. The contrast indeed between 
 the subjects of the King of Sardinia and the citizens 
 of the independent republics of Switzerland, affords 
 a powerful illustration of the blighting mischiefs of 
 despotism, within the space of a few miles. They 
 have mineral waters here, caux savonneuses^ they 
 
66 
 
 LETTERS FROM GENEVA. 
 
 call them. In the evening we had some difficulty 
 about our passports, but so soon as the syndic heard 
 my companion's rank and name, he apologized for 
 the circumstance. The inn was good. During 
 our voyage, on the distant height of a hil), covered 
 with pine-forests, we saw a ruined castle, which 
 reminded me of those on the Rhine. 
 
 We left Evian on the following morning, with a 
 wind of such violence as to permit but one sail to 
 be carried. The waves also were exceedingly high, 
 and our boat so heavily laden, that there appeared 
 to be some danger. We arrived, however, safe at 
 Meillerie, after passing with great speed mighty 
 forests which overhung the lake, and lawns of 
 exquisite verdure, and mountains with bare and 
 icy points, which rose immediately from the summit 
 of the rocks, whose bases were echoing to the 
 waves. 
 
 We here heard that the Empress Maria Louisa 
 had slept at Meillerie, — before the present inn was 
 built, and when the accommodations were those of 
 the most wretched village, — in remembrance of St. 
 Preux. How beautiful it is to find that the com- 
 mon sentiments of human nature can attach them- 
 selves to those who are the most removed from its 
 duties and its enjoyments, when Genius pleads for 
 their admission at the gate of Power. To own 
 
SAIL ROUND THE LAKE. 67 
 
 them was becoming in the Empress, and confirms 
 the affectionate praise contained in the regret of a 
 great and enlightened nation. A Bourbon dared 
 not even to have remembered Rousseau. She 
 owed this power to that democracy which her 
 husband's dynasty outraged, and of wliich it was 
 however, in some sort, the representative among 
 the nations of the earth. This httle incident shows 
 at once how unfit and liow impossible it is for the 
 ancient system of opinions, or for any power built 
 upon a conspiracy to revive them, permanently to 
 subsist among mankind. We dined there, and 
 had some honey, the best I have ever tasted, the 
 very essence of the mountain flowers, and as frag- 
 rant. Probably the village derives its name from 
 this production. ^leillerie is the well-known scene 
 of St. Preux's visionary exile ; but Meillerie is 
 indeed enchanted ground, were Rousseau no magi- 
 cian. Groves of pine, chcsnut, and walnut over- 
 shadow it ; magnificent and unbounded forests to 
 which England affords no parallel. In the midst 
 of these woods are dells of lawny expanse, incon- 
 ceivably verdant, adorned with a thousand of the 
 rarest flowers, and odorous with thyme. 
 
 The lake appeared somewhat calmer as we left 
 Meillerie, sailing close to the banks, whose magni- 
 ficence augmented with the tui'n of every pro- 
 
68 
 
 LETTERS IROM C;EXKVA. 
 
 niontory. But we congratulated ourselves too 
 sooii : the wind gradually increased in violence, 
 until it blew tremendously ; and, as it came from 
 the remotest extremity of the lake, produced 
 waves of a frightful height, arid covered the whole 
 surface with a chaos of foam. One of our boat- 
 men", who was a dreadfully stupid fellow, persisted 
 in holding the sail at a time when the boat was on 
 the point of being driven under water by the 
 hurricane. On discovei-ing his error, he let it 
 entirely go, and the boat for a moment refused to 
 obey the helm ; in addition, the rudder was so 
 broken as to render the management of it very 
 difficult ; one wave fell in, and then another. jSly 
 companion, an excellent swimmer, took off his 
 coat, I did the same, and we sat with our arms 
 crossed, every instant expecting to be swamped. 
 The sail was, however, again held, the boat obeyed 
 the helm, and still in imminent peril from the 
 immensity of the waves, we arrived in a few 
 minutes at a sheltered port, in the village of St. 
 Gingoux. 
 
 I felt in this near prospect of death a mixture 
 of sensations, among which terror entered, though 
 but subordinately. My feelings would have been 
 less painful had I been alone ; but I know that 
 my companion would have attempted to save me, 
 
SAIL ROUND THE LAKE. 69 
 
 and I was overcome with humiliation, when I 
 thought that his hfe might have been risked to 
 preserve mine. When we arrived at St. Gingoux, 
 the inliabitants, who stood on the shore, unaccus- 
 tomed to see a vessel as frail as ours, and fearing 
 to venture at all on such a sea, exchanged looks of 
 wonder and congratulation with our boatmen, who, 
 as well as ourselves, were well pleased to set foot 
 on shore. 
 
 St.Gingouxis even more beautiful than Meillerie; 
 the mountains are higher, and their loftiest points 
 of elevation descend more abruptly to the lake. 
 Onhigh,the aerial smnmits still cherish great depths 
 of snow in their i-avines, and in the paths of their 
 unseen torrents. One of the highest of these is 
 called Roche de St. Julien, beneath whose pinna- 
 cles the forests become deeper and more extensive; 
 the chesnut gives a peculiarity to the scene, which 
 is most beautiful, and will make a picture in my 
 memory, distinct from all other mountain scenes 
 which I have ever before visited. 
 
 As we arrived here early, we took a voiture to 
 visit the mouth of the Rhone. We went between 
 the mountains and the lake, under groves of 
 mighty chesnut trees, beside perpetual streams, 
 which are nourished by the snows above, and form 
 stalactites on the rocks, over which tliev fall. We 
 
70 
 
 LETTERS FROM GEXEVA. 
 
 saw an immense chosnut tree, which had been over- 
 thrown by the hurricane of the morning. The 
 place where the Rhone joins the lake was marked 
 by a line of tremendous breakers ; the river is as 
 rapid as when it leaves the lake, but is muddy 
 and dark. We went about a league farther on 
 the road to La Yalais, and stopped at a castle called 
 La Tour deBouverie, which seems to be the frontier 
 of Switzerland and Savoy, as we were asked for our 
 passports, on the supposition of our proceeding to 
 Italy. 
 
 On one side of the road was the immense Roche 
 de St. Julien, which overhung it ; through the 
 gateway of the castle we saw the snowy mountains 
 of La Valais, clothed in clouds, and, on the other 
 side, was the willowy plain of the Rhone, in a 
 character of striking contrast with the rest of the 
 scene, bounded by the dark mountains that over- 
 hang Clarens, Vevai, and the lake that rolls between. 
 In the midst of the plain rises a little isolated hill, 
 on which the white spire of a church peeps from 
 anions: the tufted chesnut woods. We returned 
 to St. Gingoux before sun-set, and I passed the 
 evening in reading Julie. 
 
 As my companion rises late, I had time before 
 breakfast, on the ensuing morning, to hunt the 
 waterfalls of the river that fall into the lake at St. 
 
SAIL ROUND THE LAKE. 71 
 
 Gingoux. The stream is indeed, from the decHvity 
 over which it falls, only a succession of waterfalls, 
 which roar over the rocks with a perpetual sound, 
 and suspend their unceasing spray on the leaves 
 and flowers that overhang and adorn its savage 
 banks. The path that conducted along this river 
 sometimes avoided the precipices of its shores, by 
 leading through meadows ; sometimes threaded the 
 base of the perpendicular and caverned rocks. I 
 gathered in these meadows a nosegay of such 
 flowers as I never saw in England, and which I 
 thought more beautiful for that rarity. 
 
 On my return, after breakfast, we sailed for 
 Clarens, determining first to see the three mouths 
 of the Rhone, and then the castle of Chillon ; the 
 day was fine, and the water calm. We passed 
 from the blue waters of the lake over the stream 
 of the Rhone, which is rapid even at a great dis- 
 tance from its confluence with the lake ; the turbid 
 waters mixed with those of the lake, but mixed 
 with them unwillingly. (See Nouvelle Helo'ise, Lettre 
 17, Part. 4.) I read Julie all day ; an overflowing, 
 as it now seems, surrounded by the scenes which 
 it has so wonderfully peopled, of sublimest genius, 
 and more than human sensibility. Meillerie, the 
 Castle of Chillon, Clarens, the mountains of La 
 Valais and Savoy, present themselves to the ima- 
 
72 LETTERS FROM GENEVA. 
 
 ^ination as monuments of things that were once 
 famihar, and of beings that were once dear to it. 
 They were created indeed by one mind, but a mind 
 so powerfully bright as to cast a shade of falsehood 
 on the records that are called reality. 
 
 We passed on to the Castle of Chillon, and 
 visited its dungeons and towers. These prisons 
 are excavated below the lake ; the principal dun- 
 geon is supported by seven columns, whose branch- 
 ing capitals support the roof. Close to the very 
 walls, the lake is 800 feet deep ; iron rings are 
 fastened to these columns, and on them were 
 engraven a multitude of names, partly those of 
 visitors, and partly doubtless of the prisoners, of 
 Avhom now no memory remains, and who thus 
 beguiled a solitude which they have long ceased to 
 feel. One date was as ancient as 1670. At the 
 commencement of the Reformation, and indeed 
 long after that period, this dungeon was the recept- 
 acle of those who shook, or who denied the system 
 of idolatry, from the effects of which mankind is 
 even now slowly emerging. 
 
 Close to this long and lofty dungeon was a nar- 
 row cell, and beyond it one larger and far more 
 lofty and dark, supported upon two unornamented 
 arches. Across one of these arches was a beam, 
 now black and rotten, on which prisoners were 
 
PAII, ROUXn THE LAKE, 73 
 
 hung in secret. I never saw a monument more 
 terrible of that cold and inhuman tyranny, which 
 it has been the delight of man to exercise over 
 man. It was indeed one of those many tremendous 
 fulfilments which render the " pernicies humani 
 generis" of the great Tacitus, so solemn and irre- 
 fragable a prophecy. The gendarme, who con- 
 ducted us over this castle, told us that there was 
 an opening to the lake, by means of a secret spring, 
 connected with which the whole dungeon might 
 be filled with water before the prisoners could 
 possibly escape ! 
 
 We proceeded with a contrary wind to Clarens, 
 against a heavy swell. I never felt more stronglv 
 than on landing at Clarens, that the spirit of old 
 times had deserted its once cherished habitation. 
 A thousand times, thought I, have Julia and St. 
 Preux walked on this terrassed road, looking to- 
 wards these mountains which I now behold ; nay, 
 treading on the ground where I now tread. From 
 the window of our lodging our landlady pointed 
 out " le bosquet de Julie."''' At least the inha-- 
 bitants of this village are impressed with an idea, 
 that the persons of that romance had actual exist- 
 ence. In the evening we walked ihither. It is, 
 indeed, Julia's wood. The hay was making imder 
 the trees ; the trees themselves were aged, but 
 
 VOL. n. E 
 
74 LETTERS FROM GENEVA. 
 
 vigorous, and interspersed with younger ones, 
 which are destined to be their successors, and in 
 future years, when we are dead, to afford a shade 
 to future worshippers of nature, who love the 
 memory of that tenderness and peace of which 
 this was the imaginary abode. We walked for- 
 Avard among the vineyards, whose narrow terraces 
 overlook this affecting scene. Why did the cold 
 maxims of the world compel me at this moment to 
 repress the tears of melancholy transport which it 
 would have been so sweet to indulge, immeasur- 
 ably, even until the darkness of night had swallowed 
 up the objects which excited them I 
 
 I forgot to remark, what indeed my companion . 
 remarked to me, that our danger from the storm 
 took place precisely in the spot where Julie and 
 her lover were nearly overset, and where St. Preux 
 was tempted to plunge with her into the lake. 
 
 On the following day we went to see the castle 
 of Clarens, a square strong house, with very few 
 windows, surrounded by a double terrace that 
 overlooks the valley, or rather the plain of Clarens. 
 The road which conducted to it wound up the 
 steep ascent through woods of walnut and chesnut. 
 We gathered roses on the terrace, in the feeling 
 that they might bo the posterity of some planted 
 by Julia's hand. We sent their dead and withered 
 leaves to the absent. 
 
SAIL ROUND TUE LAKE. 75 
 
 We went again to " the bosquet de Julie," and 
 found that the precise spot was now utterly ob- 
 literated, and a heap of stones marked the place 
 where the little chapel had once stood. Whilst 
 we were execrating the author of this brutal folly, 
 our guide informed us that the land belonged to 
 the convent of St. Bernard, and that this outrage 
 had been committed by their orders. I knew 
 before, that if avarice could harden the hearts of 
 men, a system of prescriptive religion has an influ- 
 ence far more inimical to natural sensibility. 1 
 know that an isolated man is sometimes restrained 
 by shame from outraging the venerable feelings 
 arising out of the memory of genius, which once 
 made nature even lovelier than itself; but asso- 
 ciated man holds it as the very sacrament of his 
 union to forswear all delicacy, all benevolence, all 
 remorse ; all that is true, or tender, or sublime. 
 
 We sailed from Clarens to Vevai. Vevai is a 
 town more beautiful in its simplicity than any I 
 have ever seen. Its market-place, a spacious square 
 interspersed with trees, looks directly upon the 
 mountains of Savoy and La Valais, the lake, and 
 the valley of the Rhone. It was at Vevai that 
 Rousseau conceived the design of Julie. 
 
 From Vevai we came to Ouchy, a village near 
 Lausanne. The coasts of the Pays de Vaud, though 
 
7b" LETTERS EROM GENEVA. 
 
 lull of villages and vineyards, present an aspect of 
 tranquillity and peculiar beauty which well com- 
 pensates for the solitude which I am accustomed 
 to admire. The hills are very high and rocky, 
 crowned and interspersed with woods. Water- 
 falls echo from the cliffs, and shine afar. In one 
 place we saw the traces of two rocks of immense 
 size, which had fallen from the mountain behind. 
 One of these lodged in a room where a young 
 woman was sleeping, without injuring her. The 
 vineyards were utterly destroyed in its path, and 
 the earth torn up. 
 
 The rain detained us two days at Ouchy. We, 
 however, visited Lausanne, and saw Gibbon's house. 
 We were shown the decayed summer-house where 
 he finished his History, and the old acacias on the 
 terrace, from which he saw Mont Blanc, after 
 having written the last sentence. There is some- 
 thing grand and even touching in the regret which 
 he expresses at the completion of his task. It was 
 conceived amid the ruins of the Capitol. The 
 sudden departure of his cherished and accustomed 
 toil must have left him, like the death of a dear, 
 friend, sad and solitary. 
 
 My companion gathered some acacia leaves to 
 preserve in remembrance of him. I refrained 
 Irom doing so, fearing to outrage the greater and 
 
SAIL ROUXD THE LAKE. 
 
 more sacred name of Rousseau; the contemplation 
 of whose imperishable creations liad left no vacancy 
 in my heart for mortal things. Gibbon had a cold 
 and unimpassioned spirit. I never felt more incli- 
 nation to rail at the prejudices which cling to such 
 a tiling, than now that Julie and Clarens, Lau- 
 sanne and the Roman Empire, compelled me to a 
 contrast between Rousseau and Gibbon. 
 
 When we returned, in the only interval of sun- 
 shine during the day, T walked on the pier which 
 the lake was lashing with its waves. A rainbow 
 spanned the lake, or rather rested one extremity 
 of its arch upon the water, and the other at the 
 foot of the mountains of Savoy. Some white 
 houses, T know not if they were those of Meillerie, 
 shone through the yellow fire. 
 
 On Saturday the SOth of June we (juittcd 
 Ouchy, and after two days of pleasant sailing 
 arrived on Sunday evening at Montalegre. 
 
 S. 
 
LETTER IV. 
 
 To T. P. Esci. 
 
 ST. MARTIN — SERVOZ CIIAMOUNI MONTANVERT 
 
 MONT BLANC. 
 
 Hotel de Londres, Chamouni, 
 July 22nd, 1816. 
 
 Whilst you, my friend, are engaged in securing 
 a home for us, we are wandering in search of recol- 
 lections to embellish it. I do not err in conceiving 
 that you are interested in details of all that is 
 majestic or beautiful in nature ; but how shall I 
 describe to you the scenes by which I am now 
 surrounded l To exhaust the epithets which ex- 
 press the astonishment and the admiration — the 
 very excess of satisfied astonishment, where expec- 
 tation scarcely acknowledged any boundary, is this, 
 to impress upon your mind the images which fill 
 mine now even till it overflow l I too have read 
 the raptures of travellers; I will be warned by 
 their example ; I will simply detail to you all that 
 I can relate, or all that, if related, would enable 
 you to conceive of what we have done or seen since 
 the mornino; of the 20th, when we left Geneva. 
 
EXCURSION TO CIIAMOUNI. 79 
 
 We commenced our intended journey to Cha- 
 mouni at half-past eight in the morning. We 
 passed through the champain country, wliich ex- 
 tends from Mont Saleve to the base of the higher 
 Alps. The country is sufficiently fertile, covered 
 with corn-fields and orchards, and intersected by 
 sudden acclivities with flat summits. The day was 
 cloudless and excessively hot, the Alps were per- 
 petually in sight, and as we advanced, the moun- 
 tains, which form their outskirts, closed in around 
 us. Wo passed a bridge over a stream, which di.s- 
 charges itself into the Arve. The Arve itself, 
 much swollen by the rains, flows constantly to the 
 right of the road. 
 
 As we approached Bonneville through an avenue 
 composed of a beautiful species of drooping poplar, 
 we observed that the corn-fields on each side were 
 covered with inundation. Bonneville is a neat little 
 town, with no conspicuous peculiarity, except the 
 white towers of the prison, an extensive building 
 overlooking the town. At Bonneville the Alps 
 commence, one of which, clothed by forests, rises 
 almost immediately from the opposite bank of the 
 Arve. 
 
 From Bonneville to Cluses the road conducts 
 through a spacious and fertile plain, surrounded on 
 all sides by mountains, covered like those of Meil- 
 
8(y LETTERS FROM GENEVA. 
 
 lerie with forests of intermingled pine and chesnut. 
 At Cluses the road turns suddenly to the right, 
 following the Arve along the chasm, which it seems 
 to have hollowed for itself among the perpendicular 
 mountains. The scene assumes here a more savage 
 and colossal character : the valley becomes narrow, 
 iiiforJing no more space than is sufficient for the 
 river and the road. The pines descend to the 
 banks, imitating, with their irregular spires, the 
 pyramidal crags which lift themselves far above the 
 regions of forest into the deep azure of the sky, 
 and among the white dazzling clouds. The scene, 
 at the distance of half a mile from Cluses, differs 
 from that of Matlock in little else than in the 
 immensity of its proportions, and in its untameable, 
 inaccessible solitude, inhabited only by the goats 
 which we saw browsing on the rocks. 
 
 Near Maglans, within a league of each other, 
 we saw two waterfalls. They were no more than 
 mountain rivulets, but the height from which they 
 fell, at least of ticelve hundred feet, made them 
 assume a character inconsistent with the smallness 
 of their stream. The first fell from the overhang- 
 ing brow of a black precipice on an enormous rock, 
 precisely resembling some colossal Egyptian statue 
 of a female deity. It struck the head of the vision- 
 ary image, and gracefully dividing there, fell fronn 
 
EXCURSION TO CHAMOINI. SI 
 
 it in folds of foam more like to cloud than water, 
 imitating a veil of the most exquisite woof. It 
 then united, concealing the lower part of the statue, 
 and hiding itself in a winding of its channel, burst 
 into a deeper fall, and crossed our route in its path 
 towards the Arve. 
 
 The other waterfall was more continuous and 
 larger. The violence with which it fell made it 
 look more like some shape which an exhalation had 
 assumed, than like water, for it streamed beyond 
 the mountain, which appeared dark behind it, as 
 it might have appeared behind an evanescent 
 cloud. 
 
 The character of the scenery continued the 
 same until we arrived at St. Martin, (called in 
 the maps Sallanches,) the mountains perpetually 
 becoming more elevated, exhibiting at every turn 
 of the road more craggy summits, loftier and 
 wider extent of forests, darker and more deep 
 recesses. 
 
 The following morning we proceeded from St. 
 Martin, on mules, to Chamouni, accompanied by 
 two guides. We proceeded, as we had done the 
 preceding day, along the valley of the Arve, a 
 valley surrounded on all sides by immense moun- 
 tains, whose rugged precipices are intermixed on 
 high with dazzling snow. Their bases wore still 
 e3 
 
S2 LETTERS FROM GENEVA. 
 
 covered with the eternal forests, which perpetually 
 grew darker and more profound as we approached 
 the inner regions of the mountains. 
 
 On arriving: at a small village at the distance 
 of a league from St. Martin, we dismounted from 
 our mules, and were conducted by our guides to 
 view a cascade. We beheld an immense body of 
 water fall two hundred and fifty feet, dashing 
 from rock to rock, and casting a spray which formed 
 a mist around it, in the midst of which hung a 
 multitude of sunbows, which faded or became 
 unspeakably vivid, as the inconstant sun shone 
 through the clouds. When we approached near to 
 it, the rain of the spray reached us, and our 
 clothes were wetted by the quick-falling but minute 
 particles of water. The cataract fell from above 
 into a deep craggy chasm at our feet, where, 
 changing its character to that of a mountain stream, 
 it pursued its course towards the Arve, roaring 
 over the rocks that impeded its progress. 
 
 As we proceeded, our route still lay through the 
 valley, or rather, as it had now become, the vast 
 ravine, which is at once the coucli and the creation 
 of the terrible Arve. We ascended, winding be- 
 tween mountains, whose immensity staggers the 
 imagination. We crossed the path of a torrent, 
 which three days since had descended from the 
 thawing snow, and torn the road away. 
 
EXCURSION TO CHAMOLXI. 83 
 
 We dined at Servoz, a little village, where 
 there are lead and copper mines, and where we 
 saw a cabinet of natural curiosities, like those of 
 Keswick and Bethgelert. We saw in this cabinet 
 some chamois'' horns, and the horns of an exceed- 
 ingly rare animal called the bouquetin, which 
 inhabits the deserts of snow to the south of 
 Mont Blanc : it is an animal of the stag kind ; 
 its horns weigh, at least, twenty-seven English 
 pounds. It is inconceivable how so small an animal 
 could support so inordinate a weight. The horns 
 are of a very peculiar conformation, being broad, 
 massy, and pointed at the ends, and surrounded 
 with a number of rings, which are supposed to 
 afford an indication of its age : there were seven- 
 teen rings on the largest of these horns. 
 
 From Servoz three leagues remain to Chamouni. 
 — Mont Blanc was before us — the Alps, with their 
 innumerable glaciers on high all around, closing in 
 the complicated windings of the single vale — forests 
 inexpressibly beautiful, but majestic in their beauty 
 — intermingled beech and pine, and oak, over- 
 shadowed our road, or receded, whilst la\Mis of 
 such verdure as I have never seen before, occupied 
 these openings, and gradually became darker in 
 their recesses. Mont J^lanc was before us, but it 
 was covered with cloud ; its base, furrowed with 
 
84 I.ETTERS FROM GEXEVA. 
 
 dreadful gaps, was seen above. Pinnacles of snow 
 intolerably bright, part of the chain connected with 
 Mont Blanc, shone through the clouds at intervals 
 on high, I never knew — I never imagmed — what 
 mountains were before. The immensity of these 
 aerial summits excited, when they suddenly burst 
 upon the sight, a sentiment of ecstatic wonder, not 
 imallied to madness. And remember this was all 
 one scene, it all pressed home to our regard and 
 our imagination. Though it embraced a vast 
 extent of space, the snowy pyramids which shot 
 into the briglit blue sky seemed to overhang our 
 path ; the ravine, clothed with gigantic pines, and 
 black with its depth below, so deep that the very 
 roaring of the untameable Arve, which rolled 
 through it, could not be heard above — all was as 
 much our own, as if we had been the creators of 
 such impressions in the minds of others as now 
 occupied our own. Nature was the poet, whoso 
 harmony held our spirits more breathless than that 
 of the divinest. 
 
 As we entered the valley of Chamouni, (which, 
 in fact, may be considered as a continuation of those 
 which v.e have followed from Bonneville and 
 -Cluses.) clouds hung upon the mountains at the 
 distance perhaps, of GOOO feet from the earth, but 
 so as effectually to conceal, not only JNlont Blanc, 
 
EXCl'RSIOX TO CHAMOL'NT. 8a 
 
 but the other aiguilles^ as they call them here, 
 attached and subordinate to it. ^V''e were travel- 
 ling along the valley, when suddenly we heard a 
 sound as of the burst of smothered thunder rolling 
 above ; yet there was something earthly in the 
 sound, that told us it could not be thunder. Our 
 guide hastily pointed out to us a part of the moun- 
 tain opposite, from whence the sound came. It 
 was an avalanche. We saw the smoke of its path 
 among the rocks, and continued to hear at inter- 
 vals the bursting of its fall. It fell on the bed of 
 a torrent, which it displaced, and presently we saw 
 its tawny-coloured waters also spread themselves 
 over the ravine, which was their couch. 
 
 We did not, as we intended, visit the Glacier de 
 Boisson to-day, although it descends within a few 
 few minutes' walk of the road, wishing to survey 
 it at least when unfatigued. We saw this glacier, 
 which comes close to the fertile plain, as we passed. 
 Its surface was broken into a thousand unaccount- 
 able figures : conical and pyramidical crystalliza- 
 tions, more than fifty feet in height, rise from its 
 surface, and precipices of ice, of dazzling splendour, 
 overhang the woods and meadows of the vale. This 
 glacier winds upwards from the valley, until it joins 
 the masses of frost from which it was produced 
 above, winding through its own ravine like a bright 
 
86 LETTERS FROM GENEVA. 
 
 belt flung over the black region of pines. There is 
 more in all these scenes than mere magnitude of 
 proportion : there is a majesty of outline ; there is 
 an awful grace in the very colours which invest 
 these wonderful shapes — a charm which is peculiar 
 to them, quite distinct even from the reality of 
 their unutterable greatness. 
 
 Juhjli. 
 
 Yesterday morning we went to the source of the 
 Arveiron. It is about a league from this village; 
 the river rolls forth impetuously from an arch of 
 ice, and spreads itself in many streams over a vast 
 space of the valley, ravaged and laid bare by its 
 inundations. The glacier by which its waters are 
 nourished, overhangs this cavern and the plain, 
 and the forests of pine which surround it, with 
 terrible precipices of solid ice. On the other side 
 rises the immense glacier of Montanvert, fifty miles 
 m extent, occupying a chasm among mountains of 
 inconceivable height, and of forms so pointed and 
 abrupt, that they seem to pierce the sky. From 
 this glacier we saw, as we sat on a rock, close to 
 one of the streams of the Arveiron, masses of 
 ice detach themselves from on high, and rush with 
 a loud dull noise into the vale. The violence of 
 
EXCURSION TO CHAMOUXI. S7 
 
 their fall turned them into powder, which flowed 
 over the rocks in imitation of waterfalls, whose 
 ravines they usurped and filled. 
 
 In the evening, I went with Ducree, my guide, 
 the only tolerable person I have seen in this coun- 
 try, to visit the glacier of Boisson. This glacier, 
 like that of INIontanvcrt, comes close to the vale, 
 overhanging the green meadows and the dark 
 woods with the dazzling whiteness of its precipices 
 and pinnacles, which are like spires of radiant 
 crystal, covered with a net-work of frosted silver. 
 These glaciers flow perpetually into the valley, 
 ravaging in their slow but irresistible progress the 
 pastures and the forests which surround them, 
 performing a work of desolation in ages, which a 
 river of lava might accomplish in an hour, but far 
 more irretrievably ; for where the ice has once 
 descended, the hardiest plant refuses to grow ; if 
 even, as in some extraordinary instances, it should 
 recede after its progress has once commenced. The 
 glaciers perpetually move onward, at the rate of a 
 foot each day, with a motion that commences at 
 the spot where, on the boundaries of perpetual 
 congelation, they are produced by the freezing of 
 the waters which arise from the partial melting of 
 the eternal snows. They drag with them from the 
 regions whence they derive their origin, all the 
 
8S 
 
 LETTERS FROM GENEVA. 
 
 ruins of the mountain, enormous rocks, and immense 
 accumulations of sand and stones. These are driven 
 onwards by the irresistible stream of solid ice ; and 
 when they arrive at a declivity of the mountain, 
 sufficiently rapid, roll down, scattering ruin. I 
 tsaw one of these rocks which had descended in the 
 spring, (winter here is the season of silence and 
 safety,) which measured forty feet in every 
 direction. 
 
 The verge of a glacier, like that of Boisson, pre- 
 sents the most vivid image of desolation that it is 
 possible to conceive. No one dares to approach 
 it ; for the enormous pinnacles of ice which per- 
 petually fall, are perpetually reproduced. The 
 pines of the forest, which bound it at one extremity, 
 are overthrown and shattered to a wide extent at 
 its base. There is something inexpressibly dread- 
 ful in the aspect of the few branchless trunks, 
 which, nearest to the ice rifts, still stand in the 
 uprooted soil. The meadows perish, overwhelmed 
 with sand and stones. Within this last year, these 
 glaciers have advanced three hundred feet into the 
 valley. Saussure, the naturalist, says, that they 
 have their periods of increase and decay : the 
 people of the country hold an opinion entirely dif- 
 ferent ; but as I judge, more probable. It is agreed 
 by all, that the snow on the summit of Mont Blanc 
 
EXCCRSION TO CHAMOUM. 89 
 
 and the neighbouring mountains perpetually aug- 
 ments, and that ice, in the form of glaciers, subsists 
 ^vithout melting in the valley of Chamouni during 
 its transient and variable summer. If the snow 
 which produces this glacier must augment, and the 
 heat of the valley is no obstacle to the perpetual 
 existence of such masses of ice as have already 
 descended into it, the consequence is obvious ; the 
 glaciers must augment and will subsist, at least until 
 they have overflowed this vale. 
 
 I will not pursue Buffon's sublime but gloomy 
 theory — that this globe which we inhabit will, at 
 some future period, be changed into a mass of frost 
 by the encroachments of the polar ice, and of that 
 produced on the most elevated points of the earth. 
 Do you, who assert the supremacy of Ahriman, 
 imagine him throned among these desolating snows, 
 among these palaces of death and frost, so sculp- 
 tured in this their terrible magnificence by the 
 adamantine hand of necessity, and that he casts 
 around him, as the first essays of his final usurpa- 
 tion, avalanches, torrents, rocks, and thunders, and 
 above all these deadly glaciers, at once the proof 
 and symbols of his reign ; — add to this, the degra- 
 dation of the human species — who, in these regions, 
 are half deformed or idiotic, and most of whom are 
 deprived of anything that can excite interest or 
 
90 LETTERS FROM GENEVA. 
 
 admiration. This is part of the subject more 
 mournful and less subhme ; but such as neither the 
 poet nor tlie philosopher should disdain to regard. 
 This morning we departed, on the promise of a 
 fine day, to visit the glacier of Montanvert. In 
 that part where it fills a slanting valley, it is 
 called the Sea of Ice. This valley is 9o0 toises, or 
 7600 feet, above the level of the sea. AVe had not 
 proceeded far before the rain began to fall, but we 
 persisted until we had accomplished more than 
 half of our journey, when we returned, wet 
 through. 
 
 Chamouni, July 2oth. 
 
 We have returned from visiting the glacier of 
 Montanvert, or as it is called, the Sea of Ice, a 
 scene in truth of dizzying wonder. The path that 
 winds to it along the side of a mountain, now 
 clothed with pines, now intersected with snowy 
 hollows, is wide and steep. The cabin of Montan- 
 vert is three leagues from Chamouni, half of which 
 distance is performed on mules, not so sure-footed 
 but that on the first day the one which I rode fell 
 in what the guides call a mauvais pas, so that I 
 narrowly escaped being precipitated down the 
 mountain. We passed over a hollow covered with 
 
EXCURSION TO CHAMOUNI. 91 
 
 snow, down which vast stones are accustomed to 
 roll. One had fallen the preceding day, a little 
 time after we had returned : or guides desired us 
 to pass quickly, for it is said that sometimes the 
 least sound will accelerate their descent. We 
 arrived at JNIontanvert, however, safe. 
 
 On all sides precipitous mountains, the abodes of 
 unrelenting frost, surround this vale : their sides 
 are banked up with ice and snow, broken, heaped 
 high, and exhibiting terrific chasms. The summits 
 are sharp and naked pinnacles, whose overhanging 
 steepness will not even permit snow to rest upon 
 them. Lines of dazzling ice occupy here and there 
 their perpendicular rifts, and shine through the 
 driving vapours with inexpressible brilliance : they 
 pierce the clouds like things not belonging to this 
 earth. The vale itself is filled with a mass of 
 undulating ice, and has an ascent sufficiently gradual 
 even to the remotest abysses of these horrible 
 deserts. It is only half a league (about two miles) 
 in breadth, and seems much less. It exhibits an 
 appearance as if frost had suddenly bound up the 
 waves and whirlpools of a mighty torrent. We 
 walked some distance upon its surface. The waves 
 are elevated about twelve or fifteen feet from the 
 surface of the mass, which is intersected by long 
 gaps of unfathomable depth, the ice of whose sides 
 
92 LETTERS FKOM GENEVA. 
 
 is more beautifully azure than the sky. In these 
 regions every thing changes, and is in motion. 
 This vast mass of ice has one general progress, 
 which ceases neither day nor night ; it breaks 
 and bursts for ever : some undulations sink while 
 others rise ; it is never the same. The echo of 
 rocks, or of the ice and snow which fall from their 
 overhanging precipices, or roll from their aerial 
 summits, scarcely ceases for one moment. One 
 would think that Mont Blanc, like the god of the 
 Stoics, was a vast animal, and that the frozen 
 blood for ever circulated through his stony 
 veins. 
 
 We dined (M***, C*^**, and I) on the grass, 
 in the open air, surrounded by this scene. The 
 air is piercing and clear. We returned down the 
 mountain, sometimes encompassed by the driving 
 vapours, sometimes cheered by the sunbeams, and 
 arrived at our inn by seven o'clock. 
 
 Montahgre, Jaly 2Pith. 
 
 The next morning we returned through the rain 
 
 to St. Martin. The scenery had lost something of 
 
 its immensity, thick clouds hanging over the highest 
 
 mountains ; but visitings of sunset intervened be- 
 
EXCrRSION TO CHAMOUXI. 93 
 
 tween the showers, and the blue sky shone between 
 the accumulated clouds of snowy whiteness which 
 brought them ; the dazzling mountains sometimes 
 glittered through a chasm of the clouds above 
 our heads, and all the charm of its grandeur 
 remained. We repassed Pont PeUisier, a wooden 
 bridge over the Arve, and the ravine of the Arve. 
 We repassed the pine forests which overhang the 
 defile, the chateau of St. Michel, a haunted ruin, 
 built on the edge of a precipice, and shadowed 
 over by the eternal forest. We repassed the vale 
 of Servoz, a vale more beautiful, because more 
 luxuriant, than that of Chamouni. Mont Blanc 
 forms one of the sides of this vale also, and the 
 other is inclosed by an irregular amphitheatre of 
 enormous mountains, one of which is in ruins, and 
 fell fifty years ago into the higher part of the 
 valley : the smoke of its fall was seen in Piedmont, 
 and people went from Turin to investigate whether 
 a volcano had not burst forth among the Alps. 
 It continued falling many days, spreading, with 
 the shock and thunder of its ruin, conster- 
 nation into the neighbouring vales. In the even- 
 ing we arrived at St. Martin. The next day 
 we wound through the A%alley, which I have 
 described before, and arrived in the evening at 
 our home. 
 
94 LETTERS FROM GENEVA. 
 
 We have bought some specimens of minerals 
 and plants, and two or three crystal seals, at 
 Mont Blanc, to preserve the remembrance of 
 having approached it. There is a cabinet of 
 Histoire Naturelle at Chamouni, just as at Keswick, 
 ^latlock, and Clifton ; the proprietor of which is 
 the very vilest specimen of that vile species of 
 quack, that, together with the whole army of auber- 
 gistes and guides, and indeed the entire mass of 
 the population, subsist on the weakness and cre- 
 dulity of travellers as leeches subsist on the sick. 
 The most interesting of my purchases is a large 
 collection of all the seeds of rare alpine plants, 
 with their names written upon the outside of the 
 papers that contain them. These I mean to colo- 
 nise in my garden in England, and to permit you 
 to make what choice you please from them. 
 They are companions which the Celandine — the 
 classic Celandine, need not despise ; they are as 
 ■wild and more daring than he, and will tell him 
 tales of things even as touching and sublime as the 
 gaze of a vernal poet. 
 
 Did I tell you that there are troops of wolves 
 among these mountains ? In the winter they 
 descend into the valleys, which the snow occupies 
 six months of the year, and devour every thing 
 that they can find out of doors. A wolf is more 
 
EXCURSIOX TO CHAMOCNI. 9-5 
 
 powerful than the fiercest and strongest dog. 
 There are no bears in these regions. We heard, 
 when we were at Lucerne, that they were occa- 
 sionally found in the forests which surround that 
 lake. Adieu. 
 
 S. 
 
JOURNAL. 
 
 Geneva, Sunday, 18//i August, 1816. 
 
 See Apollo's Sexton,* who tells us many mys- 
 teries of his trade. We talk of Ghosts. Neither 
 Lord Byron nor M. G. L. seem to believe in them; 
 and they both agree, in the very face of reason, that 
 none could believe in ghosts without believing in 
 God. I do not think that all the persons who pro- 
 fess to discredit these visitations, really discredit 
 them ; or, if they do in the da}liglit, are not ad- 
 monished by the approach of loneliness and mid- 
 night, to think more respectfully of the world of 
 shadows. 
 
 Lewis recited a poem, which he had composed at 
 
 * M. G. Lewis — so named in English Bards .ind Scotch Reviewers. 
 When Lewis first saw Lord B)ron, he asked him earnestly, — " Why 
 did you call me Apollo's Sexton." The noble Poet found it difEcult 
 to reply to this categorical species of reproof. The above stories have, 
 some of them, appeared in print ; but, as a ghost story depends entirely 
 on tlie mode in vvhicli it is told, I think the reader will be pleased to read 
 tlitsc, written by SlicUey, fresh from tlieii relation by Lewis M S. 
 
GHOST STORIES. 97 
 
 the request of the Princess of Wales. The Princess 
 of Wales, he premised, was not only a believer in 
 ghosts, but in magic and witchcraft, and asserted, 
 that prophecies made in her youth had been accom- 
 plished since. The tale was of a lady in Germany. 
 This lady, Minna, had been exceedingly attached 
 to her husband, and they had made a vow that 
 the one who died first, should return after death 
 to visit the other as a ghost. She was sitting 
 one day alone in her chamber, when she heard an 
 unusual sound of footsteps on the stairs. The door 
 opened, and her husband's spectre, gashed with a 
 deep wound across the forehead, and in military 
 habiliments, entered. She appeared startled at 
 the apparition ; and the ghost told her, that when 
 he should visit her in future, she would hear a 
 passing bell toll, and these words distinctly uttered 
 close to her ear, " Minna, I am here." On 
 inquiry, it was found that her husband had fallen 
 in battle on the very day she was visited by the 
 vision. The intercourse between the ghost and 
 the woman continued for some time, until the latter 
 laid aside all terror, and indulged herself in the 
 affection which she had felt for him while livinsf. 
 One evening she went to a ball, and permitted her 
 thoughts to be alienated by the attentions of a 
 Florentine gentleman, more witty, more graceful, 
 
 VOL. II. F 
 
98 JOURNAL. 
 
 and more gentle, as it appeared to her, than any 
 person she had ever seen. As he was conducting 
 her through the dance, a death bell tolled. Minna, 
 lost in the fascination of the Florentine's attentions, 
 disregarded, or did not hear the sound. A second 
 peal, louder and more deep, startled the whole com- 
 pany, when Minna heard the ghost"'s accustomed 
 whisper, and raising her eyes, saw in an opposite 
 mirror the reflexion of the ghost, standing over 
 her. -She is said to have died of terror. 
 Lewis told four other stories — all grim. 
 
 A YOUNG man who had taken orders, had just 
 been presented with a living, on the death of the 
 incumbent. It was in the Catholic part of Germany. 
 He arrived at the parsonage on a Saturday night ; 
 it was summer, and waking about three o''clock in 
 the morning, and it being broad day, he saw a 
 venerable-looking man, but with an aspect exceed- 
 ingly melancholy, sitting at a desk in the window, 
 reading, and two beautiful boys standing near him, 
 whom he regarded with looks of the profoundest 
 grief. Presently he rose from his seat, the boys 
 followed him, and they were no more to be seen. 
 
GHOST STOr.IES. 99 
 
 The )'oung man, much troubled, arose, hesitating 
 whether he should regard what he had seen as a 
 dream, or a waking phantasy. To divert his 
 dejection, he walked towards the church, which the 
 sexton was already employed in preparing for the 
 morning service. The first sight that struck him 
 was a portrait, the exact resemblance of the man 
 whom he had seen sitting in his chamber. It was 
 the custom in this district to place the portrait of 
 each minister, after his death, in the church. 
 
 He made the minutest inquiries respecting his 
 predecessor, and learned that he was universally 
 beloved, as a man of unexampled integrity and 
 benevolence ; but that he was the prey of a secret 
 and perpetual sorrow. His grief was supposed to 
 have arisen from an attachment to a young lady, 
 with whom his situation did not permit him to 
 unite himself. Others, however, asserted, that a 
 connexion did subsist between them, and that 
 even she occasionally brought to his house two 
 beautiful boys, the offspring of their connexion. — 
 Nothing further occurred until the cold weather 
 came, and the new minister desired a fire to be 
 lighted in the stove of the room where he slept. A 
 hideous stench arose from the stove as soon as it 
 was lighted, and, on examining it, the bones of two 
 male children were found within, 
 p 2 
 
100 JOURNAL. 
 
 Lord Lyttleton and a number of his friends were 
 joined during the chase by a stranger. He was 
 excellently mounted, and displayed such courage; 
 or, rather so much desperate rashness, that no other 
 person in tlio hunt could follow him. The gentle- 
 men, when the chase was concluded, invited the 
 stranger to dine with them. His conversation was 
 something of a wonderful kind. He astonished, 
 he interested, he commanded the attention of the 
 most inert. As night came on, the company, 
 being weary, began to retire one by one, much 
 later than the usual hour : the most intellectual 
 among them were retained latest by the stranger*'s 
 fascination. As he perceived that they began to 
 depart, he redoubled his efforts to retain them. At 
 last, when few remained, he entreated them to stay 
 with him ; but all pleaded the fatigue of a hard 
 day''s chase, and all at last retired. They had been 
 in bed about an hour, when they were awakened by 
 the most horrible screams, which issued from the 
 stranger's room. Every one rushed towards it. 
 The door was locked. After a moment's delibera- 
 tion they burst it open, and found the stranger 
 stretched on the ground, writhing with agony, and 
 weltering in blood. On their entrance he arose, 
 
GHOST STORIES. 101 
 
 and collecting himself, apparently with a strong 
 effort, entreated them to leave him — not to disturb 
 him, that he would give every possible explanation 
 in the morning. They complied. In the morning, 
 his chamber was found vacant, and he was seen no 
 more. 
 
 HI. 
 
 Miles Andrews, a friend of Lord Lyttleton, was 
 sitting one night alone when Lord Lyttleton came 
 in, and informed him that he was dead, and that 
 this was his ghost which he saw before him. 
 Andrews pettishly told him not to play any ridi- 
 culous tricks upon him, for he was not in a temper 
 to bear them. The ghost then departed. Lithe 
 morning Andrews asked his servant at what hour 
 Lord Lyttleton had arrived. The servant said he 
 did not know that he had arrived, but that he 
 would inrpiirc. On inquiry it was found that Lord 
 Lyttleton had not arrived, nor had the door been 
 opened to any one during the whole night. 
 Andrews sent to Lord Lyttleton, and discovered, 
 that he had died precisely at the hour of the appa- 
 rition. 
 
102 JOURNAL. 
 
 IV. 
 
 A GENTLEMAN oTi a visit to a friend who lived on 
 the skirts of an extensive forest in the east of 
 Germany lost his way. He wandered for some 
 hours among the trees, when he saw a light at a 
 distance. On approaching it, he was surprised to 
 observe, that it proceeded from the interior of a 
 ruined monastery. Before he knocked he thought 
 it prudent to look through the window. He saw 
 a multitude of cats assembled round a small grave, 
 four of whom were letting down a coffin with a 
 crown upon it. The gentleman, startled at this 
 unusual sight, and imagining that he had arrived 
 among the retreats of fiends or witches, mounted 
 his horse and rode away with the utmost precipi- 
 tation. He arrived at his friend's house at a late 
 hour, who had sate up for him. On his arrival his 
 friend questioned as to the cause of the traces of 
 trouble visible in his face. He began to recount 
 his adventure, after much difficulty, knowing that 
 it was scarcely possible that his friends should give 
 faith to his relation. No sooner had he mentioned 
 the coffin with a crown upon it, than his friend's 
 cat, who seemed to have been lying asleep before 
 the fire, leaped up, saying — " Then I am the King 
 of the Cats !" and scrambled up the chimney, and 
 was seen no more. 
 
EETURX TO ENGLAND. 103 
 
 Thursday, 29th August. — We depart from Ge- 
 neva, at nine in the morning. The Swiss are very 
 slow drivers ; besides which we have J ura to 
 mount ; we, therefore, go a very few posts to-day. 
 The scenery is very beautiful, and we see many 
 magnificent views. We pass Les Rousses, which, 
 when we crossed in the spring, was deep in snow. 
 We sleep at Morrez. 
 
 Friday, 30th. — ^V e leave Morrez, and arrive in 
 
 the evening at Dole, after a various day. 
 
 Saturday, 31st. — From Dole wc go to Rouvray, 
 where we sleep. We pass through Dijon ; and, 
 after Dijon, take a different route than that which 
 we followed on the two other occasions. The 
 scenery has some beauty and singularity in the 
 line of the mountains which surround the Val do 
 Suzon. Low, yet precipitous hills, covered with 
 vines or woods, and with streams, meadows, and 
 poplars, at the bottom. 
 
 Sunday, September 1st. — Leave Rouvray, pass 
 Auxerre, where we dine ; a pretty town, and arrive. 
 at two o'clock, at Villeneuve le Guiard. 
 
 Mondav 2d. — From Villeneuve le Guiard, we 
 
104. 
 
 JOURNAL, 
 
 arrive at Fontainebleau, The scenery around 
 this palace is wild and oven savage. The soil 
 is full of rocks, apparently granite, which on 
 every side break through the ground. The hills 
 are low, but precipitous and rough. The valleys, 
 equally wild, are shaded by forests. In the midst 
 of this wilderness stands the palace. Some of the 
 apartments equal in magnificence anything that I 
 could conceive. The roofs are fretted with gold, 
 and the canopies of velvet. From Fontainebleau 
 we proceed to Versailles, in the route towards 
 Rouen, We arrive at Versailles at nine. 
 
 Tuesday 8d. — We saw the palace and gardens of 
 Versailles and le Grand et Petit Trianon, They sur- 
 pass Fontainebleau. The gardens are full of statues, 
 vases, fountains, and colonnades. In all that essen- 
 tially belongs to a garden they are extraordinarily 
 deficient. The orangery is a stupid piece of expense. 
 There was one orange-tree, not apparently so old, 
 sown in 1442. We saw only the gardens and the 
 theatre at the Petit Trianon. The gardens are in 
 the English taste, and extremely pretty. The 
 Grand Trianon was open. It is a summer palace, 
 light, yet magnificent. We were unable to devote 
 the time it deserved to the gallery of paintings 
 here. There was a portrait of Madame de la 
 
RETURN TO ENGLAND. 105 
 
 Valliere, the repentant mistress of Louis XIV. 
 She was melancholy, but exceedingly beautiful, 
 and was represented as holding a scull, and sitting 
 before a crucifix, pale, and with downcast eyes. 
 
 We then went to the great palace. The apartments 
 are imfurnished, but even with this disadvantage, 
 are more magnificent than those of Fontainebleau. 
 They are lined with marble of various colours, 
 whose pedestals and capitals are gilt, and the 
 ceiling is richly gilt with compartments of painting. 
 The arrangement of these materials has in them, 
 it is true, something effeminate nnd royal. Could 
 a Grecian architect have commanded all the labour 
 and money which was expended on Versailles, he 
 would have produced a fabric which the A\hole 
 world has never equalled. We saw the Hall of 
 Hercules, the balcony where the King and the 
 Queen exhibited themselves to the Parisian mob. 
 The people who showed us through the palace, 
 obstinately refused to say anything about the 
 Revolution. We could not even find out in which 
 chamber the rioters of the 10th August found the 
 king. We saw the Salle d'Opera, where are now 
 preserved the portraits of the kings. There was 
 the race of the house of Orleans, with the exception 
 of Egalite, all extremely handsome. There was 
 Madame do Maintenon, and beside her a beautiful 
 f3 
 
106 JOURNAL. 
 
 little girl, the daughter of La VaHiere. The 
 pictures had been hidden during the Revolution. 
 We saw the Library of Louis XVL The librarian 
 had held some place in the ancient court near 
 Marie Antoinette. He returned with the Bourbons, 
 and was waiting for some better situation. He 
 showed us a book which he had preserved during 
 the Revolution. It was a book of paintings, repre- 
 senting a Tournament at the Court of Louis XIV.; 
 and it seemed that the present desolation of 
 France, the fury of the injured people, and all the 
 horrors to which they abandoned themselves, stung 
 by their long sufferings, flowed naturally enough 
 from expenditures so immense, as must have been 
 demanded by the magnificence of this tournament. 
 The vacant rooms of this palace imaged well the 
 hollow show of monarchy. After seeing these things 
 we departed toward Havre, and slept at Auxerre. 
 
 Wednesday 4th. — We passed through Rouen, 
 and saw the cathedral, an immense specimen of 
 the most costly and magnificent gothic. The inte- 
 rior of the church disappoints. We saw the burial- 
 place of Richard Coeur de Lion and his brother. 
 The altar of the church is a fine piece of marble. 
 Sleep at Yvetot. 
 
 Thursday 5th. — We arrive at Havre, and wait 
 for the packet — wind contrary. S. 
 
LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 LETTER I. 
 
 TO LEIGH HUNT, ESQ. 
 
 Lyons, March 22, 1818. 
 My dear Friend, 
 
 Why did you not wake mc that night before we 
 left England, you and Marianne f I take this as 
 rather an unkind piece of kindness in you ; but 
 which, in consideration of the six hundred miles 
 between us, I forgive. 
 
 We have journeyed towards the spring that has 
 been hastening to meet us from the south ; and 
 though our weather was at first abominable, we 
 have now warm sunny days, and soft winds, and a 
 sky of deep azure, the most serene I ever saw. The 
 heat in this city to-day, is like that of London in 
 the midst of summer. JSIy spirits and health sym- 
 pathize in the change. Indeed, before I left Lon- 
 
110 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 don, my spirits wei'e as feeble as my health, and I 
 had demands on them which I found it diffieu It to 
 supply. I have read Foliage, with most of the 
 poems I am already familiar. What a delightful 
 poem the " Nymphs " is ! It is truly poetical, in 
 the intense and emphatic sense of the word. If 
 six hundred miles were not between us, I should 
 say what pity that glib was not omitted, and that 
 the poem is not as faultless as it is beautiful. But, 
 for fear I should spoil your next poem, I will not 
 let slip a word upon the subject. 
 
 Give my love to Marianne and her sister, and 
 tell Marianne she defrauded me of a kiss by not 
 waking me when slie went away, and that, as I have 
 no better mode of conveying it, I must take the 
 best, and ask you to pay the debt. When shall I 
 see you again 1 Oh, that it might be in Italy ! I 
 confess that the thought of how long we may be 
 divided makes me very melancholy. Adieu, my 
 dear friends. Write soon. 
 
 Ever most affectionately yours, 
 
 P. B. S.* 
 
 • In a brief journal I kept at that time, I find a few pages in Shelley's 
 handwriting.descriptive of thepassage over the mountains ofLesEschelles. 
 — " March 26, Thursday. We travel towards the mountains, and begin 
 to enter the valleys of the Alps. The country becomes covered again 
 with verdure and cultivation, and wliite chateaux and scattered cottages 
 aaioug woods of old oak and walnut trees. Tiie vines are here pecu- 
 
HI 
 
 LETTER II. 
 
 To T. L. P. Esq. 
 
 Milan, April, 1818. ' 
 
 My dear p., 
 Behold us arrived at length at the end of our 
 journey — that is, witliin a few miles of it — because 
 
 liarly picturesque ; they are trelliscd upon immense stakes, and the 
 trunks of them are moss-covered and hoary with age. Unlike the 
 French vines, which creep lowly on the ground, they form rows of inter- 
 laced bowers, which, when the leaves are green and the red grapes arc 
 hanging among those hoary brandies, will afford a delightful shadow to 
 those who sit npon the moss underneath. The vines are sometimes 
 planted in the open fields, and sometimes among lofty orchards of apple 
 and pear-trees, the twigs of which were just becoming purple with the 
 bursting blossoms. 
 
 We dined at Les Eschelles, a village at the foot of the mountain of 
 the same name, the boundaries of France and Savoy. Before this we 
 had been stopped atPontBonvoisin, where the legal limits of the French 
 and Sardinian territories are placed. We here beard that a Milanese 
 had been sent back all the way to Lyons, because his p.assport was 
 unauthorised by the S.ardinian Consul, a few days before, and that wc 
 should be subjected to the same treatment. We, in respect to the cha- 
 racter of our nation I suppose, were suffered to p.ass. Our books, 
 however, were, after a long discussion, sent to Chambery, to be sub- 
 mitted to the censor; a priest, who admits nothing of Rousseau, 
 Voltaire, &c., into the dominions of the King of Sardinia. All suck 
 books are burned. 
 
 After dinner we ascended Les Eschelles, winding along a road, cut 
 through perpendicular rocks, of immense elevation, by Charles Emanuel, 
 Duke of Savoy, in 1582. The rocks, whicli cannot be less than a thou- 
 sand feet in pcrpendicul.ar height, sometimes overhang the road on eacli 
 side, and almost shut out the sky. The scene is like that described in 
 
112 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 we design to spend the summer on the shore of the 
 Lake of Como. Our journey was somewhat painful 
 from the cold— and in no other manner interesting 
 until we passed the Alps : of course I except the 
 Alps themselves ; but no sooner had we arrived at 
 Italy, than the loveliness of the earth and the 
 serenity of the sky made the greatest difference in 
 my sensations. I depend on these things for life; 
 for in the smoke of cities, and the tumult of human 
 kind, and the chilling fogs and rain of our own 
 country, I can hardly be said to live. With what 
 delight did I hear the woman, who conducted us to 
 see the triumphal arch of Augustus at Susa, speak 
 the clear and complete language of Italy, though 
 half unintelligible to me, after that nasal and abbre- 
 viated cacophony of the French ! A ruined arch 
 
 the Prometheus of iEscliylus. Vast rifts and caverns in the granite 
 precipices, wintrv mountains with ice and snow above ; the loud sounds 
 of unseen waters within the caverns, and walls of toppling rocks, only 
 to be scaled as he describes, by the winged chariot of the ocean nymphs. 
 
 Under the dominion of this tyranny, the inhabitants of the fertile 
 valleys, bounded by these mountains, are in a state of most frightful 
 poverty and disease. At the foot of this ascent, were cut into the rocks 
 at several places, stories of the misery of the inhabitants, to move the 
 compassion of the traveller. One old man, lame and blind, crawled out 
 of a hole in the rock, wet with the perpetual melting of the snows of 
 above, and dripping like a shower-bath. 
 
 The country, as we descended to Chambery, continued as beautiful ; 
 though marked with somewhat of a softer character than before ; 
 we arrived a little after uight-fall. 
 
MILAN. lis 
 
 of magnificent proportions, in the Greek taste, 
 standing in a kind of road of green lawn, overgrown 
 with violets and primroses, and in the midst of 
 stupendous mountains, and a blonde woman, of light 
 and graceful manners, something in the style of 
 Fuseli's Eve, were the first things we met in 
 Italy. 
 
 This city is very agreeable. V\c went to the 
 opera last night — which is a most splendid exhibi- 
 tion. The opera itself was not a favourite, and the 
 singers very inferior to our own. But the ballet, 
 or rather a kind of melodrame or pantomimic 
 drama, was the most splendid spectacle I ever saw. 
 We have no JNI iss "IMelan ji) here — in every other 
 respect, Milan is un(^uestionably superior. The 
 manner in which language is translated into gesture, 
 the complete and full effect of the whole as illus- 
 trating the history in question, the unaffected self- 
 possession of each of the actors, even to the chil- 
 dren, made this choral drama more impressive than 
 I could have conceived possible. The story is 
 Othello^ and strange to say, it left no disagreeable 
 impression. 
 
 I write, but I am not in the humour to write, 
 and you must expect longer, if not more entertain- 
 ing, letters soon — that is, in a w'eek or so — when I 
 am a little recovered from my journey. Pi-ay tell 
 
114 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 US all the news with regard to our own offspring, 
 whom we left at nurse in England : as well as those 
 of our friends. Mention Cobbett and politics 
 too — and Hunt — to whom Mary is now writing — 
 and particularly your own plans and yourself. You 
 shall hear more of me and my plans soon. My 
 health is improved already — and my spirits some- 
 thing — and I have many literary schemes, and one 
 in particular — which I thirst to be settled that I 
 may begin. I have ordered Oilier to send you 
 some sheets &c. for revision. 
 
 Adieu. — Always faithfully yours, 
 
 P. B. S. 
 
 LETTER III. 
 
 To T. L. P., Esq. 
 
 Milan, April 20, 1818. 
 
 My dear p., 
 I HAD no conception that the distance between 
 us, measured by time in respect of letters, was so 
 great. I have but just received yours dated the 
 2d — and when you will receive mine written from 
 this city somewhat later than the same date, I 
 cannot know. I am sorry to hear that you have been 
 obliged to remain at Marlow ; a certain degree of 
 
MILAN. 115 
 
 society being almost a necessity of life, particularly 
 as we are not to see you this summer in Italy. But 
 this, I suppose, must be as it is. I often revisit 
 Marlow in thought. The curse of this life is, that 
 whatever is once known, can never be unknown. 
 You inhabit a spot, which before you inhabit it, is 
 as indifferent to you as any other spot upon earth, 
 and when, persuaded by some necessity, you think 
 to leave it, you leave it not ; it clings to you — and 
 with memories of things, which, in your experience 
 of them, gave no such promise, revenges your 
 desertion. Time flows on, places are changed ; 
 friends who were with us, are no longer with us ; 
 yet what has been seems yet to be, but barren and 
 stripped of life. See, I have sent you a study for 
 Nightmare Abbey. 
 
 Since I last wrote to you we have been to 
 Como, looking for a house. This lake exceeds any 
 thing I ever beheld in beauty, with the exception 
 of the arbutus islands of Killarney. It is long and 
 narrow, and has the appearance of a mighty river 
 winding among the mountains and the forests. We 
 sailed from the town of Como to a tract of country 
 called the Tremezina, and saw the various aspects 
 presented by that part of the lake. The mountains 
 between Como and that village, or rather cluster 
 of villages, are covered on high with chesnut forests 
 
116 
 
 LETTERS FROM ITALY, 
 
 (the eating chesnuts, on which the inhabitants of 
 the country subsist in time of scarcity), which 
 sometimes descend to the very verge of the lake, 
 overhanging it witii their hoary branches. But 
 usually the immediate border of this shore is com- 
 posed of laurel-trees, and bay, and myrtle, and 
 wild fig-trees, and olives, which grow in the crevices 
 of the rocks, and overhang the caverns, and shadow 
 the deep glens, which are filled with the flashing 
 light of the waterfalls. Other flowering shrubs, 
 which I cannot name, grow there also. On high, 
 the towers of village churches are seen \vhite 
 among the dark forests. Beyond, on the opposite 
 shore, which faces the south, the mountains descend 
 less precipitously to the lake, and although they are 
 much higher, and some covered with perpetual 
 snow, there intervenes between them and the lake 
 a range of lower hills, which have glens and rifts 
 opening to the other, such as I should fancy the 
 abysses of Ida or Parnassus. Here are plantations 
 of olive, and orange, and lemon -trees, which are 
 now so loaded with fruit, that there is more fruit 
 than leaves, — and vineyards. This shore of the 
 lake is one continued village, and the JNIilanese 
 nobility have their villas here. The union of culture 
 and the untameable profusion and loveliness of 
 nature is here so close, that the line where they are 
 
MILAN. 117 
 
 divided can hardly be discovered. But the finest 
 scenery is that of the Villa Pliniana ; so called 
 from a fountain which ebbs and flows every three 
 hours, described by the younger Pliny, which is in 
 the court-yard. This house, which was once a 
 magnificent palace, and is now half in ruins, we 
 are endeavouring to procure. It is built upon ter- 
 races raised from the bottom of the lake, together 
 with its garden, at the foot of a semicircular pre- 
 cipice, overshadowed by profound forests of chesnut. 
 The scene from the colonnade is the most extraor- 
 dinary, at once, and the most lovely that eye ever 
 beheld. On one side is the mountain, and imme- 
 diately over you are clusters of cypress-trees of an 
 astonishing height, which seem to pierce the sky. 
 Above you, from among the clouds, as it were, 
 descends a waterfall of immense size, broken by 
 the woody rocks into a thousand channels to the lake. 
 On the other side is seen the blue extent of the 
 lake and the mountains, speckled with sails and 
 spires. The apartments of the Pliniana are im- 
 mensely largo, but ill furnished and antique. The 
 terraces, which overlook the lake, and conduct 
 under the shade of such immense laurel-trees as 
 deserve the epithet of Pythian, are most delightful. 
 We staid at Como two days, and have now returned 
 to ]\Iilan, waiting the issue of our negotiation about 
 
118 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 a house. Como is only six leagues from ^Milan, 
 and its mountains are seen from the cathedral. 
 
 This cathedral is a most astonishing work of art. 
 It is built of white marble, and cut into pinnacles 
 of immense height, and the utmost delicacy of 
 workmanship, and loaded A\ith sculpture. The 
 effect of it, piercing the solid blue with those groups 
 of dazzling spires, relieved by the serene depth of 
 this Italian heaven, or by moonlight when the stars 
 seem gathered among those clustered shapes, is 
 beyond any thing I had imagined architecture 
 capable of producing. The interior, though very 
 sublime, is of a more earthly character, and with 
 its stained glass and massy granite columns over- 
 loaded with antique figures, and the silver lamps, 
 that burn forever under the canopy of black cloth 
 beside the brazen altar and the marble fretwork of 
 the dome, give it the aspect of some gorgeous 
 sepulchre. There is one solitary spot among those 
 aisles, behind the altar, where the light of day is 
 dim and yellow under the storied window, which 
 I have chosen to visit, and read Dante there. 
 
 I have devoted this summer, and indeed the next 
 year, to the composition of a tragedy on the subject 
 of Tasso's madness, which I find upon inspection 
 is, if properly treated, admirably dramatic and 
 poetical. But, you will say, I have no dramatic 
 
MILAN. 119 
 
 talent ; very true, in a certain sense ; but I have 
 taken the resohition to see what kind of a tragedy 
 a person without dramatic talent could write. It 
 shall be better morality than Fazio, and better 
 poetry than Bertram, at least. You tell me nothing 
 of Rhododaphne, a book from which, I confess, I 
 expected extraordinary success. 
 
 Who lives in my house at Marlow now, or what 
 is to be done with it ? I am seriously persuaded 
 that the situation was injurious to my health, or I 
 should be tempted to feel a very absurd interest in 
 who is to be its next possessor. The expense of 
 our journey here has been very considerable — but 
 we arc now living at the hotel here, in a kind of 
 pension, which is very reasonable in respect of price, 
 and when we get into a menage of our own, we have 
 every reason to expect that we shall experience 
 something of the boasted cheapness of Italy. The 
 finest bread, made of a sifted flour, the whitest and 
 the best I ever tasted, is only one Evglish penny a 
 pound. All the necessaries of life bear a propor- 
 tional relation to this. But then the luxuries, 
 tea, &c., are very dear, — and the English, as usual, 
 are cheated in a way that is quite ridiculous, if the 
 have not their wits about them. AVe do not know 
 a single human being, and the opera, until last 
 night, has been always the same. Lord Byron, 
 
120 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 we hear, has taken a house for three years, at 
 Venice ; whether we shall see him or not, I do 
 not know. The number of English who pass 
 through this town is very great. They ought 
 to be in their own country in the present crisis. 
 Their conduct is wholly inexcusable. The people 
 Jiere, though inoffensive enough, seem both in 
 body and soul a miserable race. The men are 
 hardly men ; they look like a tribe of stupid 
 and shrivelled slaves, and I do not think that I 
 have seen a gleam of intelligence in the countenance 
 of man since I passed the Alps. The women in 
 enslaved countries are always better than the men ; 
 but they have tight-laced figures, and figures and 
 mien which express (O how unlike the French !) a 
 mixture of the coquette and prude, which remindsme 
 of the worst characteristics of the English.* Every- 
 thing but humanity is in much greater perfection 
 here than in France. The cleanliness and comfort of 
 the inns is something quite English. The country 
 is beautifully cultivated ; and altogether, if you can, 
 
 * These impressions of Slielley, with regard to the Italians, formed 
 in ignorance, and with precipitation, hccanie altogether altered after a 
 longer stay in Italy. He quickly discovered the extraordinary intelligence 
 and genius of this wonderful people, amidst the ignorance in which they 
 are carefully kept by their rulers, and the vices, fostered by a religious 
 system, which these same rulers have used as their most successful 
 engine. 
 
MILAN. 121 
 
 as one ought always to do, find your happiness in 
 yourself, it is a most delightful and commodious 
 place to live in. 
 
 Adieu. — Your affectionate friend, 
 
 P. B. S. 
 
 LETTER IV. 
 
 To T. L. P. Esq. 
 
 Milan, April ^Oth, 1818. 
 My dear p., 
 
 I WRITE, simply to tell you, to direct your next 
 letters, Poste Restante, Pisa, We have engaged 
 a vctturino for that city, and leave Milan to- 
 morrow morning. Our journey will occupy six or 
 seven days. 
 
 Pisa is not six miles from the Mediterranean, 
 with which it communicates by the river Arno. 
 We shall pass by Piacenza, Parma, Bologna, the 
 Apennines, and Florence, and I will endeavour to 
 tell you something of these celebrated places in 
 my next letter ; but I cannot promise much, for, 
 though my health is much improved, my spirits 
 are unequal, and seem to desert me when I attempt 
 to write. 
 
 Pisa, they say, is uninhabitable in the midst 
 
 VOL. II. G 
 
122 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 of summer — we shall do, therefore, what other 
 people do, retire to Florence, or to the mountains. 
 But T will write to you our plans from Pisa, when 
 I shall understand them better myself. 
 
 You may easily conjecture the motives which 
 led us to foreo;o the divine solitude of Como. To 
 rae, whose chief pleasure in life is the contempla- 
 tion of nature, you may imagine how great is this 
 loss. 
 
 Let us hear from you once a fortnight. Do not 
 forget those who do not forget you. 
 
 Adieu. — Ever most sincerely yours, 
 
 P. B. Shelley. 
 
 LETTER V. 
 
 To T. L. P. Esq. 
 
 Livorno, June b, 1818. 
 My dear p., 
 
 We have not heard from you since the middle 
 of April — that is, we have received only one letter 
 from you since our departure from England. It 
 necessarily follows that some accident has inter- 
 cepted them. Address, in future, to the care of 
 Mr. Gisborne, Livorno — and 1 shall receive them, 
 though sometimes somewhat circuitously, yet 
 always securely. 
 
LEGHORN. 123 
 
 We left Milan on the 1st of May, and travelled 
 across the Apennines to Pisa. This part of the 
 Apennine is far less beautiful than the Alps ; the 
 mountains are wide and wild, and the whole 
 scenery broad and undetermined — the imagination 
 cannot find a home in it. The plain of the 
 Milanese, and that of Parma, is exquisitely beau- 
 tiful — it is like one garden, or rather cultivated 
 wilderness ; because the corn and the meadow- 
 grass grow under high and thick trees, festooned 
 to one another by regular festoons of vines. On 
 the seventh day we arrived at Pisa, where wo 
 remained three or four days. A large disagreeable 
 city, almost without inhabitants. We then pro- 
 ceeded to this great trading town, where we have 
 remained a month, and which, in a few days, we 
 leave for the Bagni di Lucca, a kind of watering- 
 place situated in the depth of the Apennines ; the 
 scenery surrounding this village is very fine. 
 
 We have made some acquaintance with a very 
 amiable and accomplished lady, Mrs. Gisborne, 
 who is the sole attraction in this most unattractive 
 of cities. We had no idea of spending a month 
 here, but she has made it even agreeable. We 
 shall see something of Italian society at the Bagni 
 di Lucca, where the most fashionable people 
 resort. 
 
 G 2 
 
124 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 When you send my parcel — which, by-the-bye, 
 I should request you to direct to Mr. Gisborne — I 
 wish you could contrive to enclose the two last 
 parts of Clarke"'s Travels, relating to Greece, and 
 belonginjj to Hookham. You know I subscribe 
 there still — and I have determined to take the 
 Examiner here. You would, therefore, oblige 
 me, by sending it weekly, after having read it 
 yourself, to the same direction, and so clipped, as 
 to make as little weight as possible. 
 
 I write as if writing where perhaps my letter 
 may never arrive. 
 
 With every good wish from all of us, 
 Believe me most sincerely yours, 
 
 P. B. S. 
 
 LETTER VI. 
 
 To Mr. and Mrs. GISBORNE, ; 
 
 (lf.ghorn). 
 
 You cannot know, as some friends in England 
 do, to whom my silence is still more inexcusable, 
 that this silence is no proof of forgetfulness or 
 neglect. 
 
 I have, in truth, nothing to say, but that I shall 
 
BAGNI DI LUCCA. 125 
 
 be happy to see you again, and renew our delightful 
 walks, until the desire or the duty of seeing new 
 things hurries us away We have spent a month 
 here in our accustomed solitude, with the exception 
 of one night at the Casino ; and the choice society 
 of all ages, which I took care to pack up in a large 
 trunk before we left England, have revisited us 
 here. I am employed just now, having little better 
 to do, in translating into my fainting and inefficient 
 periods, the divine eloquence of Plato''s Symposium ; 
 only as an exercise, or, perhaps, to give ]\Iary some 
 idea of the manners and feelings of the Athenians 
 — so different on many subjects from that of any 
 other community that ever existed. 
 
 We have almost finished A riosto — who is enter- 
 taining and graceful, and sometimes a poet. Forgive 
 me, worshi[)pcrs of a more equal and tolerant 
 divinity in poetry, if Ariosto pleases me less than 
 you. Where is the gentle seriousness, the delicate 
 sensibility, the calm and sustained energy, without 
 which true gi-eatness cannot be I He is so cruel, 
 too, in his descriptions; his most prized virtues 
 are vices almost without disguise. He constantly 
 vindicates and embellishes revenge in its grossest 
 forn\ ; the most deadly superstition that ever 
 infested the world. How different from the tender 
 and solemn enthusiasm of Petrarch — or even the 
 
126 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 delicate moral sensibility of Tasso, though some- 
 what obscured by an assumed and artificial style. 
 
 We read a good deal here — and we read little 
 in Livorno. We have ridden, Mary and I, once 
 only, to a place called Prato Fiorito, on the top of 
 the mountains : the road, winding through forests, 
 and over torrents, and on the verge of green 
 ravines, affords scenery magnificently fine. I 
 cannot describe it to you, but bid you, though 
 vainly, come and see. I take great delight in 
 watching the changes of the atmosphere here, and 
 the growth of the thunder showers with which the 
 noon is often overshadowed, and which break and 
 fade away towards evening into flocks of delicate 
 clouds. Our fire -flies are fading away fast ; but 
 there is the planet Jupiter, who rises majestically 
 over the rift in the forest-covered mountains to 
 the south, and the pale summer lightning which is 
 spread out every night, at intervals, over the sky. 
 No doubt Providence has contrived these things, 
 that, when the fire-flies go out, the low-flying owl 
 may see her way home. 
 
 Remember me kindly to the Machinista. 
 
 With the sentiment of impatience until we see 
 you again in the autumn, 
 
 I am, yours most sincerely, 
 
 P. B. Shelley. 
 
 Bagni di Lucca, July lOth, 1818. 
 
BAGNI DI LUCCA. 127 
 
 LETTER VII. 
 
 To WILLIAM GODWIN, Esq. 
 
 Bagni di Lucca, Jult/2bth, 1818. 
 
 My Dear Godwin, 
 
 We have, as yet, seen nothing of Italy which 
 marks it to us as the habitation of departed 
 greatness. The serene sky, the magnificent 
 scenery, the dehghtful productions of the chmate, 
 are known to us, indeed, as the same with those 
 which the ancients enjoyed. But Rome and Naples 
 —even Florence, are yet to see ; and if we were to 
 write you at present a history of our impressions, 
 it would give you no idea that we lived in Italy. 
 
 I am exceedingly delighted with the plan you 
 propose of a book, illustrating the character of our 
 calumniated republicans. It is precisely the subject 
 for Mary, and I imagine, that, but for the fear of 
 being excited to refer to books not within her 
 reach, she would attempt to begin it here, and 
 order the works you notice. I am unfortunately 
 little skilled in English history, and the interest 
 which it excites in me is so feeble, that I find it a 
 duty to attain merely to that general knowledge of 
 it which is indispensable. 
 
 Mary has just finished Ariosto with me, and. 
 
128 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 indeed, has attained a very competent knowledge 
 of Italian. She is now reading Livy, I have 
 been constantly occupied in literature, but have 
 wi'itten little — except some translations from 
 Plato, in which I exercised myself, in the despair 
 of producing anything original. The Symposium 
 of Plato seems to me one of the most valuable 
 pieces of all antiquity, whether we consider the 
 intrinsic merit of the composition, or the light 
 which it throws on the inmost state of manners 
 and opinions among the ancient Greeks. I have 
 occupied myself in translating this, and it has 
 excited me to attempt an Essay upon the cause of 
 some differences in sentiment between the Ancients 
 and Moderns, with respect to the subject of the 
 dialogue. 
 
 Two things give us pleasure in your last 
 letters. The resumption of [jjour Answer to] 
 Malthus, and the favourable turn of the general 
 election. If Ministers do not find some means, 
 totally inconceivable to me, of plunging the 
 nation in war, do you imagine that tliey can 
 subsist? Peace is all that a country, in the 
 present state of England, seems to require, to afford 
 it tranquillity and leisure for attempting some 
 remedy ; not to the universal evils of all constituted 
 society, but to the pecuhar system of misrule 
 
BAGNI UI LUCCA. 129 
 
 under which those evils have been exasperated now. 
 I wish that I had health or spirits that would 
 enable me to enter into public affairs, or that I 
 could find words to express all that I feel and 
 know. 
 
 The modern Italians seeui a miserable people, 
 without sensibility, or imagination, or understand- 
 ing. Their outside is polished, and an intercourse 
 with them seems to proceed with much facility, 
 though it ends in nothing, and produces nothing. 
 The women are particularly empty, and though 
 possessed of the same kind of superficial grace, are 
 devoid of every cultivation and refinement. They 
 have a ball at the Casino here every Sunday, which 
 we attend — but neither Mary nor C*** dance. 
 I do not know whether they refrain from philo- 
 sophy or protestantism. 
 
 I hear that poor Mary's book is attacked most 
 violently in the Quarterly Review. We have 
 heard some praise of it, and among others, an 
 article of Walter Scott's in Blackwood's Magazine. 
 
 If you should have anything to send us — and, I 
 assure you, anything relating to England is inter- 
 esting to us— commit it to the care of Oilier the 
 bookseller, or P * * * — they send me a parcel 
 every quarter. 
 
 My health is, I think, better, and, I imagine, 
 G 3 
 
130 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 continues to improve, but I still have busy thoughts 
 and dispiriting cares, which I would shake off— and 
 
 it is now summer. A thousand good wishes to 
 
 yourself and your undertakings. 
 
 Ever most affectionately yours, 
 
 P. B. S. 
 
 LETTER VIII. 
 
 To Mrs. SHELLEY, 
 (bagni di lucca). 
 
 Florence, Thursday, 11 o' Clock, 
 {20th Augtist, 1818.) 
 Dearest Mary, 
 
 We have been delayed in this city four hours, 
 for the Austrian minister's passport, but are now 
 on the point of setting out with a vetturino, who 
 engages to take us on the third day to Padua ; 
 that is, we shall only sleep three nights on the 
 road. ****** Yesterday''s journey, per- 
 formed in a one-horse cabriolet, almost without 
 springs, over a rough road,was excessively fatiguing. 
 *** suffered most from it; for, as to myself, there 
 are occasions in which fatigue seems a useful medi- 
 cine, as I have felt no pain in my side — a most 
 delightful respite — since I left you. The country 
 
FLORENCE. 131 
 
 was various and exceedingly beautiful. Sometimes 
 there were those low cultivated lands, with their 
 vine festoons, and large bunches of grapes just 
 becoming purple— at others we passed between high 
 mountains, crowned with some of the most majestic 
 Gothic ruins I ever saw, which frowned from the 
 bare precipices, or were half seen among the olive 
 copses. As we approached Florence, the country 
 became cultivated to a very high degree, the plain 
 was filled with the most beautiful villas, and, as far 
 as the eye could reach, the mountains were covered 
 with them ; for the plains are bounded on all sides 
 by blue and misty mountains. The vines are here 
 trailed on low trellises of reeds interwoven into 
 crosses to support them, and the grapes, now almost 
 ripe, arc exceedingly abundant. You everywhere 
 meet those teams of beautiful white oxen, which 
 are now labouring the little vine-divided fields with 
 their Virgilian ploughs and carts. Florence itself, 
 that is the Lung' Arno, (for I have seen no more) 
 I think is the most beautiful city I have yet seen. 
 It is surrounded with cultivated hills, and from the 
 bridge which crosses the broad channel of the 
 Arno, the view is the most animated and elegant 
 I ever saw. You see three or four bridges, one 
 apparently supported by Corinthian pillars, and 
 the white sails of the boats, relieved by the deep 
 
132 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 green of the forest, which comes to the water's edge, 
 and the sloping hills covered with bright villas on 
 every side. Domes and steeples rise on all sides, 
 and the cleanliness is remarkably great. On the 
 other side there are the foldings of the Vale of 
 Arno above; first the hills of olive and vine, then 
 the chesnut woods, and then the blue and misty 
 pine forests, which invest the aerial Apennines, that 
 fade in the distance. I have seldom seen a city so 
 lovely at first sight as Florence. 
 
 We shall travel hence within a few hours, with 
 the speed of the post, since the distance is 190 
 miles, and we are to do it in three days, besides the 
 half day, which is somewhat more than sixty miles 
 a day. We have now got a comfortable carriage 
 and two mules, and, thanks to Paolo, have made 
 a very decent bargain, comprising everything, to 
 Padua. I should say we had delightful fruit for 
 breakfast — figs, very fine— and peaches, unfortu- 
 nately gathered before they were ripe, whose smell 
 was like what one fancies of the wakening of Para- 
 dise flowers. 
 
 Well, my dearest Mary, are you very lonely i 
 Tell me truth, my sweetest, do you ever cry I I 
 shall hear from you once at Venice, and once on 
 ray return here. I f you love me you will keep up 
 your spirits — and, at all events, tell me truth about 
 
FLORENCE. 13o 
 
 it ; for, I assure you, I am not of a disposition to 
 be flattered by your sorrow, though I should be 
 by your cheerfuhiess ; and, above all, by seeing such 
 fruits of my absence as were produced when we 
 were' at Geneva. What acquaintances have you 
 made ? I might have travelled to Padua with a 
 German, who had just come from Rome, and had 
 scarce recovered from a malaria fever, caught in the 
 Pontine Marshes, a week or two since ; and I con- 
 ceded to ***''s entreaties— and to your absent 
 suggestions, and omitted the opportunity, although 
 I have no great faith in such species of contagion. 
 Tt is not very hot — not at all too much so for ray 
 sensations, and the only thing that incommodes me 
 are the gnats at night, who roar like so many hum- 
 ming tops in one's ear — and I do not always find 
 zanzariere. How is Willmouse and little Clara ; 
 They must be kissed for me — and you must parti- 
 cularly remember to speak my name to William, 
 and see that he does not quite forget me before 1 
 return. Adieu — my dearest girl, I think that we 
 shall soon meet. I shall write again from Venice. 
 Adieu, dear Mary ! 
 
 I have been reading the " Noble Kinsmen," in 
 which, with the exception of that lovely scene, to 
 which you added so much grace in reading to me, 
 I have been disappointed. The Jailor's Daughter 
 
134 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 is a poor imitation, and deformed. The whole story 
 wants moral discrimination and modesty. I do 
 not believe Shakspeare wrote a word of it. 
 
 LETTER IX. 
 
 To Mrs. SHELLEY, 
 (bagni di lucca). 
 
 Venice, Sunday mornvig. 
 
 My dearest Mary, 
 
 We arrived here last night at 12 o"* clock, and it 
 is now before breakfast the next morning. I can, of 
 course, tell you nothing of the future ; and though 
 I shall not close this letter till post time, yet I do 
 not know exactly when that is. Yet, if you are 
 very impatient, look along the letter and you will 
 see another date, when I may have something to 
 relate. 
 
 I came from Padua hither in a gondola, and the 
 gondoliere, among other things, without any hint 
 on my part, began talking of Lord Byron. He 
 said he was a (jiovinotto Inglese^ with a nome strava- 
 gante^ who lived very luxuriously, and spent great 
 sums of money. This man, it seems, was one of 
 Lord B.'s gondolieri. No sooner had we arrived at 
 the inn, than the waiter began talking about him — 
 
A'ENICE. 135 
 
 said, that he frequented Mrs.H.'s conversazioni very 
 much. 
 
 Our journey from Florence to Padua contained 
 nothing which may not be related another time. 
 At Padua, as I said, we took a gondola— and left 
 it at three o'clock. These gondolas are the most 
 beautiful and convenient boats in the world. They 
 are finely carpeted and furnished with black, and 
 painted black. The couches on which you lean 
 are extraordinarily soft, and are so disposed as to 
 be the most comfortable to those who lean or sit. 
 The windows have at will either Venetian plate-glass 
 flowered, or Venetian blinds, or blinds of black cloth 
 to shut out the sight. The weather here is ex- 
 tremely cold — indeed, sometimes very painfully so, 
 and yesterday it began to rain. We passed the 
 laguna in the middle of the night in a most violent 
 storm of wind, rain, and lightning. It was very 
 curious to observe the elements above in a state of 
 such tremendous convulsion, and the surface of the 
 water almost calm ; for these lagunas, though five 
 miles broad, a space enough in a storm to sink a 
 gondola, are so shallow that the boatmen di'ive the 
 boat along with a pole. The sea-water, furiously 
 agitated by the wind, shone with sparkles like stars. 
 Venice, now hidden and now disclosed by the driving 
 rain, shone dimly with its lights. We were all 
 
136 
 
 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 this while safe and comfortable. Well, adieu, 
 dearest : I sliall, as Miss Byron says, resume the 
 pen in the evening. 
 
 Sunday Niijht, o o'clock in the Morning, 
 
 Well, I will try to relate everything in its order. 
 ***** 
 At three o'clock I called on Lord Byron : he was 
 delighted to see me. 
 
 He took me in his gondola across the laguna to 
 a long sandy island, which defends Venice from the 
 Adriatic. When we disembarked, we found his 
 horses waiting for us, and we rode along the sands 
 of the sea, talking. Our conversation consisted in 
 histories of his wounded feelings, and questions as 
 to ray affairs, and great professions of friendship 
 and regard for me. He said, that if he had been 
 in England at the time of the Chancery affair, he 
 would have moved heaven and earth to have pre- 
 vented such a decision. We talked of literary 
 matters, his Fourth Canto, which, he says, is very 
 good, and indeed repeated some stanzas of great 
 energy to me. When we returned to his palace — 
 which, 
 
 * * * [The letter is here torn) . 
 
 The Hoppners are the most amiable j)eople 1 
 ever knew. They are much attached to each other, 
 and have a nice little boy, seven months old. Mr. 
 
VENICE. 137 
 
 H. paints beautifully, and this excursion, which he 
 has just put off, was an expedition to the Julian 
 Alps, in this neighbourhood — for the sake of 
 sketching, to procure winter employment. He has 
 only a fortnight's leisure, and he has sacrificed two 
 days of it to strangers whom he never saw before. 
 Mrs. H. has hazel eyes and sweet looks. 
 (Paper torn.) 
 
 Well, but the time presses, I am now going to 
 the banker's to send you money for the journey, 
 which I shall address to you at Florence, Post- 
 office. Pray come instantly to Este, where I shall 
 be waiting in the utmost anxiety for your arrival. 
 You can pack up directly you get this letter, and 
 employ the next day on that. The day after, get 
 up at four o'clock, and go post to Lucca, where you 
 will arrive at six. Then take a vetturino for 
 Florence to arrive the same evening. From 
 Florence to Este is three days' vetturino journey — 
 and you could not, I think, do it quicker by the 
 post. Make Paolo take you to good inns, as we 
 found very bad ones, and pray avoid the Tre Mori 
 at Bologna, perche vi sono cose inespressibili nei 
 letti. I do not think you can, but tr?/ to get from 
 Florence to Bologna in one day. Do not take the 
 post, for it is not much faster and very expensive. 
 I have been obliged to decide on all these things 
 
138 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 without you : I have done for the best — and, my 
 own beloved Mary, you must soon come and scold 
 me if I have done wrong, and kiss me if I have 
 done right — for, I am sure, I do not know which — 
 and it is only the event that can show. We shall 
 at least be saved the trouble of introduction, and 
 have formed acquaintance with a lady who is so 
 good, so beautiful, so angelically mild, that were 
 she as wise too, she would be quite a ***. Her 
 eyes are like a reflection of yours. Her manners 
 are like yours when you know and like a person. 
 
 Do you know, dearest, how this letter was 
 written? By scraps and patches, and interrupted 
 every minute. The gondola is now come to take 
 me to the banker's. Este is a little place, and the 
 house found without difficulty. I shall count four 
 days for this letter : one day for packing, four for 
 coming here — and on the ninth or tenth day we 
 shall meet. 
 
 I am too late for the post — but I send an express 
 to overtake it. Enclosed is an order for fifty 
 pounds. If you knew all that I had to do ! — 
 
 Dearest love, be well, be happy, come to me — 
 confide in your own constant and affectionate 
 
 P. B. S. 
 
 Kiss the blue-eyed darlings for me, and do not 
 let William forget me. Clara cannot recollect 
 me. 
 
13.9 
 
 LETTER X. 
 
 To Mrs. SHELLEY. 
 
 (l CAPPUCCINI ESTE.) 
 
 Padua, mezzogiorno. 
 My best Mary, 
 
 I FOUND at Mount Selice a favourable opportunity 
 for going to Venice, where I shall try to make 
 some arrangement for you and little Ca. to come 
 for some days, and shall meet you, if I do not 
 write anything in the mean time, at Padua, on 
 Thursday morning. C. says she is obliged to 
 come to see the JNIedico, whom we missed this 
 morning, and who has appointed as the only hour 
 at which he can be at leisure — half-past eight in the 
 morning. You must, therefore, arrange matters 
 so that you should come to the Stella d'Oro a little 
 before that hour — a thing to be accomplished only 
 by setting out at half-past three in the morning. 
 You will by this means arrive at Venice very early 
 in the day, and avoid the heat, which might be 
 bad for the babe, and take the time, when she 
 would at least sleep great part of the time. C. 
 will return with the return carriage, and I shall 
 meet you, or send to you at Padua. 
 
 Meanwhile remember Charles the First — and do 
 you be prepared to bring at least some of Myrra 
 
140 
 
 LETTERS PROM ITALY. 
 
 translated ; bring the book also with you, and the 
 sheets of " Prometheus Unbound," which you 
 will find numbered from one to twenty-six on the 
 table of the pavilion. My poor little Clara, how is 
 she to-day ? Indeed I am somewhat uneasy about 
 her, and though I'feel secure that there is no danger, 
 it would be very comfortable to have some reason- 
 able person's opinion about her. The ISledico at 
 Padua is certainly a man in great practice, but 
 I confess he does not satisfy me. 
 
 Am I not like a wild swan to be gone so suddenly i 
 But, in fact, to set off alone to Venice required an 
 exertion. I felt myself capable of making it, and 
 I knew that you desired it. What will not be— 
 if so it is destined — the lonely journey through 
 that wide, cold France ? But we shall see. 
 
 Adieu, my dearest love — remember Charles I. 
 and Myrra. I have been already imagining how 
 you will conduct some scenes. The second volume 
 of St. Leon begins with this proud and true senti- 
 ment — " There is nothing which the human mind 
 can conceive, which it may not execute." Shak- 
 speare was only a human being. 
 
 Adieu till Tiiursday. Your ever affectionate 
 
 P. B. S. 
 
141 
 
 LETTER XI. 
 
 To T. L. P. Esq. 
 
 Este, Octobers, 1818. 
 
 My dear p., 
 
 I HAVE not written to you, I think, for six weeks. 
 But I have been on the point of writing many 
 times, and have often felt that I had many things 
 to say. But I have not been without events to 
 disturb and distract me, amon^jst wliich is the 
 death of my little girl. She died of a disorder 
 peculiar to the climate. We have all had bad 
 spirits enough, and I, in addition, bad health. I 
 intend to be better soon : there is no malady, bodily 
 or mental, which does not either kill or is killed. 
 
 We left the Baths of Lucca, I think, the day 
 after I wrote to you — on a visit to Venice — partly 
 for the sake of seeing the city. We made a very 
 delightful acquaintance there with a Mr. and Mrs. 
 Hoppncr, the gentleman an Englishman, and the 
 lady a Swissesse, mild and beautiful, and unpreju- 
 diced, in the best sense of the word. The kind 
 attentions of these people made our short stay at 
 Venice very pleasant. I saw Lord Byron, and 
 really hardly knew him again ; he is changed into 
 the liveliest and happiest-looking man I ever met. 
 He read me the first canto of his " Don Juan" — 
 
142 LETTEI'.S rr.OM ITALY. 
 
 a tiling in the style of Beppo, but infinitely better, 
 and dedicated to Southey, in ten or a dozen stanzas, 
 more like a mixture of wormwood and verdigrease 
 than satire. Venice is a wonderfully fine city. 
 The approach to it over the laguna, with its domes 
 and turrets glittering in a long line over the blue 
 waves, is one of the finest architectural delusions 
 in the world. It seems to have — and literally it 
 has — its foundations in the sea. The silent streets 
 are paved with water, and you hear nothing but 
 the dashing of the oars, and the occasional cries of 
 the gondolieri. I heard nothing of Tasso. The gon- 
 dolas themselves are things of a most romantic and 
 picturesque appearance ; I can only compare them 
 to moths of which a cofiin might have been the 
 chrysalis. They are hung with black, and painted 
 black, and carpeted with grey ; they curl at the 
 prow and stern, and at the former there is a non- 
 descript beak of shining steel, which glitters at the 
 end of its long black mass. 
 
 The Doge's palace, with its library, is a fine 
 monument of aristocratic power. I saw the 
 dungeons, where these scoundrels used to torment 
 their victims. They are of three kinds — one 
 adjoining the place of trial, where the prisoners 
 destined to immediate execution were kept. I 
 could not descend into them, because the day 
 
ESTE. 1 43 
 
 on which I visitsd it, was festa. Another under 
 the leads of the palace, where the sufferers were 
 roasted to death or madness by the ardours of 
 an Italian sun : and others called the Pozzi — or 
 wells, deep underneath, and communicating with 
 those on the roof by secret passages — where the 
 prisoners were confined sometimes half up to their 
 middles in stinking water. When the French came 
 here, they found only one old man in the dungeons, 
 and he could not speak. But Venice, which was 
 once a tyrant, is now the next worse thing, a slave ; 
 for in fact it ceased to be free, or worth our regret 
 as a nation, from the moment that the oligarcliy 
 usurped the rights of the people. Yet, I do not 
 imagine that it was ever so degraded as it has 
 been since the French, and especially the Austrian 
 yoke. The Austrians take sixty per cent, in 
 taxes, and impose free quarters on the inhabitants. 
 A horde of German soldiers, as vicious and more 
 disgusting than the Venetians themselves, insult 
 these miserable people. I had no conception of 
 the excess to which avarice, cowardice, supersti- 
 tion, ignorance, passionless lust, and all the inex- 
 pressible brutalities which degrade human nature, 
 could be carried, until I had passed a few days at 
 Venice. 
 
 We have been living this last month near the 
 
144 LETTERS FUOM ITALY. 
 
 little town from which I date this letter, in a very 
 pleasant villa which has been lent to us, and we are 
 now on the point of proceeding to Florence, Rome, 
 and Naples — at which last city we shall spend the 
 winter, and return northwards in the spring. 
 Behind us here are the Euganean hills, not so 
 beautiful as those of the Bagni di Lucca, with 
 Arqua, where Petrarch's house and tomb are reli- 
 giously preserved and visited. At the end of our 
 garden is an extensive Gothic castle, now the habi- 
 tation of owls and bats, where the Medici family 
 resided before they came to Florence. We see 
 before us the wide flat plains of Lombardy, in 
 which we see the sun and moon rise and set, and 
 the evening star, and all the golden magnificence 
 of autumnal clouds. But I reserve wonder for 
 Naples. 
 
 I have been writing — and indeed have just 
 finished the first act of a lyric and classical drama, 
 to be called " Prometheus Unbound." Will you 
 tell me what there is in Cicero about a drama sup- 
 posed to have been written by vEschylus under 
 this title. 
 
 I ought to say that I have just read Malthus in 
 a French translation, Malthus is a very clever 
 man, and the world would be a great gainer if it 
 would seriously take his lessons into consideration. 
 
FERRARA. 145 
 
 if it were capable of attending seriously to any- 
 thing but mischief — but what on earth does he 
 mean by some of his inferences ! 
 
 Yours ever faithfully, 
 P. B. S. 
 
 I will write again from Rome and Florence — in 
 better spirits, and to more agreeable purpose, I 
 hope. You saw those beautiful stanzas in the 
 fourth canto about the Nymph Egeria. Well, 1 did 
 not whisper a word about nympholcpsy : I hope 
 you acquit me — and I hope you will not carry 
 delicacy so far as to let this suppress anything 
 nympholeptic. 
 
 LETTER XII. 
 
 To T. L. P., Esq. 
 
 Ferrara, Nov. 8th, 1818. 
 My Dear P., 
 
 We left Este yesterday on our journey 
 
 towards Naples. The roads were particularly bad ; 
 
 we have, therefore, accomplished only two days' 
 
 journey, of eighteen and twenty-four miles each, 
 
 and you may imagine that our horses must be 
 
 tolerably good ones, to drag our carriage, with five 
 
 people and heavy luggage, through deep and 
 
 VOL. II. H 
 
146 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 clayey roads. The roads are, however, good 
 during the rest of the way. 
 
 The country is flat, but intersected by lines of 
 wood, trellised with vines, whose broad leaves are 
 now stamped with the redness of their decay. 
 Every here and there one sees people employed in 
 agricultural labours, and the plough, the harrow, or 
 the cart, drawn by long teams of milk-white or 
 dove-coloured oxen of immense size and exquisite 
 beauty. This, indeed, might be the country of 
 Pasiphaes. In one farm-yard I was shown sixty- 
 three of these lovely oxen, tied to their stalls, in 
 excellent condition. A farm-yard in this part of 
 Italy is somewhat different from one in England. 
 First, the house, which is large and high, with 
 strange-looking unpainted window-shutters, gene- 
 rally closed, and dreary beyond conception. The 
 farm-yard and out-buildings, however, are usually 
 in the neatest order. The threshing-floor is not 
 under cover, but like that described in the Georgics, 
 usually flattened by a broken column, and neither 
 the mole, nor the toad, nor the ant, can find on its 
 area a crevice for their dwelling. Around it, at 
 this season, are piled the stacks of the leaves and 
 stalks of Indian corn, which has lately been 
 threshed and dried upon its surface. At a little 
 distance are vast heaps of many- coloured zucchi or 
 
FERRARA. 147 
 
 pumpkins, some of enormous size, piled as winter 
 food for the hogs. There are turkeys, too, and 
 fowls wandering about, and two or three dogs, wlio 
 bark with a sharp hylactism. The people who 
 are occupied with the care of these things seem 
 neither ill-clothed nor ill-fed, and the blunt incivi- 
 lity of their manners has an English air with it, 
 very discouraging to those who are accustomed to 
 the impudent and polished lying of the inhabitants 
 of the cities. I should judge the agricultural 
 resources of this country to be immense, since it 
 can wear so flourishing an appearance, in spite of 
 the enormous discouragements which the various 
 tyranny of the governments inflicts on it. I 
 ought to say that one of the farms belongs to a Jew 
 banker at Venice, another Shylock. — We arrived 
 late at the inn where I now write ; it was once the 
 palace of a Venetian nobleman, and is now an 
 excellent inn. To-morrow we are going to see the 
 sights of Ferrara. 
 
 A^ov. 7. 
 We have had heavy rain and thunder all night ; 
 and the former still continuing, we went in the 
 carriage about the town. We went first to look 
 at the cathedral, but the beggars very soon made 
 us sound a retreat ; so, whether, as it is said, 
 there is a copy of a picture of Michael Angelo 
 h2 
 
148 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 there or no, I cannot tell. At the public library 
 we were more successful. This is, indeed, a mag- 
 nificent establishment, containing, as they say, 
 160,000 volumes. We saw some illuminated 
 manuscripts of church music, with the verses of the 
 jjsalms interlined between the square notes, each of 
 which consisted of the most delicate tracery, in 
 colours inconceivably vivid. They belonged to the 
 neighbouring convent of Certolda, and are three 
 or four hundred years old ; but their hues are as 
 fresh as if they had been executed yesterday. The 
 tomb of Ariosto occupies one end of the largest 
 saloon of which the library is composed ; it is 
 formed of various marbles, surmounted by an 
 expressive bust of the poet, and subscribed with a 
 few Latin verses, in a less miserable taste than 
 those usually employed for similar purposes. But 
 the most interesting exhibitions here, are the 
 writings, &c., of Ariosto and Tasso, which are 
 preserved, and were concealed from the undis- 
 tinguishing depredations of the French with pious 
 care. There is the arm-chair of Ariosto, an old 
 plain wooden piece of furniture, the hard seat of 
 which was once occupied by, but has now survived 
 its cushion, as it has its master. I could fancy 
 Ariosto sitting in it ; and the satires in his own 
 handwriting which they unfold beside it, and the 
 
FERRARA. 149 
 
 old bronze inkstand, loaded with figures, which 
 belonged also to him, assists the willing delusion. 
 This inkstand has an antique, rather than an 
 ancient appearance. Three nymphs lean forth 
 from the circumference, and on the top of the lid 
 stands a cupid, winged and looking up, with a torch 
 in one hand, his bow in the otlier, and his quiver 
 beside him. A medal was bound round the skeleton 
 of Ariosto, with his likeness impressed upon it. I 
 cannot say I think it had much native expression, 
 but, perhaps, the artist was in fault. On the reverse 
 is a hand, cutting with a pair of scissors the tongue 
 from a serpent, upraised from the grass, with this 
 legend — Pro bono malum. What this reverse of 
 the boasted Christian maxim means, or how it 
 applies to Ariosto, cither as a satirist or a serious 
 writer, I cannot exactly tell. The cicerone 
 attempted to explain, and it is to his commentary 
 that my bewildering is probably due — if, indeed, 
 the meaning be very plain, as is possibly the case. 
 There is here a manuscript of the entire 
 Gerusalemrae Liberata, written by Tasso's own 
 hand ; a manuscript of some poems, written in 
 prison, to the Duke Alfonso ; and the satires of 
 Ariosto, written also by his own hand ; and the 
 Pastor Fido of Guarini. The Gerusalemme, though 
 it had evidently been copied and recopied, is inter- 
 
150 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 lined, particularly towards the end, with numerous 
 corrections. The hand-writing of Ariosto is a 
 small, firm, and pointed character, expressing, as I 
 should say, a strong and keen, but circumscribed 
 energy of mind ; that of Tasso is large, free, and 
 flowing, except that there is a checked expression 
 in the midst of its flow, which brings the letters 
 into a smaller compass than one expected from the 
 beginning of the word. It is the symbol of an 
 intense and earnest mind, exceeding at times its 
 own depth, and admonished to return by the 
 chillness of the waters of oblivion striking upon its 
 adventurous feet. You know I always seek in 
 what I see the manifestation of something beyond 
 the present and tangible object ; and as we do not 
 agree in physiognomy, so we may not agree now. 
 But my business is to relate my own sensations, 
 and not to attempt to inspire others with them. 
 Some of the MSS. of Tasso were sonnets to his 
 persecutor, which contain a great deal of what 
 is called flattery. If Alfonso's ghost were asked 
 how he felt those praises now, I wonder what he 
 would say. But to me there is much more to pity 
 than to condemn in these entreaties and praises 
 of Tasso. It is as a bigot prays to and praises 
 his god, whom he knows to be the most remorse- 
 less, capricious, and inflexible of tyrants, but whom 
 
FERRARA. 151 
 
 he knows also to be omnipotent. Tasso's situation 
 was widely different from that of any persecuted being 
 of the present day ; for, from the depth of dungeons, 
 public opinion might now at length be awakened to 
 an echo that would startle the oppressor. But then 
 there was no hope. There is something irresistibly 
 pathetic to me in the sight of Tasso"'s own hand- 
 writing, moulding expressions of adulation and 
 entreaty to a deaf and stupid tyrant, in an age 
 when the most heroic virtue would have exposed 
 its possessor to hopeless persecution, and — such is 
 the alliance between virtue and genius — which 
 unoffending genius could not escape. 
 
 We went afterwards to see his prison in the 
 hospital of Sant" Anna, and I enclose you a piece 
 of the wood of the very door, which for seven 
 years and three months divided this glorious being 
 from the air and the light which had nourished in 
 him those influences which he has communicated, 
 through his poetry, to thousands. The dungeon is 
 low and dark, and, when I say that it is really a 
 very decent dungeon, I speak as one who has seen 
 the prisons in the doge's palace of Venice. But it 
 is a horrible abode for the coarsest and meanest 
 thing that ever wore the shape of man, much 
 more for one of delicate susceptibilities and elevated 
 fancies. It is low, and has a grated window, and 
 
152 LETTEBS FROM ITALY. 
 
 being sunk some feet below the level of the earth, 
 is full of unwholesome damps. In the darkest 
 corner is a mark in the wall whore the chains were 
 rivetted, which bound him hand and foot. After 
 some time, at the instance of some Cardinal, his 
 friend, the Duke allowed his victim a fire-place ; 
 the mark where it was walled up yet remains. 
 
 At the entrance of the Liceo, where the library 
 is, we were met by a penitent ; his form was com- 
 pletely enveloped in a ghost-like drapery of white 
 flannel ; his bare feet were sandalled ; and there was 
 a kind of net-work visor drawn over his eyes, so as 
 entirely to conceal his face. I imagine that this 
 man had been adjudged to suffer this penance for 
 some crime known only to himself and his confessor, 
 and this kind of exhibition is a striking instance of 
 the power of the Catholic superstition over the 
 human mind. He passed, rattling his wooden box 
 for charity.* 
 
 Adieu. — You will hear from me again before I 
 arrive at Naples. 
 
 Yours, ever sincerely, 
 ' P. B. S. 
 
 * These penitents ask alms, to be spent in masses for the souls in 
 
 purgatory. 
 
 M. S. 
 
BOLOGNA. 153 
 
 LETTER XIII. 
 
 To T. L. P., Esq. 
 
 Bologna, Monday, Nov. 9lk, )818. 
 
 My dear p., 
 I HAVE seen a quantity of thiniis here — cliurche.s, 
 palaces, statues, fountains, and pictures ; and 
 my brain is at this moment like a portfolio of 
 an architect, or a print-shop, or a common-place 
 book. I will try to recollect something of what I 
 have seen ; for, indeed, it requires, if it will obey, 
 an act of volition. First, wc went to the cathedral, 
 which contains nothing remarkable, except a kind 
 of shrine, or rather a marble canopy, loaded with 
 sculptures, and supported on four marble columns. 
 We went then to a palace — I am sure I forget the 
 name of it — where we saw a large gallery cf 
 pictures. Of course, in a picture gallery you see 
 three hundred pictures you forget, for one you 
 remember. I remember, however, an interesting 
 picture by Guido, of the Rape of Proserpine, in 
 which Proserpine casts back her languid and half- 
 unwilling eyes, as it were, to the flowers she liad 
 left ungathered in the fields of Enna. There was 
 an exquisitely executed piece of Correggio, about 
 four saints, one of whom seemed to have a pet 
 h3 
 
154 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 dragon in a leash. I was told that it was the 
 devil who was bound in that style — but who can 
 make anything of four saints? For what can 
 they be supposed to be about? There was one paint- 
 ing, indeed, by this master, Christ beatified, inex- 
 pressibly fine. It is a half figure, seated on a mass 
 of clouds, tinged with an etherial, rose-like lustre ; 
 the arms are expanded ; the whole frame seems 
 dilated with expression ; the countenance is 
 heavy, as it were, with the weight of the rapture 
 of the spirit ; the lips parted, but scarcely parted, 
 with the breath of intense but regulated passion ; 
 the eyes are calm and benignant; the 'whole 
 features harmonised in majesty and sweetness. 
 The hair is parted on the forehead, and falls in 
 heavy locks on each side. It is motionless, but 
 seems as if the faintest breath would move it. 
 The colouring, I suppose, must be very good, if I 
 could remark and understand it. The sky is of a 
 pale aerial orange, like the tints of latest sunset ; 
 it does not seem painted around and beyond the 
 figure, but everything seems to have absorbed, and 
 to have been penetrated by its hues. I do not 
 think we saw any other of Correggio, but this spe- 
 cimen gives me a very exalted idea of his powers. 
 
 We went to see heaven knows how many more 
 palaces — Ranuzzi, Marriscalchi, Aldobrandi. If 
 
BOLOGNA. 155 
 
 you want Italian names for any purpose, here they 
 are ; I should be glad of them if I was writing a 
 novel. I saw many more of Guido. One, a 
 Samson drinking water out of an ass's jaw-bone, 
 in the midst of the slaughtered Philistines. Why 
 he is supposed to do this, God, who gave him this 
 jaw-bone, alone knows — but certain it is, that the 
 painting is a very fine one. The figure of Samson 
 stands in strong relief in the foreground, coloured, 
 as it were, in the hues of human life, and full of 
 strength and elegance. Round him he the Phi- 
 listines in all the attitudes of death. One prone, 
 with the slight convulsion of pain just passing 
 from his forehead, whilst on his lips and chin death 
 lies as heavy as sleep. Another leaning on his 
 arm, with his hand, white and motionless, hanging 
 out beyond. In the distance, more dead bodies ; 
 and, still further beyond, the blue sea and the blue 
 mountains, and one white and tranquil sail. 
 
 There is a Murder of the Innocents, also, by 
 Guido, finely coloured, with much fine expression — 
 but the subject is very horrible, and it seemed 
 deficient in strength — at least, you require the 
 highest ideal energy, the most poetical and exalted 
 conception of the subject, to reconcile you to such 
 a contemplation. There was a Jesus Christ 
 crucified, by the same, very fine. One gets tired, 
 
lo6 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 indeed, whatever may be the conception and 
 execution of it, of seeing that monotonous and 
 agonised form for ever exhibited in one prescriptive 
 attitude of torture. But the Magdalen, cHnging to 
 the cross with the look of passive and gentle 
 despair beaming from beneath her bright flaxen 
 hair, and the figure of St. John, with his looks 
 uplifted in passionate compassion ; his hands 
 elapsed, and his fingers twisting themselves toge- 
 ther, as it were, with involuntary anguish ; his feet 
 almost writhing up from the ground with the same 
 sympathy ; and the whole of this arrayed in colours 
 of a diviner nature, yet most like nature''s self. 
 Of the contemplation of this one would never 
 weary. 
 
 There was a "Fortune"" too, of Guido; a piece of 
 mere beauty. There was the figure of Fortune 
 on a globe, eagerly proceeding onwards, and 
 Love was ti'ying to catch her back by the hair, and 
 her face was half turned towards hira ; her long 
 
 CD 
 
 chesnut hair was floating in the stream of the 
 wind, and threw its shadow over her fair forehead. 
 Her hazel eyes were fixed on her pursuer, with a 
 meaning look of playfulness, and a light smile was 
 hovering on her lips. The colours which arrayed 
 her delicate limbs were etherial and warm. 
 
 But, perhaps, the most interesting of all the 
 
BOLOGNA; 157 
 
 pictures of Guido which I saw was a Madonna 
 Lattante. She is leaning over her child, and the 
 maternal feelings with which she is pervaded are 
 shadowed forth on her soft and gentle countenance, 
 and in her simple and affectionate gestures— there 
 is what an unfeeling observer would call a dullness 
 in the expression of her face ; her eyes are almost 
 closed ; her lip depressed ; there is a serious, and 
 even a heavy relaxation, as it were, of all the 
 muscles which are called into action by ordinary 
 emotions ; but it is only as if the spirit of love, 
 almost insupportable from its intensity, W9re brood- 
 ing over and weighing down the soul, or whatever 
 it is, without which the material frame is inani- 
 mate and inexpressive. 
 
 There is another painter here, called Frances- 
 chini, a Bolognese, who, though certainly very 
 inferior to Guido, is yet a person of excellent 
 powers. One entire church, that of Santa Cata- 
 rina, is covered by his works. I do not know 
 whether any of his pictures have ever been seen in 
 England. His colouring is less warm than that of 
 Guido, but nothing can be more clear and deli- 
 cate; it is as if he could have dipped his pencil 
 in the hues of some serenest and star-shining 
 twilight. His forms have the same delicacy and 
 aerial loveliness ; their eyes are all bright with 
 
158 LETTEKS FROM ITALY. 
 
 innocence and love ; their lips scarce divided by 
 some gentle and sweet emotion. His winged 
 children arc the loveliest ideal bcinfjs ever created 
 by the human mind. These are generally, whether 
 in the capacity of Cherubim or Cupid, accessories 
 to the rest of the picture ; and the underplot of 
 their lovely and infantine play is something almost 
 pathetic, from the excess of its unpretending 
 beauty. One of the best of his pieces is an Annun- 
 ciation of the Virgin ; the Angel is beaming in 
 beauty ; the Virgin, soft, retiring, and simple. 
 
 We saw besides one picture of Raphael — St. 
 Cecilia : this is in another and higher style ; you 
 forget that it is a picture as you look at it ; and 
 yet it is most unlike any of those things which we 
 call reality. It is of the inspired and ideal kind, 
 and seems to have been conceived and executed in 
 a similar state of feeling to that which produced 
 among the ancients those perfect specimens of 
 poetry and sculpture which are the baffling models 
 of succeeding generations. There is a unity and a 
 perfection in it of an incommunicable kind. The 
 central figure, St. Cecilia, seems rapt in such 
 inspiration as produced her image in the painter s 
 mind ; her deep, dark, eloquent eyes lifted up ; her 
 chesnut hair flung back from her forehead — she 
 holds an organ in her hands — her countenance, as 
 
BOLOONA. 159 
 
 it were, calmed by the depth of its passion and 
 rapture, and penetrated throughout with the warm 
 and radiant Hght of hfe. She is hstening to the 
 music of heaven, and, as I imagine, has just ceased 
 to sing, for tlie four figures that surround her 
 evidently point, by their attitudes, towards her ; 
 particularly St. John, who, with a tender yet im- 
 passioned gesture, bends his countenance towards 
 her, languid with the depth of his emotion. At 
 her feet lie various instruments of music, broken 
 and unstrung. Of the colouring I do not speak ; 
 it eclipses nature, yet it has all her truth and 
 softness. 
 
 We saw some pictures of Domenichino, Carracci, 
 Albano, Guercino, Elizabetta Sirani. The two 
 former, remember, I do not pretend to taste — I 
 cannot admire. Of the latter there are some beau- 
 tiful Madonnas. There are several of Guercino, 
 which they said were very fine. T dare say they 
 were, for the strength and complication of his 
 figures made my head turn round. One, indeed, 
 was certainly powerful. It was the representation 
 of the founder of the Carthusians exercising his 
 austerities in the desert, with a youth as his atten- 
 dant, kneeling beside him at an altar : on another 
 altar stood a skull and a crucifix ; and around were 
 the rocks and the trees of the wildei*ness. I 
 
160 LETTERS mOM ITAT.Y. 
 
 never saw such a figure as this fellow. His face 
 was wrinkled like a di'ied snake"'s skin, and 
 drawn in long hard lines : his very hands were 
 wrinkled. He looked like an animated mummy. 
 He was clothed in a loose dress of death-coloured 
 Hannel, such as you might fancy a shroud might 
 be, after it had wrapt a corpse a month or two. It 
 had a yellow, putrified, ghastly hue, which it cast on 
 all the objects around, so that the hands and face of 
 the Carthusian and his companion were jaundiced 
 by this sepulchral glimmer. Why write books 
 against religion, when we may hang up such 
 pictures ? But the world either will not or cannot 
 see. The gloomy effect of this was softened, and, 
 at the same time, its sublimity diminished, by the 
 figure of the Virgin and Child in the sky, looking 
 down with admiration on the monk, and a beautiful 
 flying figure of an angel. 
 
 Enough of pictures. I saw the place where 
 Guido and his mistress, Elizabetta Sirani, were 
 buried. This lady was poisoned at the age of 
 twenty-six, by another lover, a rejected one, of 
 course. Our guide said she was very ugly, and 
 that we might see her portrait to-morrow. 
 
 Well, good-night, for the present. " To-morrow 
 to fresh fields and pastures new." 
 
BOLOGNA. 1(U 
 
 ICov. 10. 
 
 To-day we first went to see those divine pictures 
 of Raffael and Guido again, and then rode up the 
 mountains, beliind this city, to visit a chapel dedi- 
 cated to the Madonna. It made me melancholy 
 to see that they had been varnishing and restoring 
 some of these pictures, and that even some had 
 been pierced by the French bayonets. These are 
 symptoms of the mortality of man ; and, perhaps, 
 few of his works are more evanescent than paint- 
 ings. Sculpture retains its freshness for twenty 
 centuries — the Apollo and the Venus arc as they 
 were. But books are perhaps the only productions 
 of man coeval with the human race. Sophocles and 
 Shakspearo can be produced and reproduced for 
 ever. But how evanescent are paintings, and must 
 necessarily be. Those of Zouxis and Apelles 
 are no more, and perhaps they bore the same 
 relation to Homer and ^Eschylus, that those of 
 Guido and Raffael bear to Dante and Petrarch. 
 There is one refuge from the despondency of this 
 contemplation. The material part, indeed, of 
 their works must perish, but they survive in the 
 mind of man, and the remembrances connected 
 with them are transmitted from generation to 
 generation. The poet embodies them in his crea- 
 tions ; the systems of philosophers are modelled to 
 
162 
 
 LETTERS FfiOM ITALY, 
 
 gentleness by their contemplation ; opinion, that 
 legislator, is infected with their influence ; men 
 become better and wiser ; and the unseen seeds 
 are perhaps thus sown, which shall produce a plant 
 more excellent even than that from which they 
 fell. But all this might as well be said or thought 
 at Marlow as Bologna. 
 
 The chapel of the JNIadonna is a very pretty 
 Corinthian building — very beautiful, indeed. It 
 commands a fine view of these fertile plains, the 
 many-folded Apennines, and the city, I have just 
 returned from a moonlight walk through Bologna. 
 It is a city of colonnades, and the effect of moon- 
 light is strikingly picturesque. There are two 
 towers here — one 400 feet high — ugly things, built 
 of brick, which lean both different ways ; and with 
 the delusion of moonlight shadows, you might 
 almost fancy that the city is rocked by an earth- 
 quake. They say they were built so on purpose ; 
 but I observe in all the plain of Lombardy the 
 church towers lean. 
 
 Adieu. — God grant you patience to read this 
 long letter, and courage to support the expectation 
 of the next. Pray part them from the Cohbetts on 
 your breakfast table — they may fight it out in your 
 mind. 
 
 Yours ever, most sincerely, 
 
 P. B. S. 
 
ROME. ] 6*3 
 
 LETTER XIV. 
 
 To T. L, P., Esq. 
 
 Rome, November 20th, 1818. 
 My dear p., 
 
 Behold mc in the capital of the vanished world ! 
 But I have seen nothing except St. Peter's and 
 the Vatican, overlooking the city in the mist of 
 distance, and the Dogana, where they took us to 
 have our luggage examined, which is built between 
 the ruins of a temple to Antoninus Pius. The 
 Corinthian columns rise over the dwindled palaces 
 of the modern town, and the wrought cornice is 
 changed on one side, as it were, to masses of wave- 
 worn precipice, which overhang you, far, far on 
 high. 
 
 I take advantage of this rainy evening, and 
 before Rome has effaced all other recollections, to 
 endeavour to recall the vanished scenes through 
 which we have passed. We left Bologna, I forget 
 on what day, and passing by Rimini, Fano, and 
 Foligno, along the Via Flaminia and Tcrni, have 
 arrived at Rome after ten days' somewhat tedious, 
 but most interesting, journey. The most remark- 
 able things we saw were the Roman excavations 
 in the rock, and the great waterfall of Terni. 
 
164< LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 Of course you have heard that there are a 
 Roman bridge and a triumphal arch at Rimini, 
 and in what excellent taste they are built. The 
 bridge is not unlike the Strand bridge, but more 
 bold in proportion, and of course infinitely smaller. 
 From Fano we left the coast of the Adriatic, and 
 entered the Apennines, following the course of the 
 Metaurus, the banks of which were the scene of 
 the defeat of Asdrubal : and it is said (you can 
 refer to the book) that Livy has given a very exact 
 and animated description of it. I forget all about 
 it, but shall look as soon as our boxes are opened. 
 Following the river, the vale contracts, the banks 
 of the river become steep and rocky, the forests of 
 oak and ilex which overhang its emerald-coloured 
 stream, cling to their abrupt precipices. About 
 four miles from Fossombrone, the river forces for 
 itself a passage between the walls and toppling pre- 
 cipices of the loftiest Apennines, which are here 
 rifted to their base, and undermined by the narrow 
 and tumultuous torrent. It was a cloudy morning, 
 and we had no conception of the scene that awaited 
 us. Suddenly the low clouds were struck by the 
 clear north wind, and like curtains of the finest 
 gauze, removed one by one, were drawn from before 
 the mountain, whose heaven-cleaving pinnacles and 
 black crags overhanging one another, stood at length 
 
BOME. 1 65 
 
 defined in the light of day. The road runs parallel 
 to the river, at a considerable height, and is car- 
 ried through the mountain by a vaulted cavern. 
 The marks of the chisel of the legionaries of the 
 Roman Consul are yet evident. 
 
 We passed on day after day, until we came to 
 Spoleto, I think the most romantic city I ever saw. 
 There is here an aqueduct of astonishing elevation, 
 which unites two rocky mountains, — there is the 
 path of a torrent below, whitening the green dell 
 with its broad and barren track of stones, and 
 above there is a castle, apparently of great strength 
 and of tremendous magnitude, which overhangs the 
 city, and whose marble bastions are perpendicular 
 with the precipice. I never saw a more impres- 
 sive picture ; in which the shapes of nature are of 
 the grandest order, but over which the creations 
 of man, sublime from their antiquity and great- 
 ness, seem to predominate. The castle was built 
 by Belisarius or Narses, I forget which, but was of 
 that epoch. 
 
 From Spoleto we went to Terni, and saw the 
 cataract of the Velino. The glaciers of Montan- 
 vert and the source of the Arveiron is the grandest 
 spectacle I ever saw. This is the second. Imagine 
 a river sixty feet in breadth, with a vast volume of 
 waters, the outlet of a great lake among the higher 
 
1()6 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 mountains, falling 300 feet into a sightless gulf 
 of snow-white vapour, which bursts up for ever and 
 for ever from a circle of black crags, and thence 
 leaping downwards, make five or six other cata- 
 racts, each fifty or a hundred feet high, which 
 exhibit, on a smaller scale, and with beautiful and 
 sublime vai'iety, the same appearances. But words 
 (and far less could painting) will not express it. 
 Stand upon the brink of the platform of cliff, which 
 is directly opposite. You see the ever-moving 
 water stream down. It comes in thick and tawny 
 folds, flaking off like solid snow gliding down a 
 mountain. It does not seem hollow within, but 
 without it is unequal, like the folding of linen 
 thrown carelessly down ; your eye follows it, and it 
 is lost below ; not in the black rocks which gird it 
 around, but in its own foam and spray, in the cloud - 
 like vapours boiling up from below, w^hich is not 
 like rain, nor mist, nor spray, nor foam, but water, 
 in a shape wholly unlike anything I ever saw 
 before. It is as white as snow, but thick and 
 impenetrable to the eye. The very imagination is 
 bewildered in it. A thunder comes up from the 
 abyss wonderful to hear; for, though it ever sounds, 
 it is never the same, but, modulated by the changing 
 motion, rises and falls intermittingly ; we passed 
 half an hour in one spot looking at it, and 
 
ROME. 167 
 
 thought but a few minutes had gone by. The 
 surrounding scenery is, in its kind, the loveliest 
 and most sublime that can be conceived. In our 
 first walk, we passed through some olive groves, of 
 large and ancient trees, whose hoary and twisted 
 trunks leaned in all directions. We then crossed 
 a path of orange trees by the river side, laden with 
 their golden fruit, and came to a forest of ilex of 
 a large size, whose evergreen and acorn-bearing 
 boughs were intertwined over our winding path. 
 Around, hemming in the narrow vale, were pinna- 
 cles of lofty mountains of pyramidical rock clothed 
 with all evergreen plants and trees ; the vast pine 
 whose feathery foliage trembled in the blue air, 
 the ilex, that ancestral inhabitant of these moun- 
 tains, the arbutus with its crimson-coloured fruit 
 and glittering leaves. After an hour's walk, we 
 came beneath the cataract of Terni, within the 
 distance of half a mile ; nearer you cannot approach, 
 for the Nar, which has here its confluence with the 
 Velino, bars the passage. We then crossed the 
 river formed by this confluence, over a narrow 
 natural bridge of rock, and saw the cataract from 
 the platform I first mentioned. ^Ve think of 
 spending some time next year near this waterfall. 
 The inn is very bad, or we should have stayed there 
 longer. 
 
1 G8 LETTERS FUOM ITALY. 
 
 We came from Terni last night to a place called 
 Nepi, and to-day arrived at Rome across the much- 
 belied Campagna di Roma, a place I confess infi- 
 nitely to my taste. It is a flattering picture of 
 Bagshot Heath. But then there are the Apennines 
 on one side, and Rome and St. Peter"'s on the 
 other, and it is intersected by perpetual dells 
 clothed with arbutus and ilex. 
 
 Adieu — very faithfully yours, 
 
 P. B. S. 
 
 LETTER XV. 
 
 To T. L. P., Esq. 
 
 Naples, December 22, 1818. 
 My dear p., 
 I have received a letter from you here, dated 
 November 1st; you see the reciprocation of letters 
 from the term of our travels is more slow, I 
 entirely agree with what you say about Childe 
 Harold. The spirit in which it is written is, if 
 insane, the most wicked and mischievous insanity 
 that ever was given forth. It is a kind of obstinate 
 and self-willed folly, in which he hardens himself. 
 I remonstrated with him in vain on the tone of 
 
NAPLES. 169 
 
 mind from which such a view of things alone arises. 
 For its real root is very different from its apparent 
 one. Nothing can be less sublime than the true 
 source of these expressions of contempt and despe- 
 ration. The fact is, that first, the Italian women 
 with whom he associates, arc perhaps the most con- 
 temptible of all who exist under the moon — the most 
 ignorant, the most disgusting, the most bigoted ; 
 * * * * an ordinary Englishman cannot approach 
 them. Well, L. B. is familiar with the lowest sort 
 of these women, the people his gondolieri pick up 
 in the streets. He associates with wTctches who 
 seem almost to have lost the gait and physiognomy 
 of man, and who do not scruple to avow practices, 
 which are not only not named, but I believe seldom 
 even conceived in England. Ho says he disap- 
 proves, but he endures. He is heartily and deeply 
 discontented with himself; and contemplating in the 
 distorted mirror of his own thoughts the nature 
 and the destiny of man, what can he behold but 
 objects of contempt and despair I But that he is 
 a great poet, I think the address to Ocean proves. 
 And he has a certain degree of candour while you 
 talk to him, but unfortunately it does not outlast 
 your departure. No, I do not doubt, and, for his 
 sake, I ought to hope, that his present career must 
 end soon in some violent circumstance. 
 VOL. ir. 1 
 
170 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 Since I last wrote to you, 1 have seen the ruins 
 of Rome, the Vatican, St. Peter''s, and all the 
 miracles of ancient and modern art contained in 
 that majestic city. The impression of it exceeds 
 anything I have ever experienced in my travels. 
 We stayed there only a week, intending to return 
 at the end of February, and devote two or three 
 months to its mines of inexhaustible contemplation, 
 to which period I refer you for a minute account of 
 it. We visited the Forum and the ruins of the 
 Coliseum every day. The Coliseum is unlike any 
 work of human hands I ever saw before. It is of 
 enormous height and circuit, and the arches built of 
 massy stones are piled on one another, and jut into 
 the blue air, shattered into the forms of overhang- 
 ing rocks. It has been changed by time into the 
 image of an amphitheatre of rocky hills overgrown 
 by the wild olive, the myrtle, and the fig-tree, and 
 threaded by little paths, which wind among its 
 ruined stairs and immeasurable galleries : the copse- 
 wood overshadows you as you wander through its 
 labyrinths, and the wild weeds of this climate of 
 flowers bloom under your feet. The arena is 
 covered with grass, and pierces, like the skirts of a 
 natural plain, the chasms of the broken arches 
 around. But a small part of the exterior cir- 
 cumference remains — it is exquisitely light and 
 
NAPLES. 171 
 
 beautiful ; and the effect of the perfection of its 
 architecture, adorned with ranges of Corinthian 
 pilasters, supporting a bold cornice, is such, as to 
 diminish the effect of its greatness. The interior 
 is all ruin. I can scarcely believe that when 
 encrusted with Dorian marble and ornamented by 
 columns of Egyptian granite, its effect could have 
 been so subhmc and so impressive as in its present 
 state. It is open to the sky, and it was the clear 
 and sunny weather of the end of November in this 
 climate when we visited it, day after day. 
 
 Near it is the arch of Constantine, or rather the 
 arch of Trajan; for the servile and avaricious senate 
 of degraded Rome, ordered that the monument of 
 his predecessor should be demolished in order to 
 dedicate one to the Christian reptile, who had crept 
 among the blood of his murdered family to the 
 supreme power. It is exquisitely beautiful and 
 perfect. The Forum is a plain in the midst of 
 Rome, a kind of desert full of heaps of stones and 
 pits, and though so near the habitations of men, is 
 the most desolate place you can conceive. The 
 ruins of temples stand in and around it, shattered 
 columns and ranges of others complete, supporting 
 cornices of exquisite workmanship, and vast vaults 
 of shattered domes distinct with regular compart- 
 ments, once filled with sculptures of ivory or brass. 
 i2 
 
172 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 The temples of Jupiter, and Concord, and Peace, 
 and the Sun, and the Moon, and Vesta, are all within 
 a short distance of this spot. Behold the wrecks of 
 what a great nation once dedicated to the abstrac- 
 tions of the mind ! Rome is a city, as it were, of the 
 dead, or rather of those who cannot die, and who 
 survive the puny generations which inhabit and 
 pass over the spot which they have made sacred 
 to eternity. In Rome, at least in the first enthu- 
 siasm of your recognition of ancient time, you see 
 nothing of the Italians, The nature of the city 
 assists the delusion, for its vast and antique walls 
 describe a circumference of sixteen miles, and thus 
 the population is thinly scattered over this space, 
 nearly as great as London. Wide wild fields are 
 enclosed within it, and there are grassy lanes and 
 copses winding among the ruins, and a great green 
 hill, lonely and bare, which overhangs the Tiber. 
 The gardens of the modern palaces are like wild 
 woods of cedar, and cypress, and pine, and the 
 neglected walks are overgrown with weeds. The 
 English burying-place is a green slope near the 
 walls, under the pyramidal tomb of Cestius, and is, 
 I think, the most beautiful and solemn cemetery I 
 ever beheld. To see the sun shining on its bright 
 grass, fresh, when we first visited it, with the 
 autumnal dews, and hear the whispering of the 
 
NAPLES. 173 
 
 wind among the leaves of the trees which have 
 overgrown the tomb of Cestius, and the soil 
 which is stirring in the sun-warm earth, and to 
 mark the tombs, mostly of women and young 
 people who were buried there, one might, if one 
 were to die, desire the sleep they seem to sleep. 
 Such is the human mind, and so it peoples with 
 its wishes vacancy and oblivion. 
 
 I have told you little about Rome ; but I reserve 
 the Pantheon, and St. Peter"'s, and the Vatican, 
 and Raphael, for my return. About a fortnight 
 
 ago I left Rome, and Mary and C followed in 
 
 three days, for it was necessary to procure lodgings 
 here without alighting at an inn. From my peculiar 
 mode of travelling I saw little of the country, but 
 could just observe that the wild beauty of the 
 scenery and the barbarous ferocity of the inhabitants 
 progressively increased. On entering Naples, the 
 first circumstance that engaged my attention was 
 an assassination. A youth ran out of a shop, pur- 
 sued by a woman with a bludgeon, and a man armed 
 with a knife. The man overtook him, and with one 
 blow in the neck laid him dead in the road. On 
 my expressing the emotions of horror and indigna- 
 tion which I felt, a Calabrian priest, who travelled 
 with me, laughed heartily, and attempted to quiz 
 me, as what the English call a flat. I never felt 
 
174 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 such an inclination to beat any one. Heaven 
 knows I have httlc power, but he saw that I 
 looked extremely displeased, and was silent. This 
 same man, a fellow of gigantic strength and stature, 
 had expressed the most frantic terror of robbers on 
 the road ; he cried at the sight of my pistol, and it 
 had been with great difficulty that the joint exertions 
 of myself and thevctturino had quieted his hysterics. 
 But external nature in these delightful regions 
 contrasts with and compensates for the deformity 
 and degradation of humanity. We have a lodging 
 divided from the sea by the royal gardens, and 
 from our windows we see perpetually the blue 
 waters of the bay, forever changing, yet forever the 
 same, and encompassed by the mountainous island 
 of Caprese, the lofty peaks which overhang Salerno, 
 and the woody hill of Posilipo, whose promon- 
 tories hide from us Misenum and the lofty isle 
 Inarime,* which, with its divided summit, forms the 
 opposite horn of the bay. From the pleasant walks 
 of the garden we see Vesuvius ; a smoke by day 
 and a fire by night is seen upon its summit, and 
 the glassy sea often reflects its light or shadow. 
 The climate is delicious. We sit without a fire, 
 with the windows open, and have almost all the 
 productions of an English summer. The weather 
 
 * The ancieut name of Ischia. 
 
NAPLES. 175 
 
 is usually like what Wordsworth calls " the first 
 fine day of March ; " sometimes very much warmer, 
 though perhaps it wants that " each minute 
 sweeter than before," which gives an intoxicating 
 sweetness to the awakening of the earth from its 
 winter's sleep in England. We have made two 
 excursions, one to Baiae and one to Vesuvius, and 
 we propose to visit, successively, the islands. 
 Paestum, Pompeii, and Beneventum. 
 
 We set off an hour after sunrise one radiant 
 morning in a little boat ; there was not a cloud in 
 the sky, nor a wave upon the sea, which was so 
 translucent that you could see the hollow caverns 
 clothed with the glaucous sea-moss, and the leaves 
 and branches of those delicate weeds that pave the 
 unequal bottom of the water. As noon approached, 
 the heat, and especially the light, became intense. 
 We passed Posilipo, and came first to the eastern 
 point of the bay of Puzzoh, which is within the 
 great bay of Naples, and which again encloses that 
 of Baiae. Here are lofty rocks and craggy islets, 
 with arches and portals of precipice standing in 
 the sea, and enormous caverns, which echoed 
 faintly with the murmur of the languid tide. This 
 is called La Scuola di Virgilio. We then went 
 directly across to the promontory of Misenuni, 
 leaving the precipitous island of Nisida on the 
 
176 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 right. Here we were conducted to see the Mare 
 Morto, and the Elysian fields ; the spot on which 
 Virgil places the scenery of the Sixth /Eneid. 
 Though extremely beautiful, as a lake, and woody 
 hills, and this divine sky must make it, I confess 
 my disappointment. The guide showed us an 
 antique cemetery, where the niches used for 
 placing the cinerary urns of the dead yet remin. 
 We then coasted the bay of Baise to the left, in 
 which we saw many picturesque and interesting 
 ruins ; but I have to remark that we never disem- 
 barked but we were disappointed — while from the 
 boat the effect of the scenery was inexpressibly 
 delightful. The colours of the water and the air 
 breathe over all things here the radiance of their 
 own beauty. After passing the bay of Baise, and 
 observing the ruins of its antique grandeur stand- 
 ing like rocks in the transparent sea under our 
 boat, we landed to visit lake Avernus. We passed 
 through the cavern of the Sibyl (not Virgil's Sybil) 
 which pierces one of the hills which circumscribe 
 the lake, and came to a calm and lovely basin of 
 water, surrounded^ by dark woody hills, and pro- 
 foundly solitary. Some vast ruins of the temple of 
 Pluto stand on a lawny hill on one side of it, and 
 are reflected in its windless mirror. It is far more 
 beautiful than the Elysian fields — but there are 
 
NAPLES. 177 
 
 all the materials for beauty in the latter, and the 
 Avernus was once a chasm of deadly and pestilen- 
 tial vapours. About half a mile from Avernus, a 
 high hill, called Monte Novo, was thrown up by 
 volcanic fire. 
 
 Passing onward we came to Pozzoli, the ancient 
 Dicaearchea, where there are the columns remain- 
 ing of a temple to Serapis, and the wreck of an 
 enormous amphitheatre, changed, like the Coliseum, 
 into a natural hill of the overteeming vegetation. 
 Here also is the Solfatara, of which there is a 
 poetical description in the Civil War of Petronius, 
 beginning — " Est locus," and in which the verses of 
 the poet are infinitely finer than what he describes, 
 for it is not a very curious place. After seeing these 
 things we returned by moonlight to Naples in our 
 boat. What colours there were in the sky, what 
 radiance in the evening star, and how the moon 
 was encompassed by a light unknowTi to our 
 regions ! 
 
 Our next excursion was to Vesuvius. We went 
 to Resina in a carriage, where Mary and I mounted 
 
 mules, and C was carried in a chair on the 
 
 shoulders of four men, much like a member of parlia- 
 ment after he has gained his election, and looking, 
 with less reason, quite as frightened. So we arrived 
 at the hermitage of San Salvador, where an old 
 I 3 
 
178 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 hermit, belted with rope, set forth the plates for 
 our refreshment. 
 
 Vesuvius is, after the glaciers, the most impres- 
 sive exhibition of the energies of nature I oversaw. 
 It has not the immeasurable greatness, the over- 
 powering magnificence, nor, above all, the radiant 
 beauty of the glaciers ; but it has all their character 
 of tremendous and irresistible strength. From 
 Resina to the hermitage you wind up the moun- 
 tain, and cross a vast stream of hardened lava, 
 which is an actual image of the waves of the sea, 
 changed into hard black stone by enchantment. 
 The lines of the boiling flood seem to hang in the 
 air, and it is difficult to believe that the billows 
 which seem hurrying down upon you are not actually 
 in motion. This plain was once a sea of liquid fire. 
 From the hermitage we crossed another vast stream 
 of lava, and then went on foot up the cone — this is 
 the only part of the ascent in which there is any 
 difficulty, and that difficulty has been much exag- 
 gerated. It is composed of rocks of lava, and decli- 
 vities of ashes ; by ascending the former and 
 descending the latter, there is very little fatigue. 
 On the summit is a kind of irregular plain, the 
 most horrible chaos that can be imagined ; riven 
 into ghastly chasms, and heaped up with tumuli of 
 great stones and cinders, and enormous rocks 
 
NAPLES. 179 
 
 blackened and calcined, which had been thrown 
 from the volcano upon one another in terrible con- 
 fusion. In the midst stands the conical hill from 
 which volumes of smoke, and the fountains of 
 liquid fire, are rolled forth forever. The mountain 
 is at present in a slight state of eruption ; and a 
 thick heavy white smoke is perpetually rolled out. 
 interrupted by enormous columns of an impene- 
 trable black bituminous vapour, which is hurled up, 
 fold after fold, into the sky with a deep hollow 
 sound, and fiery stones are rained down from its 
 darkness, and a black shower of ashes fell even where 
 we sat. The lava, like the glacier, creeps on per- 
 petually, with a crackling sound as of suppressed 
 fire. There are several springs of lava ; and in 
 one place it gushes precipitously over a high crag, 
 rolling down the half- molten rocks and its own 
 overhanging waves ; a cataract of quivering fire. 
 We approached the extremity of one of the rivers 
 of lava ; it is about twenty feet in breadth and ton 
 in height ; and as the inclined plane was not rapid, 
 its motion was very slow. We saw the masses of 
 its dark exterior surface detach themselves as it 
 moved, and betray the depth of the liquid flame. 
 In the day the fire is but slightly seen ; you only 
 observe a tremulous motion in the air, and 
 streams and fountains of white sulphurous smoke. 
 
180 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 At length we saw the sun sink between Capreseand 
 Inarime, and, as the darkness increased, the effect 
 of the fire became more beautiful. We were, as it 
 were, surrounded by streams and cataracts of the 
 red and radiant fire ; and in the midst, from the 
 column of bituminous smoke shot up into the air, 
 fell the vast masses of rock, white with the light of 
 their intense heat, leaving behind them through the 
 dark vapour trains of splendour. We descended 
 by torch-light, and I should have enjoyed the 
 scenery on my return, but they conducted me, I 
 know not how, to the hermitage in a state of intense 
 bodily suffering, the worst effect of which was spoil- 
 ing the pleasure of Mary and C — . Our guides on the 
 occasion were complete savages. You have no idea 
 of the horrible cries which they suddenly utter, no 
 one knows why, the clamour, the vociferation, the 
 
 tumult. C in her palanquin suffered most 
 
 from it ; and when I had gone on before, they 
 threatened to leave her in the middle of the road, 
 which they would have done had not my Italian 
 servant promised them a beating, after which they 
 became quiet. Nothing, however, can be more 
 picturesque than the gestures and the physiogno- 
 mies of these savage people. And when, in the 
 darkness of night, they unexpectedly begin to sing 
 in chorus some fragments of their wild but sweet 
 , national music, the effect is exceedingly fine. 
 
NAPLES. 181 
 
 Since I wrote this I have seen the museum of 
 this city. Such statues ! Tliere is a Venus ; an 
 ideal shape of the most winning loveliness. A 
 Bacchus, more sublime than any living being. A 
 Satyr, making love to a youth, in which the 
 expressed life of the sculpture, and the inconceiv- 
 able beauty of the form of the youth, overcome onc"'s 
 repugnance to the subject. There are multitudes 
 of wonderfully fine statues found in Herculaneum 
 and Pompeii. We are going to see Pompeii the 
 first day that the sea is waveless. Herculaneum is 
 almost filled up ; no more excavations are made ; 
 the king bought the ground and built a palace upon it. 
 
 You don't see much of Hunt. I wish you could 
 contrive to see him when you go to town, and ask 
 him what ho means to answer to Lord Byron's 
 invitation. Ho has now an opportunity, if he likes, 
 of seeing Italy. What do you think of joining his 
 party, and paying us a visit next year ; I mean as 
 soon as the reign of winter is dissolved? Write to me 
 your thoughts upon this. I cannot express to you the 
 pleasure it would give me to welcome such a party. 
 
 I have depression enough of spirits and not good 
 health, though I believe the warm air of Naples 
 does me good. We see absolutely no one here. 
 Adieu, my dear P***, 
 
 affectionately your friend, 
 
 P. B. S. 
 
182 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 LETTER XVI. 
 
 To. T. L. P., Esq. 
 
 Naples, Jan. 26111,1819. 
 My dear p., 
 
 Your two letters arrived within a few days of 
 each other, one being directed to Naples, and the 
 other to Livorno. They are more welcome visitors 
 to me than mine can be to you. I writing as from 
 sepulchres, you from the habitations of men yet 
 unburied ; though the sexton, Castlereagh, after 
 having dug their grave, stands with his spade in 
 his hand, evidently doubting whether he will not 
 be forced to occupy it himself. Your news about 
 the bank-note trials is excellent good. Do I not 
 recognise in it the influence of Cobbett ? You 
 don't tell me what occupies Parliament ? I know 
 you will laugh at my demand, and assure me that 
 it is indifferent. Your pamphlet I want exceed- 
 ingly to see. Your calculations in the letter are 
 clear, but require much oral explanation. You 
 know I am an infernal arithmetician. If none but 
 me had contemplated " lucentemque globum lunse, 
 Titaniaque astra," the world would yet have 
 doubted whether they were many hundred feet 
 higher than the mountain tops. 
 
NAPLES. ISo 
 
 In my accounts of pictures and things, I am 
 more pleased to interest you than the many ; and 
 this is fortunate, because, in the first place, I have 
 no idea of attempting the latter, and if I did 
 attempt it, I should assuredly fail. A perception of 
 the beautiful characterizes those who differ from 
 ordinary men, and those who can perceive it would 
 not buy enough to pay the printer. Besides, 
 I keep no journal, and the only records of my 
 voyage will be the letters I send you. The bodily 
 fatigue of standing for hours in galleries exhausts 
 rae ; I believe that I don't see half that I ought, 
 on that account. And, then, wo know nobody, 
 and the common Italians are so sullen and stupid, 
 ifs impossible to get information from them. At 
 Rome, where the people seem superior to any in 
 Italy, I cannot fail to stumble on something 
 more. O, if I had health, and strength, and equal 
 spirits, what boundless intellectual improvement 
 might I not gather in this wonderful country ! At 
 present I write little else but poetry, and little of 
 that. My first act of Prometheus is complete, 
 and I think you would like it. I consider poetry 
 very subordinate to moral and political science, 
 and if I were well, certainly I would aspire to the 
 latter, for I can conceive a great work, embodying 
 the discoveries of all ages, and harmonizing the con- 
 
184 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 tending creeds by which mankind have been ruled. 
 Far from me is such an attempt, and I shall be 
 content, by exercising my fancy, to amuse myself, 
 and perhaps some others, and cast what weight I 
 can into the scale of that balance, which the Giant 
 of Arthegall holds. 
 
 Since you last heard from me, we have been to 
 see Pompeii, and are waiting now for the return of 
 spring weather, to visit, first, Paistum, and then 
 the islands ; after which we shall return to Rome. 
 I was astonished at the remains of this city ; I had 
 no conception of anything so perfect yet remaining. 
 My idea of the mode of its destruction was this : — 
 First, an earthquake shattered it, and unroofed 
 almost all its temples, and split its columns ; then 
 a rain of light, small pumice-stones fell ; then tor- 
 rents of boiling water, mixed with ashes, filled up 
 all its crevices. A wide, flat hill, from which the 
 city was excavated, is now covered by thick woods, 
 and you see the tombs and the theatres, the tem- 
 ples and the houses, surrounded by the uninhabited 
 wilderness. We entered the town from the side 
 towards the sea, and first saw two theatres ; one 
 more magnificent than the other, strewn with the 
 ruins of the white marble which formed their seats 
 and cornices, wrought with deep, bold sculpture. 
 In the front, between the stage and the seats, is 
 
NAPLES. 185 
 
 the circular space, occasionally occupied by the 
 chorus. The stage is very narrow, but long, and 
 divided from this space by a narrow enclosure 
 parallel to it, I suppose for the orchestra. On 
 each side are the consuls' boxes, and below, in the 
 theatre at Herculaneum, were found two equestrian 
 statues of admirable workmanship, occupying the 
 same place as the great bronze lamps did at Drury 
 Lane. The smallest of the theatres is said to have 
 been comic, though I should doubt. From both 
 you see, as you sit on the seats, a prospect of the 
 most wonderful beauty. 
 
 You then pass through the ancient streets ; 
 they are very narrow, and the houses rather small, 
 but all constructed on an admirable plan, espe- 
 cially for this climate. The rooms are built 
 round a court, or sometimes two, according to 
 the extent of the house. In the midst is a 
 fountain, sometimes surrounded with a portico, 
 supported on fluted columns of white stucco; the 
 floor is paved with mosaic, sometimes wrought in 
 imitation of vine leaves, sometimes in quaint 
 figures, and more or less beautiful, according to 
 the rank of the inhabitant. There were paintings 
 on all, but most of them have been removed to 
 decorate the royal museums. Little winged figures, 
 and small ornaments of exquisite elegance, yet 
 
186 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 remain. There is an ideal life in the forms of 
 these paintings of an incomparable loveliness, 
 though most are evidently the work of very inferior 
 artists. It seems as if, from the atmosphere of 
 mental beauty which surrounded them, every 
 human being caught a splendour not his own. In 
 one house you see how the bed-rooms were 
 managed ; — a small sofa was built up, where the 
 cushions were placed; two pictures, one represent- 
 ing Diana and Endymion, the other Venus and 
 Mars, decorate the chamber; and a little niche, 
 which contains the statue of a domestic god. The 
 floor is composed of a rich mosaic of the rarest 
 marbles, agate, jasper, and porphyry ; it looks 
 to the marble fountain and the snow-white 
 columns, whose entablatures strew the floor 
 of the portico they supported. The houses have 
 only one story, and the apartments, though not 
 large, are very lofty. A great advantage results 
 from this, wholly unknown in our cities. The 
 public buildings, whose ruins are now forests as it 
 were of white fluted columns, and which then 
 supported entablatures, loaded with sculptures, 
 were seen on all sides over the roofs of the houses. 
 This was the excellence of the ancients. Their 
 private expenses were comparatively moderate ; 
 the dwelling of one of the chief senators of Pompeii 
 
NAPLES, 187 
 
 is elegant indeed, and adorned with most beautiful 
 specimens of art, but small. But their public 
 buildings are everywhere marked by the bold and 
 grand designs of an unsparing magnificence. In 
 the little town of Pompeii, (it contained about 
 twenty thousand inhabitants,) it is wonderful to 
 see the number and the grandeur of their public 
 buildings. Another advantage, too, is, that, in the 
 present case, the glorious scenery around is not shut 
 out, and that, unlike the inhabitants of the Cim- 
 merian ravines of modern cities, the ancient Pom- 
 peians could contemplate the clouds and the lamps 
 of heaven ; could see the moon rise high behind 
 Vesuvius, and the sun set in the sea, tremulous 
 with an atmosphere of golden vapour, between 
 Inarime and ISIisenum. 
 
 We next saw the temples. Of the temple of 
 ^sculapius little remains but an altar of black 
 stone, adorned with a cornice imitating the scales 
 of a serpent. His statue, in terra-cotta, was 
 found in the cell. The temple of Isis is more 
 perfect. It is surrounded by a portico of fluted 
 columns, and in the area around it are two 
 altars, and many ceppi for statues; and a little 
 chapel of white stucco, as hard as stone, of the 
 most exquisite proportion ; its panels are adorned 
 with figures in bas relief, slightly indicated, but of 
 
188 LETTERS FROM ITALY, 
 
 a workmanship the most delicate and perfect that 
 can bo conceived. They are Eg}'ptian subjects, 
 executed by a Greek artist, who has harmonized 
 all the unnatural extravagances of the original con- 
 ception into the supernatural loveliness of his 
 country's genius. They scarcely touch the ground 
 with their feet, and their wind-uplifted robes seem 
 in the place of wings. The temple in the midst, 
 raised on a high platform, and approached by 
 steps, was decorated with exquisite paintings, some 
 of which we saw in the museum at Portici. It is 
 small, of the same materials as the chapel, with 
 a pavement of mosaic, and fluted Ionic columns of 
 white stucco, so white that it dazzles you to look 
 at it. 
 
 Thence through other porticos and labyrinths of 
 walls and columns, (for I cannot hope to detail 
 everything to you,) we came to the Forum. This 
 is a large square, surrounded by lofty porticos of 
 fluted columns, some broken, some entire, their 
 entablatures strewed under them. The temple of 
 Jupiter, of Venus, and another temple, the Tribunal, 
 and the Hall of Public Justice, with their forests of 
 lofty columns, surround the Forum. Two pedestals 
 or altars of an enormous size, (for, whether they 
 supported equestrian statues, or were the altars of 
 the temple of Venus, before which they stand, the 
 
 I 
 
NAPLES. 189 
 
 guide could not tell,) occupy the lower end of the 
 Forum. At the upper end, supported on an ele- 
 vated platform, stands the temple of Jupiter. 
 Under the colonnade of its portico we sate, and 
 pulled out our oranges, and figs, and bread, and 
 medlars, (sorry fare, you will say,) and rested 
 to eat. Here was a magnificent spectacle. Above 
 and between the multitudinous shafts of the sun- 
 shining columns was seen the sea, reflecting the 
 purple heaven of noon above it, and supporting, as 
 it were, on its line the dark lofty mountains of 
 Sorrento, of a blue inexpressibly deep, and tinged 
 towards their summits with streaks of new-fallen 
 snow. Between was one small green island. 
 To the right was Caprcae, Inarime, Prochyta, 
 and Misenum. Behind was the single summit of 
 Vesuvius, rolling forth volumes of tliick white 
 smoke, whose foam -like column was sometimes 
 darted into the clear dark sky, and fell in little 
 streaks along the wind. Between Vesuvius and 
 the nearer mountains, as through a chasm, was 
 seen the main line of the loftiest Apennines, to 
 the east. The day was radiant and warm. Every 
 now and then we heard the subterranean thunder 
 of Vesuvius ; its distant deep peals seemed to 
 shake the very air and light of day, which inter- 
 penetrated our frames, with the sullen and trcmen- 
 
190 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 dous sound. This scene was what the Greeks 
 beheld (Pompeii, you know, was a Greek city). 
 They Uved in liarmony with nature ; and the inter- 
 stices of their incomparable columns were portals, 
 as it were, to admit the spirit of beauty which 
 animates this glorious universe to visit those whom 
 it inspired. If such is Pompeii, what was Athens ? 
 ^Vhat scene was exhibited from the Acropolis, the 
 Parthenon, and the temples of Hercules, and 
 Theseus, and the Winds ? The islands and the 
 ^gean sea, the mountains of Argolis, and the 
 peaks of Pindus and Olympus, and the darkness of 
 the Boeotian forests interspersed ? 
 
 From the Forum we went to another public place ; 
 a triangular portico, half enclosing the ruins of an 
 enormous temple. It is built on the edge of the 
 hill overlooking the sea. A That black point is 
 the temple. In the apex of the triangle stands an 
 altar and a fountain, and before the altar once 
 stood the statue of the builder of the portico. 
 Returning hence, and following the consular road, 
 we came to the eastern gate of the city. The walls 
 are of enormous strength, and inclose a space of 
 three miles. On each side of the road beyond the 
 gate are built the tombs. How unlike ours ! They 
 seem not so much hiding-places for that which must 
 decay, as voluptuous chambers for immortal spirits. 
 
NAPLES. 191 
 
 They are of marble, radiantly Avhite; and two, 
 especially beautiful, are loaded with exquisite bas 
 reliefs. On the stucco-wall that incloses them are 
 little emblematic figures of a relief exceedingly low, 
 of dead and dying animals, and little winged genii, 
 and female forms bending in groups in some funeral 
 office. The higher reliefs represent, one a nauti- 
 cal subject, and the other a Bacchanalian one. 
 Within the cell stand the cinerary urns, sometimes 
 one, sometimes more. It is said that paintings 
 were found within ; which are now, as has been 
 everything moveable in Pompeii, removed, and 
 scattered about in royal museums. These tombs 
 were the most impressive things of all. The wild 
 woods surround them on either side ; and along 
 the broad stones of the paved road which divides 
 them, you hear the late leaves of autumn shiver 
 and rustle in the stream of the inconstant wind, as 
 it were, like the step of ghosts. The radiance and 
 magnificence of these dwellings of the dead, the 
 white freshness of the scarcely finished marble, 
 the impassioned or imaginative life of the figures 
 which adorn them, contrast strangely with the 
 simplicity of the houses of those who were living 
 when Vesuvius overwhelmed them. 
 
 I have forgotten the amphitheatre, which is of 
 great magnitude, though much inferior to the Coli- 
 
192 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 seum. I now understand why the Greeks were 
 such great poets : and, above all, I can account, 
 it seems to me, for the harmony, the unity, the 
 perfection, the uniform excellence, of all their works 
 of art. They lived in a perpetual commerce with 
 external nature, and nourished themselves upon the 
 spirit of its forms. Their theatres were all open to 
 the mountains and the sky. Their columns, the 
 ideal types of a sacred forest, with its roof of inter- 
 woven tracery, admitted the light and wind ; the 
 odour and the freshness of the country penetrated 
 the cities. Their temples were mostly upaithric; 
 and the flying clouds, the stars, or the deep sky, 
 were seen above. O, but for that series of wretched 
 wars which terminated in the Roman conquest of 
 the world ; but for the Christian religion, which put 
 the finishing stroke on the ancient system ; but for 
 those changes that conducted Athens to its ruin, — 
 to what an eminence might not humanity have 
 arrived ! 
 
 In a short time I hope to tell you something of 
 the museum of this city. 
 
 You see how ill I follow the maxim of Horace, 
 at least in its literal sense : " nil admirari " — 
 which I should say, " properes est una" — to pre- 
 vent there ever being anything admirable in the 
 world. Fortunately Plato is of my opinion ; and 
 
NAPLES. 193 
 
 I had rather err with Plato than be right with 
 Horace. 
 
 At this moment I have received your letter indi- 
 cating that you are removing to London. I am 
 very much interested in the subject of this change, 
 and beg you would write me all the particulars of 
 it. You will be able now to give mo perhaps a 
 closer insight into the politics of the times 
 
 than was permitted you at Marlow. Of li I 
 
 have a very slight opinion. There are rumours here 
 of a revolution in Spain. A ship came in twelve 
 days from Catalonia, and brought a report that the 
 king was massacred ; that eighteen thousand insur- 
 gents surrounded Madrid ; but that before the 
 popular party gained head enough seven thousand 
 were murdered by the inquisition. Perhaps you 
 know all by this time. The old king of Spain is 
 dead here. Cobbett is a fine 'I'/^eroTrotos — does his 
 influence increase or diminish I What a pity that 
 so powerful a genius should be combined with the 
 most odious moi'al qualities. 
 
 We have reports here of a change in the English 
 ministry — to what does it amount ? for, besides 
 my national interest in it, I am on the watch to 
 vindicate my most sacred rights, invaded by the 
 chancery court. 
 
 I suppose now we shall not see you in Italy this 
 
 VOL. II. K 
 
W4! LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 spring, wlicther Hunt comes or not. It's probable 
 I shall hear nothing from him for some months, 
 particularly if ho docs not come. Give me ses nou- 
 velles. 
 
 I am under an English surgeon here, who says I 
 have a disease of the liver, Mhich he will cure. 
 AVe keep horses, as this kind of exercise is abso- 
 lutely essential to my health. Elise* has just 
 married our Italian servant, and has quitted us ; 
 the man was a great rascal, and cheated enor- 
 mously : this event was very much against our 
 advice. 
 
 I have scarcely been out since I wrote last. 
 Adieu ! yours most faithfully, 
 
 P. B. S. 
 
 LETTER XVII. 
 
 To T. L. P., Esq. 
 
 Rome, March -IZd, 1819. 
 
 My dear p., 
 I WROTE to you the day before our departure 
 from Naples. We came by slow journeys, with our 
 own horses, to Rome, resting one day at Mola di 
 
 * A Swiss girl whom we had engaged as nursery-maid two years 
 before, at Geneva. 
 
ROAIK. 195 
 
 Gaeta, at the inn called Villa di Cicerone, from 
 being built on the ruins of his Villa, whose immense 
 substructions overhang the sea, and are scattered 
 among the orange-groves. Nothing can be love- 
 lier than the scene from the terraces of the inn. 
 On one side precipitous mountains, whose bases 
 slope into an inclined plane of olive and orange- 
 copses — the latter forming, as it were, an emerald 
 sky of leaves, starred with innumerable globes of 
 their ripening fruit, whose rich splendour con- 
 ti'astcd with the deep green foliage ; on the other 
 the sea — bounded on one side by the antique town 
 of Gaeta, and the other by what appears to be an 
 island, the promontory of Circe. From Gaeta to 
 Terracina the whole scenery is of the most sublime 
 character. At Terracina precipitous conical crags 
 of immense height shoot into the sky and overhang 
 the sea. At Albano we arrived again in sight of 
 Rome. Arches after arches in unending lines 
 stretching across the uninhabited wilderness, the 
 blue defined line of the mountains seen between 
 them ; masses of nameless ruin standing like rocks 
 out of the plain ; and the plain itself, with its 
 billowy and unequal surface, announced the neigh- 
 bourhood of Rome. And what shall I say to you 
 of Rome I If I speak of the inanimate ruins, the 
 rude stones piled upon stones, which are the 
 k2 
 
196 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 sepulchres of the fiimc of those who once arrayed 
 them with the beauty which has faded, will you 
 believe me insensible to the vital, the almost 
 breathing creations of genius yet subsisting in 
 their perfection ? AVhat has become, you will ask, 
 of the Apollo, the Gladiator, the Venus of the 
 Capitol ? What of the Apollo di Belvedere, the 
 Laocoon? What of Raffaele and Guido ? These 
 things are best spoken of when the mind has drunk 
 in the spirit of their forms ; and little indeed can 
 I, who must devote no more tlian a few months to 
 the contemplation of them, hope to know or feel of 
 their profound beauty. 
 
 I think I told you of the Coliseum, and its im- 
 pressions on me on my first visit to this city. 
 The next most considerable relic of antiquity, 
 considered as a ruin, is the Thermae of Caracalla. 
 These consist of six enormous chambers, above 200 
 feet in height, and each inclosing a vast space like 
 that of a field. There are, in addition, a number of 
 towers and labyrinthine recesses, hidden and woven 
 over by the wild growth of weeds and ivy. Never 
 was any desolation more sublime and lovely. The 
 perpendicular wall of ruin is cloven into steep 
 ravines filled up with flowering shrubs, whose thick 
 twisted roots are knotted in the rifts of the stones. 
 At every step the aerial pinnacles of shattered 
 
 i 
 
ROME. 197 
 
 stone group into new combinations of effect, and 
 tower above the lofty yet level walls, as the distant 
 mountains change their aspect to one travelling 
 rapidly along the plain. The perpendicular walls 
 resemble nothing more than that cliff of Bisham 
 wood, that is overgrown with wood, and yet is 
 stony and precipitous — you know the one I mean; 
 not the chalk-pit, but the spot that has the pretty 
 copse of fir-trees and privet-bushes at its base, and 
 where H * * and I scrambled up, and you, to my 
 infinite discontent, would go home. These walls 
 surround green and level spaces of lawn, on which 
 some elms have grown, and which are interspersed 
 towards their skirts by masses of the fallen ruin, 
 overtwined with the broad leaves of the crccjiing 
 weeds. The blue sky canopies it, and is as the 
 everlasting roof of these enormous halls. 
 
 But the most interesting effect remains. In one of 
 the buttresses, that supports an immense and lofty 
 arch, whicli "bridges the very winds of heaven," arc 
 the crumbling remains of an antique winding stair- 
 case, whose sides are open in many places to tho 
 precipice. This you ascend, and arrive on the sum- 
 mit of these piles. There grow on every side thick 
 entangled wildernesses of myrtle, and the myrlctiis, 
 and bay, and the flowering laurustinus, whose white 
 blossoms are just developed, the wild fig, and a 
 
398 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 thousand nameless plants sown by the wandering 
 winds. These woods are intersected on every side 
 by paths, like sheep tracks through the copse-wood 
 of steep mountains, which wind to every part of 
 the immense labyrinth. From the midst rise those 
 pinnacles and masses, themselves like mountains, 
 w'hicli have been seen from below. In one place 
 you wind along a narrow strip of weed-grown ruin, 
 on one side is the immensity of earth and sky, on 
 the other a narrow chasm, which is bounded by an 
 arch of enormous size, fringed by the many-coloured 
 foliage and blossoms, and supporting a lofty and 
 irregular pyramid, overgrown like itself with the 
 all-prevailing vegetation. Around rise other crags 
 and other peaks, all arrayed, and the deformity of 
 their vast desolation softened down, by the unde- 
 caying investiture of nature. Come to Rome. It 
 is a scene by which expression is overpowered ; 
 which words cannot convey. Still further, winding 
 up one-half of the shattered pyramids, by the path 
 through the blooming copsewood, you come to a 
 little mossy lawn, surrounded by the wild shrubs ; 
 it is overgrown with anemones, wall-flowers, and 
 violets, whose stalks pierce the starry moss, and 
 with radiant blue flowers, whose names I know not, 
 and which scatter through the air the divinest 
 odour, which, as you recline under the shade of the 
 
ROME. 199 
 
 ruin, produces sensations of voluptuous faintness, 
 like the combinations of sweet music. The paths 
 still wind on, threading the perplexed windings, 
 other labyrinths, other lawns, and deep dells of 
 wood, and lofty rocks, and terrific chasms. When 
 I tell you that these ruins cover several acres, and 
 that the paths above penetrate at least half their 
 extent, your imagination will fill up all that I am 
 unable to express of this astonishing scene. 
 
 I speak of these things not in the order in which 
 I visited them, but in that of the impression which 
 they made on me, or perhaps chance directs. The 
 ruins of the ancient Forum are so far fortunate 
 that they have not been walled up in the modern 
 city. They stand in an open, lonesome place, 
 bounded on one side by the modern city, and the 
 other by the Palatine Mount, covered with shape- 
 less masses of ruin. The tourists tell you all about 
 these things, and I am afraid of stumbling on their 
 languacre when I enumerate what is so well known. 
 There remain eight granite columns of the Ionic 
 order, with their entablature, of the temple of 
 Concord, founded by Camillus. I fear that the 
 immense expense demanded by these columns for- 
 bids us to hope that they are the remains of any 
 edifice dedicated by that most perfect and virtuous 
 of men. It is supposed to have been repaired 
 
200 
 
 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 under the Eastern Emperors ; alas, what a contrast 
 of recollections ! Near them stand those Corinthian 
 fluted columns, which supported the angle of a 
 temple ; the architrave and entablature are worked 
 with delicate sculpture. Beyond, to the south, is 
 another solitary column ; and still more distant, 
 three more, supporting the wreck of an entablature. 
 Descending from the Capitol to the Forum, is the 
 triumphal arch of Septimius Severus, less perfect 
 than that of Constantino, though from its propor- 
 tions and magnitude, a most impressive monument. 
 That of Constantino, or rather of Titus, (for the 
 relief and sculpture, and even the colossal images 
 of Dacian captives, were torn by a decree of the 
 senate from an arch dedicated to the latter, to adorn 
 that of this stupid and wicked monster, Constan- 
 tino, one of whose chief merits consists in establish- 
 ing a religion, the destroyer of those arts which 
 would have rendered so base a spoliation unneces- 
 sary) is the most perfect. It is an admirable work 
 of art. It is built of the finest marble, and the 
 outline of the reliefs is in many parts as perfect as 
 if just finished. Four Corinthian fluted columns 
 support, on each side, a bold entablature, whose 
 bases are loaded with reliefs of captives in every 
 attitude of humiliation and slavery. The com- 
 partments above express in bolder relief the enjoy- 
 
ROME. 201 
 
 ment of success ; the conqueror on his throne, or 
 in his chariot, or nodding over the crushed multi- 
 tudes, who writhe under his horses' hoofs, as those 
 below express the torture and abjectness of defeat. 
 There are three arches, whose roofs are pannclled 
 with fretwork, and their sides adorned with similar 
 reliefs. The keystone of these arches is supported 
 each by two winged figures of Victory, whose hair 
 floats on the wind of their own speed, and whose arms 
 are outstretched, bearing trophies, as if impatient to 
 meet. They look, as it were, borne from the sub- 
 ject extremities of the earth, on the breath which 
 is the exhalation of that battle and desolation, 
 which it is their mission to commemorate. Never 
 were monuments so completely fitted to the pur- 
 pose for which they were designed, of expressing 
 that mixture of energy and error which is called 
 a triumph. 
 
 I walk forth in the purple and golden light of 
 an Italian evening, and return by star or moon- 
 light, through this scene. The elms are just bud- 
 ding, and the warm spring winds bring unknown 
 odours, all sweet, from the country. I see the 
 radiant Orion through the mighty columns of the 
 temple of Concord, and the mellow fading light 
 softens down the modern buildings of the Capitol, 
 the only ones that interfere with the sublime deso- 
 k3 
 
202 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 lalion of the scene. On the steps of the Capitol 
 itself, stand two colossal statues of Castor and 
 Pollux, each with his horse, finely executed, 
 though far inferior to those of Monte Cavallo, the 
 cast of one of which you know we saw together in 
 London. This walk is close to our lodging, and 
 this is my evening walk. 
 
 What shall I say of the modern city ? Home is 
 yet the capital of the world. It is a city of 
 palaces and temples, more glorious than those 
 which any other city contains, and of ruins more 
 glorious than they. Seen from any of the emi- 
 nences that surround it, it exhibits domes beyond 
 domes, and palaces, and colonnades interminably, 
 even to the horizon ; interspersed with patches of 
 desert, and mighty ruins which stand girt by their 
 own desolation, in the midst of the fanes of living 
 religions and the habitations of living men, in 
 sublime loneliness. St. Peter's is, as you have 
 heard, the loftiest building in Europe. Externally 
 it is inferior in architectural beauty to St. Paul's, 
 though not wholly devoid of it ; internally it exhi- 
 bits littleness on a large scale, and is in every 
 respect opposed to antique taste. You know my 
 propensity to admire ; and I tried to persuade 
 myself out of this opinion— in vain; the more I 
 see of the interior of St. Peter's, the less impres- 
 
ROME. 203 
 
 sion as a whole does it produce on me. I cannot 
 even think it lofty, though its dome is consider- 
 ably higher than any hill within fifty miles of 
 London ; and when one reflects, it is an astonishing 
 monument of the daring energy of man. Its 
 colonnade is wonderfully fine, and there are two 
 fountains, which rise in spire-like columns of water 
 to an immense height in the sky, and falling on 
 the porphyry vases from which they spring, fill 
 the whole air with a radiant mist, which at noon 
 is thronged with innumerable rainbows. In the 
 midst stands an obelisk. In front is the palace- 
 like facade of St. Peter's, certainly magnificent ; 
 and there is produced, on the whole, an architec- 
 tural combination unequalled in the world. But 
 the dome of the temple is concealed, except at a 
 very great distance, by the facade and the inferior 
 part of the building, and that diabolical contriv- 
 ance they call an attic. 
 
 The effect of the Pantheon is totally the reverse 
 of that of St. Peter's. Though not a fourth part 
 of the size, it is, as it were, the visible image of 
 the universe ; in the perfection of its proportions, 
 as when you regard the unmeasured dome of heaven, 
 the idea of magnitude is swallowed up and lost. It is 
 open to the sky, and its wide dome is lighted by the 
 ever-changing illumination of the air. The clouds of 
 
204 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 noon fly over it, and at niglit the keen stars ai'e seen 
 through the azure darkness, hanging immoveably, or 
 driving after the driving moon among the clouds. 
 "NVc visited it by moonhght ; it is supported by 
 sixteen cohunns, fluted and Corinthian, of a certain 
 rare and beautiful yellow marble, exquisitely po- 
 lished, called here r/iallo antico. Above these are the 
 niches for the statues of the twelve gods. This is 
 the only defect of this sublime temple; there ought 
 to have been no interval between the commence- 
 ment of the dome and the cornice, supported by 
 the columns. Thus there would have been no 
 diversion from the magnificent simplicity of its 
 form. This improvement is alone wanting to 
 have completed the unity of the idea. 
 
 The fountains of Rome are, in themselves, mag- 
 nificent combinations of art, such as alone it were 
 worth coming to see. That in the Piazza Navona, 
 a large square, is composed of enormous fragments 
 of rock, piled on each other, and penetrated, as by 
 caverns. This mass supports an Egyptian obelisk 
 of immense height. On the four corners of the 
 rock recline, in different attitudes, colossal figures 
 representing the four divisions of the globe. The 
 water bursts from the crevices beneath them. 
 They are sculptured with great spirit ; one im- 
 patiently tearing a veil from his eyes ; another with 
 
ROME. 205 
 
 his hands stretched upwards. The Fontana di 
 Trevi is the most celebrated, and is rather a water- 
 fall than a fountain ; gushing out from masses of 
 rock, with a gigantic figure of Neptune; and 
 below are two river gods, checking two winged 
 horses, struggling up from among the rocks and 
 waters. The whole is not ill-conceived nor executed ; 
 but you know not how delicate the imagination 
 becomes by dieting with antiquity day after day. 
 The only things that sustain the comparison are 
 Raphael, Guido, and Salvator Rosa. 
 
 The fountain on the Quirinal, or rather the group 
 formed by the statues, obelisk and the fountain, is, 
 however, the most admirable of all. From the Piazza 
 Quirinale, or rather Monte Cavallo, you see the 
 boundless ocean of domes, spires, and columns, which 
 is the City, Rome. On a pedestal of white marble 
 rises an obelisk of red granite, piercing the blue sky. 
 Before it is a vast basin of porphjTy, in the midst 
 of which rises a column of the purest water, which 
 collects into itself all the overhanging colours of the 
 sky, and breaks them into a thousand prismatic hues 
 and graduated shadows — they fall together with its 
 dashing water-drops into the outer basin. The ele- 
 vated situation of this fountain produces, I imagine, 
 this effect of colour. On each side, on an elevated 
 pedestal, stand the statues of Castor and Pollux, 
 
206 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 Gcach in the act of taming his horse, which are said, 
 but I bchcvG wholly without authority, to be the 
 work of Phidias and Praxiteles. These figures 
 combine the irresistible energy with the sublime 
 and perfect loveliness supposed to have belonged, 
 to their divine nature. The reins no longer exist, 
 but the position of their hands and the sustained 
 and calm command of their regard, seem to require 
 no mechanical aid to enforce obedience. The coun- 
 tenances at so great a height are scarcely visible, 
 and I have a better idea of that of which we saw a 
 cast together in London, than of the other. But 
 the sublime and. living majesty of their limbs and 
 mien, the nervous and fiery animation of the horses 
 they restrain, seen in the blue sky of Italy, and 
 overlooking the city of Rome, surrounded by the 
 light and the music of that crystalline fountain, no 
 cast can communicate. 
 
 These figures were found at the Baths of Con- 
 stantine, but, of course, are of remote antiquity. I 
 do not acquiesce however in the practice of attri- 
 buting to Phidias, or Praxiteles, or Scopas, or some 
 great master, any admirable work that may be 
 found. We find little of what remained, and per- 
 haps the works of these were such as greatly sur- 
 passed all that we conceive of most perfect and 
 admirable in what little has escaped the deluge. If 
 
ROME. 207 
 
 I am too jealous of the honour of the Greeks, our 
 masters, and creators, the gods whom we should 
 worship, — pardon me. 
 
 I have said what I feel without entering into any 
 critical discussions of the ruijis of Kome, and the 
 mere outside of this inexhaustible mine of thought 
 and feeling. Hobhouse, Eustace, and Foi'syth, will 
 tell all the shew-knowledge about it — "the common 
 stuff of the earth." By-the-bye, Forsyth is worth 
 reading, as I judge from a chapter or two I have 
 seen. I cannot get the book here. 
 
 I ought to have observed that the central arch 
 of the triumphal arch of Titus yet subsists, more 
 perfect in its proportions, they say, than any of a 
 later date. This I did not remark. The figures 
 of Victory, with unfolded wings, and each spurning 
 back a globe w-ith outstretched feet, are, perhaps, 
 more beautiful than those on either of the others. 
 Their lips are parted : a delicate mode of indicating 
 the fervour of their desire to arrive at the destined 
 resting-place, and to express the eager respiration of 
 their speed. Indeed, so essential to beauty were the 
 forms expressive of the exercise of the imagination 
 and the affections considered by Greek artists, that 
 no ideal figure of antiquity, not destined to some 
 representation directly exclusive of such a charac- 
 ter, is to be found with closed lips. Within this 
 
208 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 arch are two panelled alto relievos, one representing 
 a train of people bearing in procession the instru- 
 ments of Jewish worship, among which is the holy 
 candlestick with seven branches; on the other, 
 Titus standing in a quadriga, with a winged 
 Victory. The grouping of the horses, and the 
 beauty, correctness and energy of their delineation, 
 is remarkable, though they are much destroyed.* 
 
 * Shelley left another description of this ruin. — " On the inner 
 compartment of the Arch of Titus, is sculptured, in deep relief, the 
 desolation of a city. On one side, the walls of the Temple, split by the 
 fury of conflagrations, hang tottering in the act of ruin. The accompani- 
 inents of a town taken by assault, matrons and virgins, and children and 
 old men, gathered into groups, and the rapine and licence of a barbarous 
 and enraged soldiery, are imaged in the distance. The foreground is 
 occupied by a procession of the victors, bearing in their profane hands 
 the holy candlesticks and the tables of shewbread, and the sacred instru- 
 ments of the eternal worship of the Jews. On the opposite side, the 
 reverse of this sad picture, Titus is represented standing in a chariot 
 drawn by four horses, crowned with laurel, and surrounded by the 
 tumultuous numbers of his triumphant army, and the magistrates, and 
 priests, and generals, and philosophers, dragged in chains beside his 
 wheels. Behind him stands a Victory eagle-winged. 
 
 " The arch is now mouldering into ruins, and the imagery almost 
 erased by the lapse of fifty generations. Beyond this obscure monu- 
 ment of Hebrew desolation, is seen the tomb of the Destroyer's family, 
 now a mountain of ruins. 
 
 " The Flavian amphitheatre has become a habitation for owls and 
 lats. The power, of whose possession it was once the type, and of 
 ■whose departure it is now the emblem, is become a dream and a 
 xnemory. Rome is no more than Jerusalem." 
 
 I 
 
ROME. 209 
 
 LETTER XVIII. 
 
 To T. L. P. Esq. 
 
 Rome, April Qih, 1819. 
 My dear p., 
 
 I SENT you yesterday a long letter, all about 
 
 antique Rome, which you had better keep for some 
 
 leisure day. I received yours, and one of Hunt's, 
 
 yesterday. — So, you know the B s? I could 
 
 not help considering ]\Irs. B., when I knew her, as 
 
 the most admirable specimen of a human being I 
 
 had ever seen. Nothing earthly ever appeared to 
 
 me more perfect than her character and manners. 
 
 It is improbable that I shall ever meet again the 
 
 person whom I so much esteemed, and still admire 
 
 I \Aish, however, that when you see her ; you would 
 
 tell her that I have not forgotten her, nor any of 
 
 the amiable circle once assembled round her ; and 
 
 that I desire such remembrances to her, as an 
 
 exile and a Pariah may be permitted to address to 
 
 an acknowledged member of the community of 
 
 mankind. I hear they dined at your lodgings. 
 
 But no mention of 7V * * * and his wife — where 
 
 were they? c * * *^ though so young when I saw 
 
 her, gave indications of her mother''s excellencies ; 
 
 and, certainly less fascinating, is, I doubt not, 
 
 equally amiable, and more sincere. It was hardly 
 
210 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 possible for a person of the extreme subtlety 
 
 and delicacy of Mrs. B ^'s understanding and 
 
 afFections, to be quite sincere and constant. 
 
 I am all anxiety about your I. H. affair. There 
 are few who will feel more hearty satisfaction at 
 your success, in this or any other enterprise, than 
 I shall. Pray let me have the earliest intelligence. 
 
 When shall I return to England ? The Pythia 
 has ascended the tripod, but she replies not. Our 
 present plans— and I know not what can induce us 
 to alter them — lead us back to Naples in a month 
 or six weeks, where it is almost decided that we 
 should remain until the commencement of 1820. 
 You may imagine when we receive such letters as 
 yours and Hunt's, what this resolution costs us — 
 but these are not our only communications from 
 England. My health is materially better. My 
 spirits not the most brilliant in the world ; but 
 that we attribute to our solitary situation, and, 
 though happy, how should I be lively? We see 
 something of Italian society indeed. The Romans 
 please me much, especially the women; who, though 
 totally devoid of every kind of information, or 
 culture of the imagination, or affections, or under- 
 standing — and, in this respect, a kind of gentle 
 savages — yet contrive to be interesting. Their 
 extreme innocence and naivete, the freedom and 
 
ROME. 211 
 
 gentleness of their manners ; the total absence of 
 affectation, makes an intercourse with them very 
 like an intercourse with uncorrupted children, 
 whom they resemble in loveliness as well as simpli- 
 city. I have seen two women in society here of 
 the highest beauty ; their brows and lips, and the 
 moulding of the face modelled with sculptural 
 exactness, and the dark luxuriance of their hair 
 floating over their fine complexions — and the lips 
 — you must hear the common-places which escape 
 from them before they cease to be dangerous. The 
 only inferior part are the eyes, which, though good 
 and gentle, want the mazy depth of colour behind 
 colour, with which the intellectual women of 
 England and Germany entangle the heart in soul- 
 inwoven labyrinths. 
 
 This is holy week, and Rome is quite full. The 
 Emperor of Austria is here, and Maria Louisa is 
 coming. On their journey through the other cities 
 of Italy, she was greeted with loud acclamations, 
 and vivas of Napoleon. Idiots and slaves ! Like 
 the frogs in the fable, because they are discontented 
 witli the log, they call upon the stork, mIio devours 
 them. Great festas, and magnificent funzioni 
 here — we cannot get tickets to all. There are five 
 thousand strangers in Rome, and only room for 
 five hundred, at the celebration of the famous 
 
212 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 Miserere, in the Sixtine chapel, the only thing I 
 regret wc shall not be present at. After all, Rome 
 is eternal, and were all that is extinguished, that 
 which has hre?h the ruins and the sculptures, would 
 remain, and Raffacle and'Guido be alone regretted. 
 
 In the S(}uarc of St. Petcr"'s there are about 
 three hundred fettered criminals afc work, hoeing 
 out the weeds that grow between the stones of the 
 pavement. Their legs are heavily ironed, and some 
 are chained two by two. They sit in long rows, 
 hoeing out the weeds, dressed in parti-coloured 
 clothes. Near them sit or saunter, groups of 
 soldiers, armed with loaded muskets. The iron 
 discord of those innumerable chains clanks up into 
 the sonorous air, and produces, contrasted with 
 the musical dashing of the fountains, and the deep 
 azure beauty of the sky, and the magnificence of 
 the architecture around, a conflict of sensations 
 alHed to madness. It is the emblem of Italy — 
 moral degradation contrasted with the glory of 
 nature and the arts. 
 
 We see no English society here ; it is not pro- 
 bable that we could if wc desired it, and I am 
 certain that we sliould find it insupportable. The 
 manners of the rich English are wholly insupport- 
 able, and they assume pretences which they would 
 not venture upon in their own country. — I am yet 
 
ROME. 213 
 
 iffnorant of the event of Hobliouse's election, I 
 saw the last numbers were — Lamb, 4,200 ; and 
 Hobhouse, 3,900 — 1 4th day. There is little hope. 
 That mischievous Cobbett has divided and weak- 
 ened the interest of the popular party, so that the 
 factions that prey upon our country have been able 
 
 to coalesce to its exclusion. The N s you have 
 
 not seen. I am curious to know what kind of a 
 girl Octavia becomes ; she promised well. Tell 
 
 H his ISIclpomene is in the Vatican, and that 
 
 her attitude and drapery surpass, if possible, the 
 graces of her countenance. 
 
 My " Prometheus Unbound" is just finished, 
 and in a month or two I shall send it. It is a 
 drama, with characters and mechanism of a kind 
 yet unattempted ; and I think the execution is 
 better than any of my former attempts. By-the- 
 bye, have you seen Oilier ? I never hear from 
 him, and am ignorant whether some verses I sent 
 him from Naples, entitled, I think, " Lines on the 
 Euganean hills," have reached him in safety or not. 
 As to the Reviews, I suppose there is nothing but 
 abuse ; and this is not hearty or sincere enough to 
 amuse me. As to the poem now printing,* I lay 
 no stress on it one way or the other. The con- 
 cluding lines are natural. 
 
 • Rostilind and Helen. 
 
214 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 I believe, my dear P., that you wish us to come 
 back to England. How is it possible ? Health, 
 competence, tran(|uillity — all these Italy permits, 
 and England takes away. I am regarded by all 
 who know or hear of me, except, I think, on the 
 whole, five individuals, as a rare prodigy of crime 
 and pollution, whose look even might infect. This 
 is a large computation, and I don't thinlc I could 
 mention more than three. Such is the spirit of 
 the English abroad as well as at home.* 
 
 Few compensate, indeed, for all the I'est, and if 
 I were alone I should laugh ; or if I were rich 
 enough to do all things, which I shall never be. 
 Pity me for my absence from those social enjoy- 
 ments which England might afford me, and which 
 
 * These expressions show liow keenly Shelley felt the calumnies 
 heaped on him during his life. The very exaggeration of which he is 
 guilty, is a clue to much of his despondency. His seclusion from 
 society resulted greatly from his extreme ill health, and his dislike of 
 strangers and numbers, as well as the system of domestic economy which 
 bis lavish benevolence forced us to restrict within narrow bounds. In 
 justice to our countrymen, I must mention that several distinguished 
 for intellectual eminence, among them Frederic, Earl of Guildford, and 
 Sir William Drummond, called on him at Rome. Accident at the 
 time prevented him from cultivating their acquaintance — the death of 
 our son, and our subsequent retirement at Pisa, shut us out still more 
 from the world. I confess that the insolence of some of the more 
 Tulgar among the travelling English, rendered me anxious that Shelley 
 should be more willing to extend his acquaintance among the better 
 sort, but his health was an insuperable bar. 
 
ROME. 215 
 
 I know so well how to appreciate. Still, I shall 
 
 return some fine morning, out of pure weakness of 
 
 heart. 
 
 My dear P., most faithfully yours, 
 
 P. B. Shelley, 
 
 LETTER XIX. 
 
 Mr. and Mrs. GISBORNE. 
 (leghorn.) 
 
 Home, April Gth, 1819. 
 My dear Friends, 
 
 A COMBINATION of circumstances, which 
 Mary will explain to you, leads us back to Naples 
 in June, or rather the end of ]\Iay, whore we 
 shall remain until the ensuing winter. We shall 
 take a house at Portici, or Castel a Mare, until 
 late in the autumn. 
 
 The object of this letter is to ask you to spend 
 this period with us. There is no society which 
 wo have regretted or desired so much as yours, 
 and in our solitude the benefit of your con- 
 cession would be greater than I can express. 
 What is a sail to Naples ? It is the season 
 of tranquil weather and prosperous winds. If 
 I knew the magic that lay in any given form of 
 words, I would employ them to persuade ; but I 
 
216 LETTERS FROM ITALY, 
 
 fear that all I can say is, as you know with truth, 
 we desire that you would come — we wish to sec 
 you. You came to see Mary at Lucca, directly I 
 had departed to Venice. It is not our custom, 
 when we can help it, any more than it is yours, to 
 divide our pleasures. 
 
 AVhat shall I say to entice you ? ^Ve shall have 
 a piano, and some books, and — little else, beside 
 ourselves. But what will be most inviting to you, 
 you will give much, though you may receive but 
 little, pleasure. 
 
 But whilst I write this with more desire than 
 hope, yet some of that, perhaps the project may 
 fall into your designs. It is intolerable to think of 
 your being buried at Livorno. The success assured 
 by Mr. Reveley's talents, requires another scene. 
 You may have decided to take this summer to 
 consider — and why not with us at Naples, rather 
 than at Livorno? 
 
 I could address, with respect to Naples, the 
 words of Polypheme in Theocritus, to all the 
 friends I wish to see, and you especially : 
 
 'E^ey^ot?, TaKdreia, koI k^evOolaa XdOoio, 
 
 "Ho'TTep eyw vvv wSe Ka67]iJLevos, otKaS' direvOeiv.* 
 Most sincerely yours, 
 
 P. B. SuELLEY. 
 
 * Come, Galatea ; and having come, forget, as do J, now sitting 
 here, to return home. 
 
LEGHORN. 217 
 
 LETTER XX. 
 
 To T. L. P. Esa. 
 
 Livorno, July, 1819. 
 
 My dear p., 
 We still remain, and shall remain nearly 
 two months longer, at Livorno. Our house is a 
 melancholy one,* and only cheered by letters from 
 England. I got your note, in which you speak of 
 three letters having been sent to Naples, which 
 I have written for. I have heard also from 
 
 H , who confirms the news of your success, an 
 
 intelligence most grateful to me. 
 
 The object of the present letter is to ask a 
 favour of you. I have written a tragedy, on the 
 subject of a story well Icnown in Italy, and, in my 
 conception, eminently dramatic. I have taken 
 some pains to make my play fit for representation, 
 and those who havcalready seen it judge favourably. 
 It is written without any of the peculiar feelings 
 and opinions which characterise my other compo- 
 sitions; I having attended simply to the impartial 
 development of such characters, as it is probable 
 the persons represented really were, together with 
 
 • We had lost our eldest, and, at that time, only child, the preced- 
 ing month at Rome. 
 
 VOL. II. L 
 
218 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 the greatest degree of popular effect to be produced 
 by such a development. I send you a translation of 
 the Italian manuscript on wliich my play is founded, 
 the chief subject of which I have touched very 
 delicately ; for my principal doubt, as to whether 
 it would succeed as an acting play, hangs entirely on 
 the question, as to whether such a thing as incest 
 in this shape, however treated, would be admitted 
 on the stage. I think, however, it will form no 
 objection; considering, first, that the facts are 
 matter of history ; and, secondly, the peculiar 
 delicacy with which I have treated it. 
 
 I am exceedingly interested in the question of 
 whether this attempt of mine will succeed or no. 
 I am strongly inclined to the affirmative at pre- 
 sent, founding my hopes on this, that, as a compo- 
 sition, it is certainly not inferior to any of the 
 modern plays that have been acted, with the 
 exception of " Remorse;'" that the interest of its 
 plot is incredibly greater and more real ; and that 
 there is nothing beyond what the multitude are 
 contented to believe that they can understand, 
 either in imagery, opinion, or sentiment. I wish 
 to preserve a complete incognito, and can trust to 
 you, that whatever else you do, you will, at least, 
 favour me on this point. Indeed, this is essential, 
 deeply essential, to its success. After it had been 
 
LEGHORN. 219 
 
 acted, and successfully, (could I hope such a thing,) 
 I would own it if I pleased, and use the celebrity it 
 might acquire to my own purposes. 
 
 What I want you to do is, to procure for me its 
 presentation at Covent Garden. The principal 
 character, Beatrice, is precisely fitted for Miss 
 CNeil, and it might even seem wTitten for her, 
 (God forbid that I should ever see her play it — it 
 would tear my nerves to pieces,) and, in all 
 respects, it is fitted only for Covent Garden. The 
 chief male character, I confess, I should be very 
 unwilling that any one but Kean should play — 
 that is impossible, and I must be contented with 
 an inferior actor. I think you know some of the 
 people of that theatre, or, at least, some one who 
 knows them, and when you have read the play, you 
 may say enough perhaps to induce them not to 
 reject iis without consideration — but of this, per- 
 haps, if I may judge from the tragedies which 
 they have accepted, there is no danger at any 
 rate. 
 
 Write to me as soon as you can on this subject, 
 because it is necessary that I should present it, or, 
 if rejected by the theatre, print it this coming 
 season ; lest somebody else should get hold of it, as 
 the story, which now exists only in manuscript, be- 
 gins to be generally luiown among the English. The 
 l2 
 
220 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 translation which I send you, is to be prefixed to 
 the play, together with a print of Beatrice. I 
 have a copy of her picture by Guide, now in the 
 Colonna palace at Rome — the most beautiful 
 creatm'e you can conceive. 
 
 Of course, you will not show the manuscript to 
 any one— and write to mc by return of post, at 
 which time the play will be ready to be sent. 
 
 I expect soon to write again, and it shall be a 
 less selfish letter. As to Oilier, I don't know 
 what has been published, or what has arrived at his 
 hands. — My " Prometheus," though ready, I do 
 not send till I know more. 
 
 Ever yours, most faithfully, 
 
 P. B. S. 
 
 LETTER XXI. 
 
 To LEIGH HUNT, Esq. 
 
 Livorno, August Ibth, 1819. 
 My dear Friend, 
 How good of you to write to us so often, and 
 such kind letters ! But it is like lending a beggar. 
 What can I offer in return ? 
 
 Though surrounded by suffermg and disquiet- 
 
LEGHORN. 221 
 
 ude, and, latterly, almost overcome by our strange 
 misfortune,* I have not been idle. My " Pro- 
 metheus'" is finished, and I am also on the eve of 
 completing another \vork,f totally different from 
 any thing you might conjecture that I should write; 
 of a more popular kind ; and if any thing of mine 
 could deserve attention, of higher claims. " Be 
 innocent of the knowledge, dearest chuck, till thou 
 approve the performance." 
 
 I send you a little poem:j: to give to Oilier for pub- 
 lication, but without v\y name. P. will correct the 
 proofs. I wrote it with the idea of offering it to 
 the "Examiner," but I find it is too long. It was 
 composed last year at Este ; two of the characters 
 you will recognise ; and the third is also in some 
 degree a painting from nature, but, with respect to 
 time and place, ideal. You will find the little piece, I 
 think, in some degree consistent with your own ideas 
 of the manner in which poetry ought to be written. 
 I have employed a certain familiar style of lan- 
 guage to express the actual way in which people 
 talk with each other, whom education and a certain 
 refinement of sentiment have placed above the use 
 of vulgar idioms. I use the word vulgar in its most 
 
 • The sudden death of William Shellev, then our only child, which 
 happened in Rome, 6th June, 1819. 
 
 t The Cenci. 
 
 X Julian and Maddalo. 
 
222 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 extensive sense. The vulgarity of rank and fashion 
 is as gross in its way as that of poverty, and its 
 cant terms equally expressive of base conceptions, 
 and, therefore, equally unfit for poetry. Not that 
 the familiar style is to be admitted in the treat- 
 ment of a subject wholly ideal, or in that part of 
 any subject which relates to common life, where 
 the passion, exceeding a certain limit, touches 
 the boundaries of that which is ideal. Strong 
 passion expresses itself in metaphor, borrowed from 
 objects alike remote or near, and casts over all the 
 shadow of its own greatness. But what am I 
 about ? If my grandmother sucks eggs, was it I 
 who taught her ? 
 
 If you would really correct the proof, I need not 
 trouble P., who, I suppose, has enough. Can you 
 take it as a compliment that I prefer to trouble 
 you? 
 
 I do not particularly wish this poem to be 
 known as mine ; but, at all events, I would not put 
 my name to it. I leave you to judge whether it is 
 best to throw it into the fire, or to publish it. So 
 much for self — self^ that burr that will stick to 
 one. Your kind expressions about my Eclogue 
 gave me great pleasure ; indeed, my great stimulus 
 in writing, is to have the approbation of those who 
 feel kindly towards me. The rest is mere duty. I 
 
LEGHORN. 223 
 
 am also delighted to hear that you think of us, and 
 form fancies about us. We cannot yet come 
 
 home. 
 
 ***** 
 
 Most affectionately yours, 
 
 P. B. Shelley. 
 
 LETTER XXTI. 
 
 To LEIGH HUNT, Esq. 
 
 Livorno, Sept. 3, 1819. 
 
 My dear Friend, 
 
 At length has arrived Ollier's parcel, and with 
 it the portrait. What a delightful present ! It 
 is almost yourself, and we sat talking with it, and 
 of it, all the evening. * * * It is a great pleasure 
 to us to possess it, a pleasure in time of need, 
 coming to us when there are few others. How we 
 wish it were you, and not your picture ! How I 
 wish we were with you ! 
 
 This parcel, you know, and all its letters, are 
 now a year old — some older. There are all kinds 
 of dates, from March to August, and " your date," 
 to use Shakspeare's expression, " is better in a pie 
 or a pudding, than in your letter." — " Virginity," 
 ParoUes says, but letters are the same thing in 
 another shape. 
 
224 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 With it came, too, Lamb's works. I have looked 
 at none of the other books yet. What a lovely 
 thing is his " Rosamund Gray !"" How much 
 knowledge of the sweetest and deepest part of 
 our nature in it ! When I think of such a 
 mind as Lamb's — when I see how unnoticed 
 remain things of such exquisite and complete per- 
 fection, what should I hope for myself, if I had not 
 higher objects in view than fame ? 
 
 I have seen too little of Italy, and of pictures. 
 Perhaps P. has shown you some of my letters to 
 him. But at Rome I was very ill, seldom able to 
 go out without a carriage ; and though I kept 
 horses for two months there, yet there is so much 
 to see ! Perhaps I attended more to sculpture 
 than painting, its forms being more easily intelli- 
 gible than that of the latter. Yet, I saw the 
 famous works of Raffaele, whom I agree with the 
 whole world in thinking the finest painter. With 
 respect to Michael Angelo I dissent, and think 
 with astonishment and indignation of the common 
 notion that he equals, and, in some respects, 
 exceeds Raffaele. He seems to me to have no 
 sense of moral dignity and loveliness ; and the 
 energy for which he has been so much praised, 
 appears to me to be a certain rude, external, 
 mechanical quality, in comparison with anything 
 
LEGHORN. 225 
 
 possessed by Raffaele, or even much inferior artists. 
 His famous painting in the Sixtine chapel, seems 
 to me deficient in beauty and majesty, both in the 
 conception and the execution. He has been called 
 the Dante of painting ; but if we find some of the 
 gross and strong outlines which are employed in 
 the most distasteful passages of the " Inferno," 
 where shall we find your Francesca — where the 
 spirit coming over the sea in a boat, like Mars 
 rising from the vapours of the horizon — where 
 Matilda gathering flowers, and all the exquisite 
 tenderness, and sensibility, and ideal beauty, in 
 which Dante excelled all poets except Shakspeare? 
 
 As to Michael Angelo's Moses — but you have a 
 cast of that in England. I ^^Tite these things, 
 heaven knows why ! 
 
 I have written something and finished it, dif- 
 ferent from anything else, and a new attempt for 
 me ; and I mean to dedicate it to you. I should 
 not have done so without your approbation, but I 
 asked your picture last night, and it smiled assent. 
 If I did not think it in some dcgi'ee worthy of you, 
 I would not make you a public offering of it. T 
 expect to have to write to you soon about it. If 
 Oilier is not turned Christian, Jew, or become 
 infected with the Murrain^ he will publish it. Don't 
 let him be frightened, for it is nothing which, by 
 l3 
 
226 
 
 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 any courtesy of language, can be termed either 
 moral or immoral. 
 
 Mary has written to Marianne for a parcel, in 
 which I beg you will make Oilier enclose what you 
 know would most interest me — your "Calendar," (a 
 sweet extract from which I saw in the Examiner,) 
 and the other poems belonging to you ; and, for 
 some friends of mine, my Eclogue. This parcel, 
 which must be sent instantly, will reach me by 
 October, but don't trust letters to it, except just a 
 line or so. When you write, write by the post. 
 Ever your affectionate 
 
 P. B. S. 
 
 My love to Marianne and Bessy, and Thornton 
 too, and Percy, &c., and if you could imagine any 
 way in which I could be useful to them here, tell 
 me. I will enquire about the Italian chalk. You 
 have no idea of the pleasure this portrait gives us. 
 
 LETTER XXIII. 
 
 To LEIGH HUNT, Esq. 
 
 Livorno, Sept. 27th,lS19. 
 
 Mt dear Friend, 
 We are now on the point of leaving this place 
 for Florence, where we have taken pleasant apart- 
 
LEGHORN. 11 i 
 
 ments for six months, which brings us to the 1st of 
 April, the season at which new flowers and new 
 thoughts spring forth upon the earth and in the 
 mind. What is then our destination is yet unde- 
 cided. I have not yet seen Florence, except as 
 one sees the outside of the streets ; but its physi- 
 ognomy indicates it to be a city, which, though the 
 ghost of a republic, yet possesses most amiable 
 qualities. I wish you could meet us there in the 
 spring, and wc would try to muster up a " licta 
 brigata," which, leaving behind them the pestilence 
 of remembered misfortunes, might act over again 
 the pleasures of the Interlocutors in Boccaccio. 1 
 have been lately reading this most divine writer. 
 He is, in a high sense of the word, a poet, and his 
 language has the rhythm and harmony of verse. I 
 think him not equal certainly to Dante or Petrarch, 
 but far superior to Tasso and Ariosto, the children 
 of a later and of a colder day. I consider the 
 three first as the productions of tlie vigour of the 
 infancy of a new nation — as rivulets from the 
 same spring as that which fed the greatness of the 
 republics of Florence and Pisa, and which checked 
 the influence of the German emperors ; and from 
 which, through obscurer channels, Raffaele and 
 Michael Angelo drew the light and the harmony of 
 their inspiration. When the second-rate poets of 
 
228 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 Italy wrote, the corrupting bliglit of tyranny was 
 already hanging on every bud of genius. Energy, 
 and simplicity, and unity of idea, were no more. 
 In vain do we seek in the finest passages of Ariosto 
 and Tasso, any expression which at all approaches 
 in this respect to those of Dante and Petrarch. 
 How much do I admire Boccaccio ! What descrip- 
 tions of nature are those in his little introductions 
 to every new day ! It is the morning of life stripped 
 of that mist of familiarity which makes it obscure 
 to us. Boccaccio seems to me to have possessed a 
 deep sense of the fair ideal of human life, con- 
 sidered in its social relations. His more serious 
 theories of love agree especially with mine. He 
 often expresses things lightly too, which have 
 serious meanings of a very beautiful kind. He is 
 a moral casuist, the opposite of the Christian, 
 stoical, ready-made, and worldly system of morals. 
 Do you remember one little remark, or rather 
 maxim of his, which might do some good to the 
 common narrow-minded conceptions of love, — 
 " Bocca bacciata non perde ventura ; anzi rin- 
 nuova, come fa la luna V 
 
 We expect Mary to be confined towards the 
 end of October. The birth of a child will probably 
 retrieve her from some part of her present melan- 
 choly depression. 
 
LEGHORN. 229 
 
 It would give me much pleasure to know Mr. 
 Lloyd. Do you know, when I was in Cumberland, 
 I got Southey to borrow a copy of Berkeley from 
 him, and I remember observing some pencil notes 
 in it, probably written by Lloyd, which I thought 
 particularly acute. One, especially, struck me as 
 being the assertion of a doctrine, of which even 
 then I had long been persuaded, and on which I 
 had founded much of my persuasions, as regarded 
 the imagined cause of the universe — " Mind cannot 
 create, it can only perceive." Ask him if he 
 remembers having ^vritten it. Of Lamb you know 
 my opinion, and you can bear witness to the regret 
 which 1 felt, when I learned that the calumny of an 
 enemy had deprived me of his society whilst in 
 England. — Oilier told me that the Quarterly are 
 going to review me. I suppose it will be a pretty 
 , and as I am acquiring a taste for humour 
 and drollery, I confess I am curious to see it. I 
 have sent my " Prometheus Unbound" to P. ; if 
 you ask him for it he will show it you. I think it 
 will please you. 
 
 Whilst I went to Florence, Mary wrote, but I 
 did not see her letter. — Well, good b'ye. Next 
 Monday I shall write to you from Florence. Love 
 to all. 
 
 Most affectionately your friend, 
 
 P. B. S. 
 
230 LETTERS PROM ITALY. 
 
 LETTER XXIV. 
 
 To Mrs. GISBORNE. 
 
 Florence, October VMli or Uth, 1819. 
 My dear Friend, 
 
 The regret we feel at our absence from you per- 
 suades me that it is a state which camiot last, and 
 which, so long as it must last, will be interrupted by 
 some intervals, one of which is destined to be, your 
 all coming to visit us here. Poor Oscar! I feel a 
 kind of remorse to think of the unequal love with 
 which two animated beings regard each other, 
 when I experience no such sensations for him, as 
 those which he manifested for us. His importunate 
 regret is, however, a type of ours, as regards you. Our 
 memory — if you will accept so humble a metaphor — 
 is for ever scratching at the door of your absence. 
 
 About Henry and the steam-engine* I am in 
 
 * Shelley set on foot the building of a steam-boat, to ply between 
 Marseilles, Genoa, and Leghorn, Such an enterprise promised fortune 
 to his friend who undertook to build it, and the anticipation filled him 
 ■with delight. Unfortunately, an unforeseen complication of circum- 
 stances caused the design to be abandoned, when already far advanced 
 towards completion. 
 
 I insert a letter from Mrs. Gisborne, which will explain some portion 
 of this letter : — 
 
 "My DEAREST Mrs. Shelley, 
 " I began to feel a little uneasy at not hearing from you by Wedues- 
 
FLORENCE. 2ol 
 
 torture until this money comes from London, 
 though I am sure that it will and must come; unless, 
 
 day's post ; you may judge, therefore, with how much pleasure 1 re- 
 ceived your friendly lines, informing me of your safe arrival, and good 
 state of health, and that of Mr. Shelley. A little agitation of the 
 nerves is a trifling evil, and was to be expected after such a tremendous 
 journey for you at such a time ; yet you could not refrain from two 
 little innocent quizzes, notwithstanding your band trembling. I confess 
 I dreaded the consequences when I saw the carriage drive off on the 
 rough road. Did you observe that foolish dog Oscar, running by your 
 side, waving his long slender tail ? Giuseppe was obliged to catch him 
 up in his arms to stop his course ; he continued for several days at dinner- 
 time to howl piteously, and to scratch with all his might at the door of 
 your abandoned house. What a forlorn house ! I cannot bear to look at 
 it. My last letter from Mr. Gisborne is dated the 4th : he has been 
 seriously indisposed ever since his first attack ; he suffers now a return 
 of his cough, which he can only mitigate by taking quantities of opium : 
 I do not expect to see him till the end of the week. You see that ho 
 was not the person to undertake a land-journey to England by abominable 
 French diligences. (What says C. to the words abominable and 
 French ?) I think he might have suffered less in a foot journey, 
 pursued leisurely, e a suo comodo. All's well that ends well ! Mr. 
 G. gives a shocking account of Marseilles ; he seems to think Tuscany a 
 delightful country, compared to what he has seen of France. I 
 remarked, in one of your letters, the account you give of your travelling 
 with a French voiturier, so unlike the obligingness we have always 
 experienced from our Italian vetturini : we have found them ever ready to 
 sacrifice themselves and their horses, sooner than do an uncivil thing, 
 and distressed beyond measure at our determination of going sometimes 
 for miles on foot, though, at the same time, their beasts might scarcely 
 have been able to drag the vehicle without us. This is in favour of the 
 Italians ; God knows, there is enough to be said against them. 
 
 " Now, I will tell you the news of the steam-boat. The contract was 
 drawn and signed the day after your departure ; the vessel to be com- 
 
232 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 indeed, my banker has broke, and then it will be 
 my loss, not Henry's — a little delay will mend the 
 matter. I would then write instantly to London 
 an effectual letter, and by return of post all would 
 be set right — it would then be a thing easily set 
 straight — but if it were not, you know me too well 
 not to know that there is no personal suffering or 
 degradation, or toil, or anything that can be 
 named, with which I do not feel myself bound to 
 support this enterprise of Henry. But all this 
 rhodomontade only shows how correct Mr. Bielby's 
 
 pk'te, and lauiiclicd, fit ineveiy respect for the sea, excepting the finishing 
 of the cabin, for 260 sequins. We have every reason to believe tliat 
 tlie work will be well executed, and that it is an excellent bargain. 
 Henry and Frankfort go on not only with vigour, but with fury ; the 
 lower part of the house is filled with models prepared for casting, forg- 
 ing, &c. We have procured the wood for the frame from the ship- 
 builder on credit, so that Frankfort can go on with his work ; but I am 
 sorry to say, that from this time the general progress of the work will 
 be retarded for want of cash. The boilers might now be going on con- 
 temporaneously with the casting, but I know that at present there is no 
 remedy for this evil. Every person concerned is making exertions, 
 and is in a state of anxiety to see the quick result of this undertaking. 
 I have advanced about 140 crowns, but prudence prohibits me from 
 going any farther. 
 
 "Henry will write to Mr. Shelley wlien the works are in a greater 
 state of forwardness : in the mean time, he sends his best love to his good 
 friends, patron and patroness, and begs his kind remembrance to Miss 
 C. — I remain, with sincere affection for you all, 
 
 " Ever yours, 
 
 "M. G." 
 
FLORENCE. 233 
 
 advice was about the discipline necessary for my 
 imagination. No doubt that all \\ill go on with 
 mercantile and common-place exactness, and that 
 you will be spared the suffering, and I the virtue, 
 incident to some untoward event. 
 
 I am anxious to liear of Mr. Gisborne's return, and 
 I anticipate the surprise and pleasure with which he 
 will learn that a resolution has been taken which 
 leaves you nothing to regret in that event. It is with 
 unspeakable satisfaction that I reflect that my 
 entreaties and persuasions overcame your scruples 
 on this point, and that whatever advantage shall 
 accrue from it will belong to you, whilst any 
 reproach due to the imprudence of such an enter- 
 prise, must rest on mo. I shall thus share the 
 pleasure of success, and bear the blame and loss, 
 (if such a thing were possible,) of a reverse; and 
 what more can a man, who is a friend to another, 
 desire for himself? Let us believe in a kind of 
 optimism, in which we are our own gods. It is 
 best that Mr. Gisborne should have returned; it is 
 best that I should have over-persuaded you and 
 Henry ; it is best that you should all live together, 
 without any more solitary attempts ; it is best that 
 this one attempt should have been made, other- 
 wise, perhaps, one thing which is best might not 
 have occurred ; and it is best that we should think 
 
234 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 all this for the best, even though it is not ; because 
 Hope, as Coleridge says, is a solemn duty, which we 
 owe alike to ourselves and to the world — a worship 
 to the spirit of good within, which requires, before 
 it sends that inspiration forth, which impresses its 
 likeness upon all that it creates, devoted and disin- 
 terested homage. 
 
 A different scene is this from that in which you 
 made the chief character of our changing drama. 
 We see no one, as usual. Madame M * * * is 
 quiet, and we only meet her now and then, by 
 chance. Her daughter, not so fair, but I fear as 
 cold, as the snowy Florimel in Spenser, is in and 
 
 out of love with C as the winds happen to 
 
 blow ; and C , who, at the moment I happen 
 
 to write, is in a high state of transitory content- 
 ment, is setting off to Vienna in a day or two. 
 
 My £100, from what mistake remains to be 
 explained, has not yet arrived, and the banker 
 here is going to advance me £50, on my bill at three 
 months — all additional facilitation, should any 
 such be needed, for the steam-boat. I have yet 
 seen little of Florence. The gallery, I have a design 
 of studying piece-meal ; one of my chief objects in 
 Italy being the observing in statuary and painting, 
 the degree in which, and the rules according to 
 which, that ideal beauty, of which we have so 
 
FLORENCE. 235 
 
 intense, yet so obscure an apprehension, is realised 
 in external forms. 
 
 Adieu — I am anxious for Henry's j&rst letter. 
 Give to him, and take to yourself those sentiments, 
 whatever they may be, with which you know that 
 I cannot cease to regard you, 
 
 Most faithfully and affectionately yours, 
 
 P. B. S. 
 
 I had forgotten to say that I should be very 
 much obliged to you, if you would contrive to send 
 the Cencis, which are at the printcr''s, to England, 
 by the next ship. I forgot it in the hurry of depar- 
 ture. — I have just heard from P., saying, that he 
 don't think that my tragedy will do, and that he 
 don't much like it. But I ought to say, to blunt 
 the edge of his criticism, that he is a nursling of 
 the exact and superficial school in poetry. 
 
 If Mr. G. is returned, send the " Prometheus" 
 with them. 
 
 LETTER XXV. 
 
 To HENRY REVELEY, Esq., 
 
 Florence, Oct. 28, 1819. 
 My dear Henry, 
 
 So it seems I am to begin the correspondence, 
 
 though I have more to ask than to tell. 
 
236 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 You know our bargain ; you are to write me 
 uncorrected letters, just as the words come, so let 
 me have them — I like coin from the mint— though 
 it may be a little rough at the edges ; — clipping is 
 penal according to our statute. 
 
 In the first place listen to a reproach ; you 
 ought have sent me an acknowledgment of my 
 last billet. I am very happy to hear from Mr. 
 Gisborne, and he knows well enough how to interest 
 me himself, not to need to rob me of an occasion 
 of hearing from you. Let you and I try if we 
 cannot be as punctual and business-like as the best 
 of them. But no clipping and coining, if you 
 please. 
 
 Now take this that I say in a light just so serious 
 as not to give you pain. In fact, my dear fellow, 
 my motive in soliciting your correspondence, and 
 that flowing from your own mind, and clothed in 
 your own words, is, that you may begin to accustom 
 to discipline yourself in the only practice of life in 
 which you appear deficient. You know that you are 
 writing to a person persuaded of all the confidence 
 and respect due to your powers in those branches 
 of science to which you have addicted yourself; 
 and you will not permit a false shame with regard 
 to the mere mechanical arrangement of words to 
 over-balance the advantage arising from the free 
 
FLORENCE. 237 
 
 communication of ideas. Thus you will become day 
 by day more skilful in the management of that 
 instrument of their communication, on which the 
 attainment of a person's just rank in society 
 depends. Do not think me arrogant. There are 
 subjects of the highest importance in which you are 
 far better qualified to instruct me, than I am 
 qualified to instruct you on this subject. 
 
 Well, how goes on all I The boilers, the keel of the 
 boat, and the cylinder, and all the other elements 
 of that soul which is to guide our " monstruo de 
 fuego y agua " over the sea ? Let me hear news 
 of their birth, and how they thrive after thoy are 
 born. And is the money arrived at Mr. Webb's I 
 Send me an account of the number of crowns you 
 realise ; as I think we had better, since it is a 
 transaction in this country, keep our accounts in 
 money of this country. 
 
 We have rains enough to set the mills going, 
 which are essential to your great iron bar. I sup- 
 pose it is at present either made or making. 
 
 My health is better so long as the scirocco 
 blows, and, but for my daily expectation of Mary's 
 confinement, I should have been half tempted to 
 have come to see you. As it is, I shall wait till 
 the boat is finished. On the subject of your actual 
 and your expected progress, you will certainly allow 
 me to hear from you. 
 
238 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 Give my kindest regards to your mother and 
 Mr. Gisborne — tell the latter, whose billet I have 
 neglected to answer, that I did so, mider the idea 
 of addressing him in a post or two on a subject 
 which gives me considerable anxiety about you all. 
 I mean the continuance of your property in the 
 British funds at this crisis of approaching revolu- 
 tion. It is the business of a friend to say what 
 he thinks without fear of giving offence ; and, if I 
 were not a friend, argument is worth its market- 
 price anywhere. 
 
 Believe me, my dear Henry, 
 Your very faithful friend, 
 
 P. B. S. 
 
 LETTER XXVI. 
 
 To Mr. and Mrs. GISBORNE. 
 
 Florence, Oct. 2%, 1819. 
 My dear Friends, 
 
 I RECEIVE this morning the strange and unex- 
 pected news, that my bill of =£200 has been returned 
 to Mr. Webb protested. Ultimately this can be 
 nothing but delay, as I have only drawn from my 
 banker's hands so much as to leave them still in 
 
FLORENCE. 239 
 
 possession of c£'80, and this I positively know, and 
 can prove by documents. By return of post, for I 
 have not only written to my banker, but to private 
 friends, no doubt Henry will be enabled to proceed. 
 Let him meanwhile do all that can be done. 
 
 Meanwhile, to save time, could not money be 
 
 obtained temporarily, at Livorno, from Mr. W , 
 
 or Mr. G , or any of your acquaintance, on my 
 
 bills at three or six months, indorsed by Mr. 
 Gisborne and Henry, so that he may go on with his 
 work I If a month is of consequence, think of this. 
 
 Be of good cheer. Madonna mia, all will go well. 
 The inclosed is for Henry, and was WTitten before 
 this news, as he will see ; but it does not, strange 
 as it is, abate one atom of my cheer. 
 
 Accept, dear Mr. G., my best regards. 
 
 Yours faithfully, 
 
 P. B. S. 
 
 LETTER XXVIL 
 
 To Mr. and Mrs. GISBORNE. 
 
 Florence, Nov. 6, 1819- 
 My dear Friends, 
 I HAVE just finished a letter of five sheets on 
 Carlisle''s affair, and am in hourly expectation of 
 
240 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 Mary's confinement, you will imagine an excuse for 
 my silence. 
 
 I forbear to address you, as I had designed, on 
 the subject of your income as a public creditor of 
 the English government, as it seems you have not 
 the exclusive management of your funds ; and the 
 peculiar circumstances of the delusion are such that 
 none but a very few persons will ever be brought 
 to see its instability but by the experience of 
 loss. If I were to convince you, Henry would pro- 
 bably be unable to convince his uncle. In vindi- 
 cation, however, of what I have already said, allow 
 me to turn your attention to England at this hour. 
 
 In order to meet the national expenses, or rather 
 that some approach towards meeting them might 
 seem to be made, a tax of £3,000,000 was imposed. 
 The first consequence of this has been a defalcation 
 in the revenue at the rate of £3,600,000 a-year. 
 Were the country in the most tranquil and prosper- 
 ous state, the minister, in such a condition of 
 affairs, must reduce the interest of the national 
 debt, or add to it; a process which would only 
 insure the greater ultimate reduction of the interest. 
 But the people are nearly in a state of insurrection, 
 and the least unpopular noblemen perceive the 
 necessity of conducting a spirit, which it is no 
 longer possible to oppose. For submitting to this 
 
FLORENCE. 241 
 
 necessity — which, be assured, the haughty aristo- 
 crats unwilhngly did — Lord Fitzwilham has been 
 degraded from his situation of Lord- Lieutenant. 
 An additional army of 11,500 men has received 
 orders to be organised. Everything is preparing 
 for a bloody struggle, in which, if the ministers suc- 
 ceed, they will assuredly diminish the interest of 
 the national debt, for no combination of the heaviest 
 tyranny can raise the taxes for its payment. If 
 the people conquer, the public creditor will e(]ually 
 suffer ; for it is monstrous to imagine that they 
 will submit to the perpetual inheritance of a double 
 aristocracy. They will perhaps find some crown 
 and church lands, and appropriate the tithes to 
 make a kind of compensation to the public creditor. 
 They will confiscate the estates of their political 
 enemies. But all this will not pay a tenth part of 
 their debt. The existing government, atrocious as 
 it is, is the surest party to which a public creditor 
 may attach himself. He may reason that it may 
 last my time, though in the event the ruin is more 
 complete than in the case of a popular revolution. 
 I know you too well to believe you capable of 
 arguing in this manner ; I only reason on how 
 things stand. 
 
 Your income may be reduced from £210 to 
 150, and then £100, and then by the issue of 
 
 VOL. n. M 
 
242 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 immense quantities of paper to save the imme- 
 diate cause of one of the conflicting parties, to any 
 value however small; or the source of it may 
 be cut off at once. The ministers had, I doubt not, 
 long since determined to establish an arbitrary 
 government ; and if they had not determined so, 
 they have now entangled themselves in that conse- 
 quence of their instinct as rulers, and if they recede 
 they must perish. They are, however, not reced- 
 ing, and we are on the eve of great actions. 
 
 Kindest regards to Henry. I hope he is not 
 stopped for want of money, as I shall assuredly 
 send him what he wants in a month from the date 
 of my last letter. I received his letter from Pistoia, 
 and have no other criticism to make on it, except 
 the severest — that it is too short. How goes on 
 Portuguese — and Theocritus ? I have deserted 
 the odorous gardens of literature, to journey across 
 the great sandy desert of politics ; not, as you may 
 imagine, without the hope of finding some enchanted 
 paradise. In all probability, I shall be overwhelmed 
 by one of the tempestuous columns which are for- 
 ever traversing, with the speed of a storm, and the 
 confusion of a chaos, that pathless wilderness. You 
 meanwhile will be lamenting in some happy oasis 
 that I do not return. This is out-Calderonizing 
 Muley. We have had lightning and rain here in 
 
FLOKENCE. 243 
 
 plenty. I like the Cascini very much, where I 
 often walk alone, watching the leaves, and the 
 rising and falling of the Arno. I am full of all 
 kinds of literary plans. 
 
 Meanwhile, all yours most faithfully, 
 
 P. B. S. 
 
 LETTER XXVIII. 
 
 To LEIGH HUNT, Esq. 
 
 Firenze, Nov. 13, 1819. 
 My dear Friend, 
 
 Yesterday morning Mary brought me a little 
 boy. She suffered but two hours' pain, and is now 
 so well that it seems a wonder that she stays in 
 bed. The babe is also quite well, and has begun 
 to suck. You may imagine that this is a great 
 relief and a great comfort to me amongst all my 
 misfortunes, past, present, and to come. 
 
 Since I last wrote to you, some circumstances 
 have occurred, not necessary to explain by letter, 
 which makes ray pecuniary condition a very painful 
 one. The physicians absolutely forbid my travelling 
 to England in the winter, but I shall probably pay 
 you a visit in the spring. With what pleasure, 
 
 M '2 
 
244 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 among all the other sources of regret and discom- 
 fort with which England abounds for me, do I think 
 of looking on the original of that kind and earnest 
 face, which is now opposite INIary's bed. It will 
 be the only thing which Mary will envy me, or will 
 need to envy me, in that journey, for I shall come 
 alone. Shaking hands with you is worth all the 
 trouble; the rest is clear loss. 
 
 I will tell you more about myself and ray pur- 
 suits in my next letter. 
 
 Kind love to Marianne, Bessy, and all the 
 children. Poor Mary begins (for the first time) 
 to look a little consoled ; for we have spent, as 
 you may imagine, a miserable five months. 
 
 Good-bye, my dear Hunt. 
 
 Your affectionate friend, 
 P. B. S. 
 
 1 have had no letter from you for a month. 
 
 LETTER XXIX. 
 
 To Mrs. GISBORNE. 
 
 Florence, Nov. 16, 1819- 
 Madonna, 
 
 I HAVE been lately voyaging in a sea without my 
 
 pilot, and although my sail has often been torn, my 
 
FLORENCE. 245 
 
 boat become leaky, and the log lost, I have yet 
 sailed in a kind of way from island to island; some of 
 craggy and mountainous magnificence, some clothed 
 with moss and flowers, and radiant with fountains, 
 some barren deserts. / have been reading Calderon 
 loithout you. I have read the " Cisma de Ingala- 
 terra,"the "Cabellos deAbsolom,"and three orfour 
 others. These pieces, inferior to those we read, at 
 least to the " Principe Constante," in the splendour 
 of particular passages, are perhaps superior in 
 their satisfying completeness. The Cabellos de 
 Absolom is full of the deepest and tenderest touches 
 of nature. Nothing can be more pathetically con- 
 ceived than the character of old David, and the 
 tender and impartial love, overcoming all insults 
 and all crimes, with which he regards his con- 
 flicting and disobedient sons. The incest scene 
 of Anion andTamar is perfectly tremendous. Well 
 may Calderon say in the person of the former — 
 
 Si sangrc sin fucgo hiere, 
 que fara sangre con fuego ? 
 
 Incest is, like many other incorrect things, a very 
 poetical circumstance. It may bo the excess of 
 love or hate. It may be the defiance of everything 
 for the sake of another, which clothes itself in the 
 glory of the highest heroism, or it may be that 
 cynical rage which, confounding the good and the 
 
246 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 bad in existing opinions, breaks through them for 
 the purpose of rioting in selfishness and antipathy. 
 Calderon, following the Jewish historians, has 
 represented Anion's action in the basest point of 
 view — he is a prejudiced savage, acting what he 
 abhors, and abhorring that which is the unwilling 
 party to his crime. 
 
 Adieu, Madonna, yours truly, 
 
 P. B. S. 
 
 I transcribe you a passage from the Cisma de 
 
 Ingalaterra — spoken by " Carlos, Embaxador de 
 
 Francia, enamorado de Ana Bolena."" Is there 
 
 anything in Petrarch finer than the second stanza.* 
 
 * Porque apenas el Sol se coroiialia 
 de nueva luz en la estacioii primeva, 
 quando yo en sus umbrales adoraba 
 segundo Sol en abrcviada esfera ; 
 la nocbe apenas tremula baxaba, 
 a solos mis dcseos lisonjera, 
 qiiando un jardin, republica de flores, 
 era terceio fiel de mis araores. 
 
 AUi, el silencio de la noche fria, 
 
 el jazrain, que en las redes se enlazava, 
 
 el cristal de la fnente que corria, 
 
 el arroyo que h solas murmurasM, 
 
 El viento que on las bojas se movia, 
 
 el Aura que en las flores respirava ; 
 
 todo era amor' ; que mucho, si en tal calina, 
 
 aves, fuentes, y flores tienen alma ! 
 
FLORENCE. 247 
 
 LETTER XXX. 
 
 To JOHN GISBORNE, Esq. 
 
 My dear Sir, 
 I ENVY you the first reading of Theocritus. 
 Were not the Greeks a glorious people ? What 
 is there, as Job says of the Leviathan, like unto 
 them? If the army of Nicias had not been 
 defeated under the walls of Syracuse ; if the 
 Athenians had, acquiring Sicily, held the balance 
 between Rome and Carthage, sent garrisons to the 
 Greek colonies in the south of Italy, Rome might 
 have been all that its intellectual condition entitled 
 it to be, a tributary, not the conqueror of Greece ; 
 
 No has visto providcnte y oficiosa, 
 mover el ayre ilmninada aveja, 
 que basta beber la purpura a la rosa 
 ya se acerca cobarde, y ya se alexa ? 
 No has visto cnamorada mariposa, 
 dar cerros a la luz, liasta que dexa, 
 en inonuuiento facil abrasadas 
 las alas dc color tornasoladas ? 
 
 Assi mi amor, cobarde muchos dias, 
 tornos liizo a la rosa y a la llama ; 
 temor cheha sido entre cenizas frias, 
 tantas vezes llorado de quien ama ; 
 pcro el amor, que vcnce con porfias, 
 y la ccasion, quo con disculpas llama, 
 me animaron, y avcja y mariposa 
 quemd las alas, y Uegu^ a la rosa. 
 
248 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 the Macedonian power would never have attained 
 to the dictatorship of the civilized states of the 
 world. Who knows whether, under the steady 
 progress which philosophy and social institutions 
 would have made, (for, in the age to which I refer, 
 their progress was both rapid and secure,) among 
 a ppople of the most perfect physical organization, 
 whether the Christian religion would have arisen, 
 or the barbarians have overwhelmed the wrecks of 
 civilization which had survived the conquest and 
 tyranny of the Romans ? What, then, should we 
 liave been ? As it is, all of us who are worth any- 
 thing, spend our manliood in unlearning the follies, 
 or expiating the mistakes of our youth. We are 
 stufted full of prejudices ; and our natural passions 
 are so managed, that if we restrain them we grow 
 intolerant and precise, because we restrain them 
 not according to reason, but according to error ; 
 and if we do not restrain them, we do all sorts of mis- 
 chief to ourselves and others. Our imagination and 
 understanding are alike subjected to rules the most 
 absurd ; — so much for Theocritus and the Greeks.* 
 
 * I subjoin here a fragment of a letter,! know not to whom addressed ; 
 
 it is to a woman which shovvs how, worsliipping as Shelley did the 
 
 spirit of the literature of ancient Greece, he considered that this could 
 be found only in its original language, and did not consider that time 
 wasted which a person who had pretensions, iutellectual culture, and 
 enthusiasm, spent in acquiring them. 
 
FLORENCE. 249 
 
 In spite of all your arguments, I wish your money 
 were out of the funds. This middle course which 
 you speak of, and which may prohably have place, 
 
 '* It is probable that you will be earnest to employ the sacred talisman 
 of language. To acquire these you are now necessitated to sacrifice 
 many hours of the time, when, instead of being conversant with particles 
 and verbs, your nature incites you to contemplation and inquiry con- 
 cerning the objects which they conceal. You desire to enjoy the 
 beauties of eloquence and poetry — to sympathise in the original language 
 with the institutors and martyrs of ancient freedom. The generous 
 and inspiriting examples of philosophy and virtue, you desire intimately 
 to know and feel ; not as mere facts detailing names, and dates, and 
 motions of the human body, but clothed in the very language of the 
 actors, — that language dictated by and expressive of the passions and 
 principles that governed their conduct. Facts are not what we want to 
 know in poetry, in history, in the lives of individual men, in satire, or 
 in panegyric. They are the mere divisions, the arbitrary points on 
 ■which we hang, and to which we refer those delicate and cnvanescent 
 hues of mind, which language delights and instructs us in precise propor- 
 tion as it expresses. What is a translation of Homer into English ? 
 A person who is ignorant of Greek, need only look at Paradise Lost 
 or the tragedy of Lear translated into French, to obtain an analogical 
 conception of its worthless and miserable inadequacy. Tacitus, or 
 Liviusjor Herodotus, arc equally undelightful and uninstruciive in trans- 
 lation. You require to know and to be intimate with those persons 
 who have acted a distinguished part to benefit, to enlighten, or even to 
 pervert and injure humankind. Before you can do this, four years are 
 }et to be consumed in the discipline of the ancient languages, and those 
 of modern Europe, which you only imperfectly know, and which con- 
 ceal ft'om your intimacy such names as Ariosto, Ta;so, Petrarch, and 
 Macchiavelli ; or Goethe, Schiller, Wieland, &c. The French language 
 you, like every other respectable woman already know; and if the great 
 name of Rousseau did not redeem it, it would liave been perhaps as 
 well that you had remained entirely ignorant of it." 
 M 3 
 
250 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 will amount to your losing not all your income, nor 
 retaining all, but have the half taken away. I feel 
 intimately persuaded, whatever political forms 
 may have place in England, that no party can 
 continue many years, perhaps not many months, in 
 the administration, without diminishing the interest 
 of the national debt. — And once having commenced 
 — and having done so safely — where will it end ? 
 
 Give Henry my kindest thanks for his most 
 interesting letter, and bid him expect one from me 
 by the next post. 
 
 IMary and the babe continue well. — Last night 
 we had a magnificent thunder storm, with claps 
 that shook the house like an earthquake. Both 
 Mary and C unite with me in kindest remem- 
 brances to all. 
 
 Most faithfully yours obliged, 
 P. B. S. 
 
 Florence, Nov. Idth, 1819. 
 
 LETTER XXXL 
 
 To HENRY REVELEY, Esq. 
 
 Florence, Nov. l7th,lS\9. 
 My dear Henry, 
 
 1 WAS exceedingly interested by your letter, and 
 
 I cannot but thank you for overcoming the inapti- 
 
FLORENCE. 251 
 
 tude of a long disuse at my request, for my plea- 
 sure. It is a great thing done, the successful 
 casting of the cylinder — may it be a happy auspice 
 for what is to follow ! I hope, in a few posts, to 
 remit the necessary money for the completion. 
 Meanwhile, are not those portions of the work 
 which can be done without expense, saving time in 
 their progress? Do you think you lose much 
 money or time by this delay ? 
 
 All that you say of the alteration in the form of 
 the boat strikes me, though one of the multitude 
 in this respect, as improvement. I long to get 
 aboard her, and be an unworthy partaker in the 
 glory of the astonishment of the Livornese, when 
 she returns from her cruise round Melloria. 
 When do you think she will be fit for sea I 
 
 Your volcanic description of the birth of the 
 cylinder is very characteristic of you, and of it.* 
 
 • I insert the extract alhulcd to from Mr. Reveley's letter : — 
 
 '■'Friday, \2(hXov. 
 *' The event is now past — both tlic steam cylinder and air-pumj) were 
 cast at three o'clock tliis afternoon. At two o'clock this morning I 
 repaired to the mill to see that the preliminary operations, upon which 
 tlie ultimate success of a fount greatly depends, were conducted with 
 proper attention. The moulds are buried in a pit, made close, before 
 the mouth of the furnace, so that the melted metal, when the plug is 
 driven in, may run easily into them, and fill up the vacant space left 
 between the core and the shell, in order to form the desired cylinders. 
 The fire was lighted in the furnace at nine, and in three hours the 
 
252 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 One might imagine God, when he made the earth, 
 and saw the granite mountains and flinty promon- 
 tories flow into their craggy forms, and the splen- 
 dour of their fusion fiUing milhons of miles of the 
 void space, like the tail of a comet, so looking, so 
 delighting in his work. God sees his machine 
 spinning round the sun, and delights in its success, 
 and has taken out patents to supply all the suns 
 in space with the same manufacture. Your boat 
 will be to the ocean of water, what this earth is to 
 the ocean of ether — a prosperous and swift voyager. 
 
 Dietal was fused. At three o'clock it was ready to cast, the fusion 
 being remarkably rapid, owing to the perfection of the furnace. The 
 metal was also lieated to an extreme degree, boiling with fury, and 
 seeming to dance with the pleasure of running into its proper form. 
 The plug was struck, and a massy stream of a bluish dazzling whiteness 
 filled the moulds in the twinkling of a shooting star. The castings 
 will not be cool enough to be drawn up till to-morrow afternoon ; but, 
 to judge from all appearances, I expect them to be perfect. 
 
 " Saturday, \3th Nov. 
 " They have been excavated and drawn up. I have examined them 
 and found them really perfect ; they are massive and strong to bear any 
 usage and sea- water, in scBCula scBCulorum. I am now going on gently 
 with the brass- work, which does not require any immediate expenses, 
 and which I attend to entirely myself. I have no workmen about me 
 at present. 
 
 " With kindest salutations to Mrs. Shelley and Miss C, 
 " 1 remain, most truly, 
 
 '• Your obliged friend and devoted servant, 
 
 " Henry W. liEViiLEY." 
 
FLORENCE. 253 
 
 When shall we see you all I You not, I suppose, 
 till your boat is ready to sail — and then, if not 
 before, I must, of course, come to Livorno. Our 
 plans for the winter are yet scarcely defined ; they 
 tend towards our spending February and March 
 at Pisa, where our communications will not be so 
 
 distant, nor so epistolary. C left us a week 
 
 ago, not without many lamentations, as all true 
 lovers pay on such occasions. He is to write me 
 an account of the Trieste steam-boat, which I will 
 transmit to you. 
 
 Mrs. Shelley, and JNIiss C return you their 
 
 kindest salutations, with interest. 
 
 Most affectionately yours, 
 
 P. B. S. 
 
 LETTER XXXII. 
 
 To LEIGH HUNT, Esq. 
 
 Florence, JVov. 23, 1819. 
 ]\Iy dear Hunt, 
 
 JHii/ don't you write to us ? I was preparing to 
 
 send you something for your " Indicator," but I 
 
 have been a drone instead of a bee in this business, 
 
 thinking that perhaps, as you did not acknowledge 
 
2o4 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 any of my late enclosures, it would not be welcome 
 to vou, whatever I mioht send. 
 
 What a state England is in ! But you will 
 never write politics. I don't wonder; but I wish, 
 then, that you would write a paper in the 
 " Examiner" on the actual state of the country, 
 and what, under all circumstances of the conflict- 
 ing passions and interests of men, we are to expect. 
 Not what we ought to expect, nor what, if so and 
 so were to happen, we might expect ; — but what, 
 as things are, there is reason to believe will come; 
 — and send it me for my information. Every word 
 a man has to say is valuable to the public now; and 
 thus you will at once gratify your friend, nay, 
 instruct, and either exhilarate him, or force him 
 to be resigned, and awaken the minds of the 
 people. 
 
 I have no spirits to write what I do not know 
 whether you will care much about ; I know well 
 that if I were in great misery, poverty, &c., you 
 would think of nothing else but how to amuse 
 and relieve me. You omit me if I am pros- 
 perous. 
 
 I could laugh, if I found a joke, in order to put 
 you in good-humour with me after my scolding; 
 in good-humour enough to write to us. * * * 
 Affectionate love to and from all. This ought not 
 
FLORENCE. ZOO 
 
 only to be the Vale of a letter, but a superscrip- 
 tion over the gate of life. 
 
 Your sincere friend, 
 
 P. B. Shelley. 
 
 I send you a sonnet I don''t expect you to 
 publish it, but you may show it to whom you please. 
 
 LETTER XXXIII. 
 
 To LEIGH HUNT, Esq. 
 
 Florence, November, 1819. 
 My dear Friend, 
 
 Two letters, both bearing date Oct. 20, arrive 
 on the same day ; one is always glad of twins. 
 
 We hear of a box arrived at Genoa with books 
 and clothes ; it must be yours. Meanwhile the 
 babe is wrapt in flannel petticoats, and we get on 
 with him as we can. Ho is small, liealthy, and 
 pretty. Mary is recovering rapidly. Marianne, 
 I hope, is quite well. 
 
 You do not tell me whether you have received 
 my lines on the Manchester affair. They are of 
 the exoteric species, and arc meant, not for the 
 " Indicator," but the " Examiner." I would send 
 for the former, if you like, some letters on such 
 
256 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 subjects of art as suggest themselves in Italy. 
 Perhaps I will, at a venture, send you a specimen 
 of what I mean next post. I enclose you in this a 
 piece for the " Examiner," or let it share the fate, 
 whatever that fate may be, of the "Masque of 
 Anarchy." * 
 
 I am sorry to hear that you have employed your- 
 self in translating the " Aminta," though I doubt 
 not it will be a just and beautiful translation. 
 You ought to write Amintas. You ought to exer- 
 cise your fancy in the perpetual creation of new 
 
 forms of gentleness and beauty. 
 
 ***** 
 
 With respect to translation, even / will not be 
 seduced by it ; although the Greek plays, and 
 some of the ideal dramas of Calderon, (with which 
 I have lately, and with inexpressible wonder and 
 delight, become acquainted,) are perpetually tempt- 
 ing me to throw over their perfect and glowing 
 forms the grey veil of my own words. And you 
 know me too well to suspect, that I refrain from a 
 belief that what I could substitute for them would 
 deserve the regret which yours would, if suppressed. 
 I have confidence in my moral sense alone ; but 
 that is a kind of originality. I have only trans- 
 lated the Cyclops of Euripides, when I could 
 
 • Peter Bell tlie Third. 
 
FLOBENCE. 257 
 
 absolutely do nothing else ; and the Symposium of 
 Plato, which is the delight and astonishment of all 
 who read it ; I mean the original, or so much of 
 the original as is seen in my translation, not the 
 translation itself. 
 
 I think I have had an accession of strength since 
 my residence in Italy, though the disease itself in 
 the side, whatever it may be, is not subdued. Some 
 day we shall all return from Italy. I fear that in 
 England things will be carried violently by the 
 rulers, and they will not have learned to yield in 
 time to the spirit of the age. The great thing to 
 do is to hold the balance between popular impa- 
 tience and tyrannical obstinacy ; to inculcate with 
 fervour both the right of resistance and the duty 
 of forbearance. You know my principles incite me 
 to take all the good I can get in politics, for ever 
 aspiring to something more. I am one of those 
 whom nothing will fully satisfy, but who are ready 
 to be partially satisfied in all that is practicable. 
 We shall see. 
 
 Give Bessy a thousand thanks from me for 
 writing out in that pretty neat hand your kind and 
 powerful defence. Ask what she would like best 
 from Italian land I We mean to bring you all 
 
258 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 something; and Mary and I have been won- 
 dering what it shall be. Do you, each of you, 
 choose. 
 
 Adieu, my dear friend, 
 
 Yours affectionately ever, 
 
 P. B. S. 
 
 LETTER XXXIV. 
 
 To HENRY REVELEY, Esq. 
 
 Florence, \%th Dec., 1819. 
 My dear Henry, 
 
 You see, as I said, it only amounts to delay, all 
 this abominable entanglement. I send you 484 
 dollars, or ordinary francesconi, I suppose, 
 but you will tell me what you receive in 
 Tuscan money, if they are not — the produce of 
 £100. So my heart is a little lightened, which, I 
 assure you, was heavy enough until this moment, 
 on your account. I write to Messrs. Ward to pay you. 
 
 I have received no satisfactory letter from my 
 bankers, but I must expect it every week — or, at 
 least, in a month from this date, when I will not 
 fail to transmit you the remainder of what may be 
 necessary. 
 
LETTERS FROM ITALY. 2o9 
 
 Every body here is talking of a steam-ship which 
 is building at Leghorn ; one person said, as if he 
 knew the whole affair, that he was waiting in 
 Tuscany to take his departure to Naples in it. 
 Your name has not, to my knowledge, been men- 
 tioned. I think you would do well to encourage 
 this publicity. 
 
 I have better health than I have known for a 
 long time — ready for any stormy cruise. When 
 will the ship be ready to sail ? We have been 
 feeding ourselves with the hope that Mr. Gisborne 
 and your mother would have paid us their promised 
 visit. I did not even hope, perhaps not even wish, 
 that you should, until the engine is finished. My 
 regret at this failure has several times impelled me 
 to go to Leghorn — but I have always resisted the 
 temptation. Ask them, entreat them, from me, to 
 appoint some early day. We have a bed and 
 room, and every thing prepared. 
 
 I write in great haste, as you may see. Ever 
 believe me, my dear Henry, your attached friend, 
 
 P. B. S. 
 
260 FLORENCE. 
 
 LETTER XXXV. 
 
 To Mr. and Mhs. GISBORNE. 
 
 Florence, Dec. 2M, 1819. 
 My dear Friends, 
 I SUFFERED iiiore pain than it would be manly 
 to confess, or than you can easily conceive, from 
 that wretched uncertainty about the money. At 
 last, however, it is certain that you will encounter 
 no further check in the receiving supplies, and a 
 weight is taken from ray spirits, which, in spite of 
 many other causes of discomfort, makes itself 
 known to have been a heavy load, by the lightness 
 which I now feel in writing to you. 
 
 So the steamboat will take three months to finish? 
 The vernal equinox will be over by that time, and 
 the early wakening of the year have paved the 
 Mediterranean with calm. Among other circum- 
 stances to regret in this delay, it is so far well that 
 our first cruise will be made in serene weather. 
 
 I send you enclosed a mandate for 396 frances- 
 coni, which is what M. Torlonia incorrectly desig- 
 nates a hundred pounds — but as we count in the 
 money of the country, that need make no difference 
 to us. 
 
 I have just finished an additional act to "■ Pro- 
 
FLORENCE. 261 
 
 metheus," which INIary is now transcribing, and 
 which will be enclosed for your inspection before it 
 is transmitted to the bookseller. I am engaged in 
 a political work — I am busy enough, and if the 
 faculties of my mind were not imprisoned within a 
 mind, whose bars are daily cares and vulgar diffi- 
 culties, I might yet do something — but as it is — 
 
 Mary is well — but for this affiiir in London I 
 think her spirits would be good. What shall I — 
 what can I — what ought I to do? You cannot 
 picture to yourself my perplexity. 
 
 Adieu, my dear friends. 
 
 Ever yours, faithfully attached, 
 P. B. S. 
 
 LETTER XXXVL 
 
 To ,TOHN GISBORNE, Esq. 
 
 My dear Sir, 
 
 We have suddenly taken the determination to 
 avail ourselves of this lovely weather to approach 
 you as far as Pisa. I need not assure you — unless 
 my malady should violently return — you will see 
 me at Leghorn. 
 
 We embark ; and I promise myself the delight 
 
262 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 of the sky, the water, and the mountains. I must 
 suffer at any rate, but I expect to suffer less in a 
 boat than in a carriage. I have many tilings to say, 
 which let me reserve till we meet. 
 
 I sympathise in all your good news, as I have 
 done in your ill. Let Henry take care of himself, 
 and not, desiring to combine too many advantages, 
 check the progress of his recovery, the greatest 
 of all. 
 
 Hemember me affectionately to him and to Mrs. 
 Gisborne, and accept for yourself my unalterable 
 sentiments of regard. Meanwhile, consider icell 
 yoia^ jAans, which I only half understand. 
 
 Ever most faithfully yours, 
 
 P. B. Shelley. 
 
 Florence, -IbthJan., 1820. 
 
REMARKS 
 
 ON SOME OF 
 
 THE STATUES IN THE GALLERY OF FLORENCE. 
 
 THE NIOBE. 
 
 Oi'^ all that remains to us of Greek antiquity, this 
 figure is perhaps the most consummate personih- 
 cation of loveliness, with regard to its countenance, 
 as that of the Venus of the Tribune is with regard 
 to its entire form of a woman. It is colossal : the 
 size adds to its value ; because it allows the spec- 
 tator the choice of a greater number of points of 
 view, and affords him a more analytical one, in which 
 to catch a greater number of the infinite modes of 
 expression, of which any form approaching ideal 
 beauty is necessarily composed. It is the figure of 
 a mother in the act of sheltering, from some divine 
 and inevitable peril, the last, we may imagine, of 
 her surviving children. 
 
 The little creature, terrified, as we may conceive, 
 at the strange destruction of all its kindred, has 
 fled to its mother, and is hiding its head in the 
 folds of her robe, and casting back one arm, as in 
 
264 REMARKS OX SOME OF THE STATUES 
 
 a passionate appeal for defence, where it never 
 before could have been souijht in vain. She is 
 clothed in a thin tunic of delicate woof ; and her 
 hair is fastened on her head into a knot, probably 
 by that mother whose care will never fasten it 
 again. Niobe is enveloped in profuse di'apery, a 
 portion of which the left hand has gathered up, 
 and is in the act of extending it over the child in 
 the instinct of shielding her from what reason 
 knows to be inevitable. The right (as the restorer 
 has properly imagined), is drawing up her daughter 
 to her ; and with that instinctive gesture, and by 
 its gentle pressure, is encouraging the child to be- 
 lieve that it can give security. The countenance 
 of Niobe is the consummation of feminine majesty 
 and loveliness, beyond which the imagination 
 scarcely doubts that it can conceive anything. 
 
 That masterpiece of the poetic harmony of 
 marble expresses other feelings. There is embodied 
 a sense of the inevitable and rapid destiny which is 
 coubummating around her, as if it were already 
 over. It seems as if despair and beauty had 
 combined, and produced nothing but the sublimity 
 of grief. As the motions of the form expressed 
 the instinctive sense of the possibility of protecting 
 the child, and the accustomed and affectionate 
 assurance that she would find an asylum within 
 
IN THE GALLERY OF FLORENCE. 265 
 
 her arms, so reason and imagination speak in the 
 countenance the certainty that no mortal defence 
 is of avail. There is no terror in the countenance, 
 onh^ grief—deep, remediless grief. There is no 
 anger : — of what avail is indignation against what 
 is known to be omnipotent 1 There is no selfish 
 shrinking from personal pain — there is no panic a 
 supernatural agency — there is no adverting to her- 
 self as herself; tlie calamity is mightier than to 
 leave scope for such emotions. 
 
 Everything is swallowed up in sorrow ; she is all 
 tears ; her countenance, in assured expectation of 
 the arrow piercing its last victim in her embrace, 
 is fixed on her onmipotent enemy. The pathetic 
 beauty of the expression of her tender, and inex- 
 haustible, and uncjuenchable despair, is beyond the 
 effect of any other sculpture. As soon as the arrow 
 shall pierce her last tie upon earth, the fable that 
 she was turned into stone, or dissolved into a 
 fountain of tears, will be but a feeble emblem of 
 the sadness of hopelessness, in which the few and evil 
 years of her remaining life, we feel, must flow away. 
 
 It is difficult to speak of the beauty of the coun- 
 tenance, or to make intelligible in words, from 
 what such astonishino; loveliness results. 
 
 The head, resting somewhat backward upon the 
 full and flowing contour of the neck, is as in the 
 
266 REMARKS ON SOME OF THE STATUES 
 
 act of watching an event momently to arrive. The 
 hair is dehcately divided on the forehead, and a 
 gentle beauty gleams from the broad and clear 
 forehead, over which its strings are drawn. The 
 f;ice is of an oval fulness, and the features con- 
 ceived with the daring of a sense of power. In 
 this respect it resembles the careless majesty which 
 Nature stamps upon the rare masterpieces of her 
 creation, harmonizing them as it were from the 
 harmony of the spirit within. Yet all this not 
 only consists with, but is the cause of, the subtlest 
 delicacy of clear and tender beauty — the expression 
 at once of innocence and sublimity of soul — of 
 purity and strength — of all that which touches the 
 most removed and divine of the chords that make 
 music in our thoughts — of that which shakes with 
 astonishment even the most superficial. 
 
 THE MINERVA. 
 
 The head is of the highest beauty. It has a close 
 helmet, from which the hair, delicately parted on 
 the forehead, half escapes. The attitude gives 
 entire effect to the perfect form of the neck, and to 
 that full and beautiful moulding of the lower part 
 of the face and mouth, which is in living beings 
 the seat of the expression of a simplicity and 
 integrity of nature. Her face, upraised to heaven, 
 is animated with a profound, sweet, and impas- 
 
IN THE GALLERY OF FLORENCE. 267 
 
 sioned melancholy, with an earnest, and fervid, and 
 disinterested pleading against some vast and 
 inevitable wrong. It is the joy and poetry of 
 sorrow, making grief beautiful, and giving it that 
 nameless feeling which, from the imperfection of 
 language, we call pain, but which is not all pain, 
 through a feeling which makes not only its posses- 
 sor, but the spectator of it, prefer it to what is 
 called pleasure, in which all is not pleasure. It is 
 difficult to think that this head, though of the 
 highest ideal beauty, is the head of Minerva, 
 although the attributes and attitude of the lower 
 part of the statue certainly suggest that idea. The 
 Greeks rarely, ia their representations of the 
 characters of their gods, — unless we call the poetic 
 enthusiasm of Apollo a mortal passion, — expressed 
 the disturbance of human feeling ; and here is deep 
 and impassioned grief animating a divine counte- 
 nance. It is, indeed, divine. Wisdom (which 
 Minerva may be supposed to emblem) is pleading 
 earnestly with Power, — and invested with the 
 expression of that grief, because it must ever plead 
 so vainly. The drapery of the statue, the gentle 
 beauty of the feet, and the grace of the attitude, 
 are what may be seen in many other statues be- 
 longing to that astonishing era which produced it; 
 — such a countenance is seen in few. 
 N 2 
 
268 REMARKS ON SOME OF THE STATUES 
 
 This statue happens to be placed on a pedestal, 
 the subject of whose reliefs is in a spirit wholly the 
 reverse. It was probably an altar to Bacchus — 
 possibly a funeral urn. Under the festoons of fruits 
 and flowers that grace the pedestal, the corners of 
 which are ornamented with the sculls of goats, are 
 scul[)tured some figures of Miionads under the inspi- 
 ration of the god. Nothing can be conceived more 
 wild and terrible than their gestures, touching, as 
 they do, the verge of distortion, into which their 
 fine limbs and lovely forms are thrown. There is 
 nothing, however, that exceeds the possibility of 
 nature, though it borders on the utmost line. 
 
 The tremendous spirit of superstition, aided by 
 drunkenness, producing something beyond insanity, 
 seems to have caught t-i«»m in its whirlwinds, and 
 to bear them over the earth, as the rapid volutions 
 of a tempest have the ever-changing trunk of a 
 waterspout, or as the torrent of a mountain river 
 whirls the autunmal leaves resistlessly along in its 
 full eddies. The hair, loose and floating, seems 
 caught in the tempest of their own tumultuous 
 motion ; their heads are thrown back, leaning with 
 a strange delirium upon their necks, and looking 
 up to heaven, whilst they totter and stumble even 
 in the energy of their tempestuous dance. 
 
 One represents Agave with the head of Pentheus 
 
IN THE GALLERY OF FLOREXCE. 269 
 
 in one hand, and in the other a great knife ; a 
 second has a spear with its pine cone, which was 
 the Thyrsus ; another dances with mad voluptuous- 
 ness ; the fourth is beating a kind of tambourine. 
 This was indeed a monstrous superstition, even 
 in Greece, where it was alone capable of combining 
 ideal beauty, and poetical and abstract enthusiasm, 
 with the wild errors from which it sprung. In 
 Rome it had a more familiar, wicked, and dry 
 appearance ; it was not suited to the severe and 
 exact apprehensions of the Romans, and their strict 
 morals were violated by it, and sustained a deep 
 injury, little analogous to its effects upon the 
 Greeks, who turned all things — superstition, pre- 
 judice, murder, madness — to beauty. 
 
 ON THE VENUS, CALLED ANADYOMENE. 
 
 She has just issued from the bath, and yet is 
 animated with the enjoyment of it. 
 
 She seems all soft and mild enjoyment, and the 
 curved lines of her fine limbs How into each other 
 with a never-ending sinuosity of sweetness. Her 
 face expresses a breathless, yet passive and inno- 
 cent voluptuousness, free from affectation. Her 
 lips, without the sublimity of lofty and impetuous 
 passion, the grandeur of enthusiastic imagination 
 of the Apollo of the Capitol, or the union of botli. 
 like the Apollo Belvidere, have the tenderness of 
 
270 REMARKS ON SOME OF THE STATUES 
 
 arch, yet pure and affectionate, desire; and the 
 mode in which the ends of the mouth are drawn 
 in, yet lifted or half- opened, with the smile that 
 for ever circles round them, and the tremulous 
 curve into which they are wrought by inextinguish- 
 able desire, and the tongue lying against the lower 
 hp, as in the listlessness of passive joy, express 
 love, still love. 
 
 Her eyes seem heavy and swimming with plea- 
 sure, and her small forehead fades on both sides 
 into that sweet swelling and thin declension of the 
 bone over the eye, in the mode which expresses 
 simple and tender feelings. 
 
 The neck is full, and panting as with the aspira- 
 tion of delight, and flows with gentle curves into 
 her perfect form. 
 
 Her form is indeed perfect. She is half-sitting 
 and half-rising from a shell, and the fulness of her 
 limbs, and their complete roundness and perfection, 
 do not diminish the vital energy with which they 
 seem to be animated. The position of the arms, 
 which are lovely beyond imagination, is natural, 
 unaffected, and easy. This, perhaps, is the finest 
 personification of Venus, the deity of superficial 
 desire, in all antique statuary. Her pointed and 
 pear-like person, ever virgin, and her attitude 
 modesty itself. 
 
IN THE GALLERY OF FLORENCE. 271 
 
 A BAS-RELIEF. 
 PROBABLY THE SIDES OF A SARCOPHAGUS. 
 
 The lady is lying on a couch, supported by a 
 young woman, and looking extremely exhausted ; 
 her dishevelled hair is floating about her shoulders, 
 and she is half-covered with drapery that falls on 
 the couch. 
 
 Her tunic is exactly like a chemise, only the 
 sleeves are longer, coming half way down the upper 
 part of the arm. An old wrinkled woman, with a 
 cloak over her head, and an enormously sagacious 
 look, has a most professional appearance, and it? 
 taking hold of her arm gently with one hand, and 
 with the other is supporting it. I think she is 
 feeling her pulse. At the side of the couch sits a 
 woman as in grief, holding her head in her hands. 
 At the bottom of the bed is another matron tear- 
 ing her hair, and in the act of screaming out most 
 violently, which she seems, however, by the rest of 
 her gestures, to do with the utmost deliberation, 
 as having come to the resolution, that it was a 
 correct thing to do so. Behind her is a gossip of 
 the most ludicrous ugliness, crying, I suppose, or 
 praying, for her arms are crossed upon her neck. 
 There is also a fifth setting up a wail. To the 
 left of the couch a nurse is sitting on the ground 
 
272 REMARKS ON SOME OF THE STATUES 
 
 dandling the child in her arms, and wholly occu- 
 pied in so doing. The infant is swaddled. Behind 
 her is a female who appears to be in the act of 
 rushing in with dishevelled hair and violent ges- 
 ture, and in one hand brandishing a whip or a 
 thunder-bolt. This is probably some emblematic 
 person, the messenger of death, or a fury, whose 
 personification would be a key to the whole. What 
 they are all wailing at, I know not ; Avhether the 
 lady is dying, or the father has directed the child 
 to be exposed : but if the mother be not dead, 
 such a tumult would kill a woman in the straw in 
 these days. 
 
 The other compartment, in the second scene of 
 the drama, tells the story of the presentation of 
 the child to its father. An old man has it in his 
 arms, and with professional and mysterious offi- 
 ciousness is holding it out to the father. The 
 father, a middle-aged and very respectable-looking 
 man, perhaps not long married, is looking with 
 tiie admiration of a bachelor on his first child, and 
 perhaps thinking, that he was once such a strange 
 little creature himself. His hands are clasped, 
 and he is gathering up betv^een his arms the folds 
 of his cloak ; an emblem of his gathering up all 
 his faculties, to understand the tale the gossip is 
 bringing. 
 
IN THE GALLERY OF FLORENCE. 273 
 
 An old man is standing beside him, probably his 
 father, with some curiosity, and much tenderness 
 in his looks. Around are collected a host of his 
 relations, of whom the youngest, a handsome girl, 
 seems the least concerned. It is altogether an 
 admirable piece, quite in the spirit of the comedies 
 of Terence. 
 
 MICHAEL ANGELO^S BACCHUS. 
 
 The countenance of this figure is a most revolting 
 mistake of the si^irit aiul meaning of Bacchus. It 
 looks drunken, brutal, nairow-mindcd, and has an 
 expression of dissoluteness the most revolting. 
 The lower part of the figure is stiff, and the manner 
 in which the shoulders are united to the breast, 
 and the neck to the head, abundantly inharmo- 
 nious. It is altogether without unity, as was the 
 idea of the deity of Bacchus in the conception of 
 a Catholic. On the other hand, considered only 
 as a piece of workmanship, it has many merits. 
 The arms are executed in a style of the most per- 
 fect and manly beauty. The body is conceived 
 with great energy, and the manner in which the 
 lines mingle into each other, of the highest bold- 
 ness and truth. It wants unity as a work of art 
 — as a representation of Bacchus it \vants every- 
 thing. 
 
 N 3 
 
274 REMARKS ON SOME OF THE STATUES, ETC. 
 A JUNO. 
 
 A statue of great merit. The countenance 
 expresses a stern and unquestioned severity of 
 dominion, with a certain sadness. The hps are 
 beautiful — susceptible of expressing scorn — but not 
 without sweetness. With fine lips a person is never 
 wholly bad, and they never belong to the expres- 
 sion of emotions wholly selfish — lips being the seat 
 of imagination. The drapery is finely conceived, 
 and the manner in which the act of throwing back 
 one leg is expressed, in the diverging folds of the 
 drapery of the left breast fading in bold yet gra- 
 duated lines into a skirt, as it descends from the 
 left shoulder, is admirably imagined. 
 
 AN APOLLO, 
 
 With serpents twining round a wreath of laurel, 
 on which the quiver is suspended. It probably 
 was, when complete, magnificently beautiful. The 
 restorer of the head and arms, following the indi- 
 cation of the muscles on the right side, has lifted 
 the arm as in triumph at the success of an arrow, 
 imagining to imitate the Lycian Apollo, in that so 
 finely described by Apollonius Rhodius, when the 
 dazzling radiance of his limbs shone over the 
 Euxine. The action, energy, and godlike anima- 
 tion of these limbs, speak a spirit which seems as 
 if it could not be consumed. 
 
PISA. 275 
 
 LETTER XXXVII. 
 
 To Mr. and Mrs. GISBORNE. 
 
 Pisa, 9lh Feb., 1820. 
 
 Pray let us see you soon, or our threat may cost 
 both us and you something — a visit to Livorno. 
 The stage direction on the present occasion is, 
 (exit Moonshine) and enter Wall ; or rather four 
 walls, who suiTound and take prisoners the Galan 
 and Dama. 
 
 Seriously, pray do not disappoint us. We shall 
 watch the sky, and the death of the Scirocco must 
 be the birth of your arrival. 
 
 Mary and I are going to study mathematics. 
 We design to take the most compendious, yet 
 certain methods of arriving at the great results. 
 We believe that your right-angled Triangle will 
 contain the solution of the problem of how to 
 proceed. 
 
 Do not write but co77ie. Mary is too idle to 
 wi'ite, but all that she has to say is come. She joins 
 with me in condemning the moonlight plan. 
 Indeed we ought not to be so selfish as to allow 
 you to come at all, if it is to cost you all the fatigue 
 and annoyance of returning the same night. But 
 it will not be — so adieu. 
 
276 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 LETTER XXXVIII. 
 
 To Mr. and Mrs. GISBORNE. 
 
 Pisa, April 23, 1820. 
 My dear Friends, 
 
 We were much pained to hear of the ilhiess you 
 all seem to have been suffering, and still more at 
 the apparent dejection of your last letter. We are 
 in daily expectation this lovely weather of seeing 
 you, and I think the change of air and scene might 
 be good for your health and spirits, even if ice can- 
 not enliven you. I shall have some business at 
 Livorno soon ; and I thought of coming to fetch 
 you, but I have changed ray plan, and mean to 
 return with you, that I may save myself two 
 journeys. 
 
 I have been thinking, and talking, and reading. 
 Agriculture this last week. But I am very 
 anxious to see you, especially now as instead of six 
 hours, you give us thirty-six, or perhaps more. I 
 shall hear of the steam-engine, and you will hear 
 of our plans, when we meet, which will be in so 
 (short a time that I neither inquire nor communicate. 
 Ever affectionately yours, 
 
 P. B. Shelley. 
 
PISA. 
 
 277 
 
 LETTER XXXIX. 
 
 To JOHN GISBORNE, Esq. 
 
 (london). 
 
 Pisa, May 26th, 1820. 
 My dear Friends, 
 
 I WRITE to you thus early, because I have deter- 
 mined to accept of your kind offer about the 
 correction of " Prometheus." The bookseller makes 
 difficulties about sending the proofs to me, and to 
 whom else can I so well entrust what 1 am so 
 much interested in having done well ; and to 
 whom would I prefer to owe the recollection of an 
 additional kindness done to me .'' I enclose you 
 two little papers of corrections and additions; — I 
 do not think you will find any difficulty in interpo- 
 lating them into their proper places. 
 
 Well, how do you like London, and your journey; 
 the Alps in their beauty and their eternity; 
 Paris in its slight and transitory colours ; and the 
 wearisome plains of Franco — and the moi-al people 
 with whom you drank tea last night I Above all, 
 how are you 'I And of the last question, believe 
 me, we are now most anxiously waiting for a reply 
 — until which I will say nothing, nor ask any- 
 thing. I rely on the journal with as much security 
 as if it were already wi'itten. 
 
278 LETTERS FROM ITALY, 
 
 I am just returned from a visit to Leghorn, 
 Casciano, and your old fortress at Sant' Elmo. I 
 bought the vases you saw for about twenty sequins 
 less than Micale asked, and had them packed up, 
 and, by the polite assistance of your friend, Mr. 
 Guebhard, sent them on board. I found your 
 Giuseppe very useful in all this business. He got 
 me tea and breakfast, and I slept in your house, 
 and departed early the next morning for Casciano. 
 Everything seems in excellent order at Casa Ricci 
 — garden, pigeons, tables, chairs, and beds. As I 
 did not find my bed sealed up, I left it as I found 
 it. What a glorious prospect you had from the 
 windows of Sant*" Elmo ! The enormous chain of 
 the Apennines, with its many-folded ridges, 
 islanded in the misty distance of the air ; the sea, so 
 immensely distant, appearing as at your feet ; and 
 the prodigious expanse of the plain of Pisa, and 
 the dark green marshes lessened almost to a strip 
 by the height of the blue mountains overhanging 
 them. Then the wild and unreclaimed fertility of 
 the foreground, and the chesnut trees, whose vivid 
 foliage made a sort of resting-place to the sense 
 before it darted itself to the jagged horizon of this 
 prospect. I was altogether delighted. I had a 
 respite from my nervous symptoms, which was 
 compensated to me by a violent cold in the head. 
 
PISA. 279 
 
 There was a tradition about you at Sant' Elmo — 
 An English family that had lived here in the time of 
 the French. The doctor, too, at the Bagni, knew 
 you. The house is in a most dilapidated condition, 
 but I suppose all that is curable. 
 
 We go to the Bagni * next month — but still 
 direct to Pisa as safest. I shall vrriie to you the 
 ultimates of my commission in my next letter. I 
 am underffoinjj a course of the Pisan baths, on 
 which I lay no singular stress — but they soothe. I 
 ought to have peace of mind, leisure, tranquillity ; 
 this I expect soon. Our anxiety about Godwin is 
 very great, and any information that you could 
 give a day or two earlier than he might, respecting 
 any decisive event in his law-suit, would be a great 
 relief. Your impressions about Godwin, (I speak 
 especially to Madonna mia, who had known him 
 before,) will especially interest me. You know 
 that added years only add to my admiration of 
 his intellectual powers, and even the moral resources 
 of his character. Of my other friends I say 
 nothing. To see Hunt is to like him ; and there 
 is one other recommendation which he has to you, 
 
 he is my friend. To know H , if any one can 
 
 know him, is to know something very unlike, and 
 
 * Balhs of natural warm springs, distant four miles from Pisa, and 
 called indifTereiitl)- Bagni di Pisa, and Bagni di San Giuliano. 
 
280 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 inexpressibly superior, to the great mass of 
 men. 
 
 ^Vill Henry vrvhe me an adamantine letter, 
 flowing, not like the words of Sophocles, with 
 honey, but molten brass and iron, and bristling 
 with wheels and teeth l I saw his steam-boat 
 asleep under the walls. I was afraid to waken 
 it, and ask it whether it was dreaming of him, for 
 the same reason that I would have refrained from 
 awakening Ariadne, after Theseus had left her — 
 unless I had been Bacchus. 
 
 Affectionately and anxiously yours, 
 
 P. B. S. 
 
 LETTER XL. 
 
 To Mr. and Mrs. GISBORNE. 
 
 (LONDON.) 
 
 My dear Friends, 
 I AM to a certain degree indiflferent as to the 
 reply to our last proposal, and, therefore, will not 
 allude to it. Permit me only on subjects of this 
 nature to express one sentiment, which you would 
 have given me credit for, even if not expressed. 
 Let no considerations of mi/ interest, or any retro- 
 spect to the source from which the funds were sup- 
 
PISA. 281 
 
 plied, modify your decision as to returning and 
 pursuing or abandoning the adventure of the 
 steam-engine. JNIy object was solely your true 
 advantage, and it is when I am baffled of this, by 
 any attention to a mere form, that I shall be ill 
 requited. Nay, more, I think it for your interest, 
 should you obtain almost whatever situation for 
 Henry, to accept Clem('nti"'s proposal, and remain 
 in England ; — not without accepting it, for it 
 does no more than balance the difference of expense 
 between Italy and London ; and if you have any 
 trust in the justice of my moral sense, and believe 
 that in what concerns true honour and virtuous 
 conduct in life, I am an experienced counsellor, you 
 will not hesitate — these things being equal — to 
 accept this proposal. The opposition I made, while 
 you were in Italy, to the abandonment of the 
 steam-boat project, was founded, you well know, 
 on the motives which have influenced everything 
 that ever has guided, or ever will guide, any- 
 thing that I can do or say respecting you. I 
 thought it against Henry's interest. I think it 
 now against his interest that he and you should 
 abandon your prospects in England. As to us — 
 we are uncertain people, who are chased by the 
 spirits of our destiny from purpose to purpose, like 
 clouds by the wind. 
 
282 LETTERS FROAI ITALY. 
 
 There is one thing more to be said. If you 
 decide to remain in England, assuredly it would 
 be foolish to return. Your journey would cost 
 you between .i'lOO and c£'20(), a sum far greater 
 than you could expect to save by the increased 
 price by which you would sell your things. 
 Remit the matter to me, and I will cast off my 
 habitual character, and attend to the minutest 
 points. With Mr. G — 's, devil take his name, 
 I can't write it — you know who"'s, assistance, all 
 this might be accomplished in such a manner as 
 to save a very considerable sum. Though I shall 
 suffer from your decision in the proportion as 
 your society is delightful to me, I cannot forbear 
 expressing my persuasion, that the time, the 
 expense, and the trouble of returning to Italy, if 
 your ultimate decision be to settle in London, 
 ought all to be spared. A year, a month, a week, 
 at Henry's age, and with his purposes, ought not 
 to be unemployed. It was the depth with which I 
 felt this truth, which impelled me to incite him to 
 this adventure of the steam-boat. 
 
PISA, 
 
 283 
 
 LETTER XLI. 
 
 To Mrs. SHELLEY. 
 (leghorn.) 
 
 My dear Love, 
 
 I BELIEVE I shall have taken a very pleasant and 
 spacious apartment at the Bagni for three months. 
 It is as all the others are— dear. I shall give forty 
 or forty-five sequins for the three months, but as 
 yet I do not know which. I could get others 
 something cheaper, and a great deal worse ; but if 
 we would write, it is requisite to have space. 
 
 To-morrow evening, or the following morning, 
 
 you will probably see me. T is planning a 
 
 journey to England to secure his property in the 
 event of a revolution, which, he is persuaded, is on 
 the eve of exploding. I neither believe that, nor 
 do I fear that the consequences will be so imme- 
 diately destructive to the existing forms of social 
 order. Money will be delayed, and the exchange 
 reduced very low, and my annuity and ****, on 
 account of these being /?2o??cy, will be in some danger; 
 but land is quite safe. Besides, it will not be so 
 
 rapid. Lot us hope we shall have a reform. T 
 
 will be lulled into security, while the slow progress 
 of things is still flowing on, after this affair of the 
 
284 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 Queen may appear to be blown over. There are 
 bad news from Palermo : the soldiers resisted the 
 people, and a terrible slaughter, amounting, it is 
 said, to four thousand men, ensued. The event, 
 however, was as it should be. Sicily, like Naples, 
 is free. By the brief and partial accounts of the 
 Florence paper, it appears that the enthusiasm of 
 the people was prodigious, and that the women 
 fought from the houses, raining down boiling oil 
 on the assailants. 
 
 I am promised a bill on Vienna on the 5th, the 
 day on w liicli my note w^ill be paid, and the day on 
 which I purpose to leave Leghorn. *** is very 
 unhappy at the idea of T.'s going to England, 
 though she seems to feel the necessity of it. Some- 
 time or other he must go to settle his affairs, and 
 they seem to agree that this is the best opportunity. 
 / have no thought of leaving Italy. The best thing 
 we can do is to save money, and, if things take 
 a decided turn, (which I am convinced they will 
 at last, but not perhaps for two or three years,) 
 it will be time for me to assert my rights, and 
 preserve my annuity. Meanwhile, another event 
 may decide us. 
 
 Kiss sweet babe, and kiss yourself for me — I 
 
 love you affectionately. 
 
 P. B. S. 
 
 Casa Silva, 
 Sundaii morning, 20ih July, 1821. 
 
LEGHORN. 285 
 
 I have taken the house for forty sequins for three 
 months — a good bargain, and a very good house as 
 things go— this is about thirteen sequins a month. 
 To-morrow I go to look over the inventory ; expect 
 me therefore on Tuesday morning. 
 
 Sunday eveni^ig. 
 
 LETTER XLII. 
 
 To Mrs. SHELLEY. 
 
 (bAGNI DI SAN GIL'LIANO.) 
 
 I AM afraid, my dearest, that I shall not be able 
 to be with you so soon as to-morrow evening, 
 though I shall use every exertion. Del Rosso I 
 have not seen, nor shall until this evening. Jackson 
 1 have, and he is to drink tea with us this evening, 
 and bring the Constitutionnel, 
 
 Vou will have seen the papers, but I doubt that 
 they will not contain the latest and most important 
 news. It is certain, by private letters from mer- 
 chants, that a serious insurrection has broken out 
 at Paris, and the reports last night arc, that an 
 attack made by the populace on the Tuileries still 
 continued when the last accounts came away. At 
 Naples the constitutional party have declared to 
 
286 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 the Austrian minister, that if the Emperor should 
 make war on them, their first action would be to 
 put to death all the members of the royal family 
 — a necessary and most just measure, when the 
 forces of the combatants, as well as the merits of 
 their respective causes, are so unequal. That 
 kings should be everywhere the hostages for liberty 
 were admirable. 
 
 What will become of the Gisbornes, or of the 
 English, at Paris ? How soon will England itself, 
 and perhaps Italy, be caught by the sacred fire? 
 And what, to come from the solar system to a 
 grain of sand, shall we do ? 
 
 Kiss babe for me, and your own self. I am some- 
 what better, but my side still vexes me — a little. 
 
 Your affectionate S. 
 
 [Lev^horn'], Casa Ricci, Sept. Ixt, 1820. 
 
 LETTER XLIII. 
 
 To THE EDITOR OF THE " QUARTERLY REVIEW." 
 
 Sir, 
 
 Should you cast your eye on the signature of 
 
 this letter before you read the contents, you might 
 
 imagine that they related to a slanderous paper 
 
 which appeared in your Review some time since. 
 
287 
 
 I never notice anonymous attacks. The wretch 
 who wrote it has doubtless the additional reward 
 of a consciousness of his motives, besides the thirty 
 guineas a sheet, or whatever it is that you pay 
 him. Of course you cannot be answerable for all 
 the writings which you edit, and / certainly bear 
 you no ill-will for having edited the abuse to which 
 I allude — indeed, I was too much amused by being 
 compared to Pharaoh, not readily to forgive editor, 
 printer, publisher, stitcher, or any one, except the 
 despicable writer, connected with something so 
 exquisitely entertaining. Seriously speaking, I am 
 not in the habit of permitting myself to be disturbed 
 by what is said or written of me, though, I dare 
 say, I may be condemned sometimes justly enough. 
 But I feel, in respect to the writer in question, that 
 " I am there sitting, where he durst not soar." 
 
 The case is different with the unfortunate subject 
 of this letter, the author of Endymion, to whose 
 feelings and situation I entreat you to allow me to 
 call your attention. I write considerably in the 
 dark ; but if it is ^Ir. Gifford that I am addressing, 
 I am persuaded that in an appeal to his humanity 
 and justice, he will acknowledge the fas ah haste 
 (loceri. I am aware that the first duty of a Reviewer 
 is towards the public, and I am willing to confess 
 that the Endymion is a poem considerably defective, 
 
288 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 and that, perhaps, it deserved as much censure as 
 the pages of your Review record against it ; but, 
 not to mention that there is a certain contempt u- 
 ousness of phraseology from which it is difficult for 
 a critic to abstain, in the review of Endymion, I 
 do not think that the writer has given it its due 
 praise. Surely the poem, with all its faults, is a 
 very remarkable production for a man of Keats"'s 
 age, and the promise of ultimate excellence is such 
 as has rarely been afforded even by such as have 
 afterwards attained high literary eminence. Look 
 at book ii. line 833, &c., and book iii. line 113 to 
 1 20 — read down that page, and then again from 
 line 193. I could cite many other passages, to 
 convince you that it deserved milder usage. Why 
 it should have been reviewed at all, excepting for 
 the purpose of bringing its excellences into notice, 
 I cannot conceive, for it was very little read, and 
 there was no danger that it should become a model 
 to the age of that false taste, with which I confess 
 that it is replenished. 
 
 Poor Keats was thrown into a dreadful state of 
 mind by this review, which, I am persuaded, was 
 not written with any intention of producing the 
 effect, to which it has, at least, greatly contributed, 
 of embittering his existence, and inducing a disease 
 from which there are now but faint hopes of his 
 
PISA. 289 
 
 recovery. The first effects are described to me to 
 have resembled insanity, and it was by assiduous 
 watching that he was restrained from effecting 
 purposes of suicide. The agony of his sufferings at 
 length produced the rupture of a blood-vessel in the 
 lungs, and the usual process of consumption appears 
 to have begun. He is coming to pay me a visit in 
 Italy; but I fear that unless his mind can be kept 
 tranquil, little is to be hoped from the mere influ- 
 ence of climate. 
 
 But let me not extort anything from your pity. 
 I have just seen a second volume, published by 
 him evidently in careless despair. I have desired 
 my bookseller to send you a copy, and allow me to 
 solicit your especial attention to the fragment of 
 a poem entitled " Hyperion,"" the composition of 
 which was checked by the Review in question. 
 The great proportion of this piece is surely in the 
 very highest style of poetry. I speak impartially, 
 for the canons of taste to which Keats has con 
 formed in his other compositions are the very 
 reverse of my own. I leave you to judge for your- 
 self : it would be an insult to you to suppose that 
 from motives, however honourable, you would lend 
 
 yourself to a deception of the public. 
 
 * * * • * * * # 
 
 {Tills letter was never sent.) 
 
 VOL. II. o 
 
290 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 LETTER XLIV. 
 
 To JOHN GISBORNE, Esq. 
 
 (at leghorn.) 
 
 Pisa,oggi, (November, 1820.) 
 
 My dear Sir, 
 I SEND you the Phrodon and Tacitus. I con- 
 gratulate you on your conquest of the Iliad. You 
 must have been astonished at the perpetually 
 increasing magnificence of the last seven books. 
 Homer there truly begins to be himself. The 
 battle of the Scamander, the funeral of Patroclus, 
 and the high and solemn close of the whole bloody 
 tale in tenderness and inexpiable sorrow, are 
 wrought in a manner incomparable with any thing 
 of the same kind. The Odyssey is sweet, but 
 there is nothing like this. 
 
 /am bathing myself in the light and odour of 
 the flowery and starry Autos. I have read them 
 all more than once. Henry will tell you how 
 much I am in love with Pacchiani. I suffer from 
 my disease considerably. Henry will also tell you 
 how much, and how whimsically, he alarmed me 
 last night. 
 
 My kindest remembrances to Mrs. Gisborne, 
 and best wishes for your health and happiness. 
 
 ■Faithfully yours, 
 
 P. B. S. 
 I have a new Calderon coming from Paris. 
 
PISA. 2.91 
 
 LETTER XLV. 
 
 To HENRY REVELEY, Esq. 
 My dear Henry, 
 
 Our ducking last night has added fire, instead of 
 quenching the nautical ardour which produced it ; 
 and I consider it a good omen in any enterprise, 
 that it begins in evil ; as being more probable that 
 it will end in good, I hope you have not suffered 
 from it. I am rather feverish, but very well as to 
 the side, whence I expected the worst consequences. 
 I send you directions for the complete equipment 
 of our boat, since you have so kindly promised to 
 undertake it. In putting into execution, a little 
 more or less expense in so trifling an affair, is to be 
 disregarded. T need not say that the approaching 
 season invites expedition. You can put her in 
 hand immediately, and write the day on which we 
 may come for her. 
 
 We expect with impatience the arrival of our 
 false friends, who have so long cheated us with 
 delay ; and Mary unites with me in desiring, that, 
 as yon participated equally in the crime, you should 
 not be omitted in the expiation. 
 
 All good be with you. — Adieu. 
 
 Yours faithfully, 
 
 S. ■ 
 o 2 
 
292 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 Williams desires to be kinelly remembered to 
 you, and begs to present his compliments to Mr. 
 and Mrs. G., and — heaven knows what. 
 
 Pisa, Tuesday, 1 o'clock, 
 irihJpril, 18-21. 
 
 LETTER XLVI. 
 
 To HENRY REVELEY, Esq. 
 
 sa, April 10 th. 
 My dear Henry, 
 
 The rullock, or place for the oar, ought not to 
 be placed where the oar-pins are now, but ought 
 to be nearer to the mast ; as near as possible, in- 
 deed, so that the rower has room to sit. In addi- 
 tion let a false keel be made in this shape, so as to 
 be four inches deep at the stern, and to decrease 
 towards the prow. It may be as thin as you 
 please. 
 
 Tell Mr. and Mrs. G that I have read the 
 
 Numancia, and after wading through the singular 
 stupidity of the first act, began to be greatly de- 
 lighted, and, at length, interested in a very high 
 degree, by the power of the writer in awakening 
 pity and admiration, in which I hardly know by 
 whom he is excelled. There is little, I allow, 
 
PISA. 293 
 
 in a strict sense, to be called poetry in this play ; 
 but the command of language, and the harmony of 
 versification, is so great as to deceive one into an 
 idea that it is poetry. 
 
 Adieu. — We shall see you soon. 
 
 Yours ever truly, 
 
 S. 
 
 LETTER XLVII. 
 
 To Mr. and Mrs, GISBORNE. 
 
 Bagnx, Tuesday Evening, 
 {Juneblh, J821.) 
 My dear Friends, 
 
 We anxiously expect your arrival at the Baths ; 
 but as I am persuaded that you will spend as much 
 time with us as you can save from your necessary 
 occupations before your departure, I will forbear to 
 vex you with importunity. My health does not per- 
 mit me to spend many hours from home. I have 
 been engaged these last days in composing a poem 
 on the death of Keats, which will shortly be finished; 
 and I anticipate the pleasure of reading it to you, 
 as some of the very few persons who will be inter- 
 ested in it and understand it. It is a highly- 
 wrought j9^ece ofart^ and perhaps better, in point 
 of composition, than anything I have written. 
 
294 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 I have obtained a purchaser for some of the 
 articles of your three Hsts, a catalogue of which I 
 subjoin. I shall do my utmost to get more ; could 
 you not send me a complete list of yowY furniture, 
 as I have had inquiries made about chests of 
 
 drawers, &c. 
 
 * * * * * 
 
 My unfortunate box ! it contained a chaos of the 
 
 elements of Charles I. If the idea of the creator 
 
 had been packed up with them, it would have 
 
 shared the same fate ; and that, I am afraid, has 
 
 undergone another sort of shipwreck. 
 
 ***** 
 
 Very faithfully and affectionately yours, 
 
 S. 
 
 LETTER XLVIII. 
 
 To JOHN GISBORNE, Esq. 
 My dear Friend, 
 I have received the heart-rending account of the 
 closing scene of the groat genius whom envy and 
 ingratitude scourged out of the world."' I do not 
 
 * The following is the account alluded to : — 
 
 " Wednesday, Uth Jan., 1821. 
 " My Dearest Friends, 
 " I HAVE this moment received a letter from Mr. Finch, which con- 
 tains some circumstances relative to Keats. I would not delay com- 
 
PISA. 295 
 
 think that if I had seen it before, I could have 
 composed my poem. The enthusiasm of the ima- 
 
 municating tlicm to you, and I hope to be in time for the Procaccino, 
 though it is already half-past twelve. I hope Jlr. S. received my long 
 despatch a few days since. 
 
 " Ever yours, 
 
 «J. G," 
 
 " ' I hasten to communicate to you what I know about the latter 
 period and closing scene of the pilgrimage of the original poet from 
 whose works, hitlicrto unseen by me, you have favoured me with such 
 a beautiful quotation. Almost despairing of his case, he left his native 
 shores by sea, in a merchant vessel for Naples, where he arrived, having 
 received no benefit during the passage, and brooding over the most 
 melancholy and mortifying reflections; and nursing a deeply-rooted 
 disgust to life and to the world, owing to having been infamously treated 
 by the very persons whom his generosity had rescued from want and 
 woe. He journeyed from Naples to Rome, and occupied, at the latter 
 place, lodgings which I had, on former occasions, more than once 
 inhabited. Here he soon took to his bed, from which he never rose 
 more. His passions were always violent, and his sensibility most keen. 
 It is extraordinary that, proportionally as his strength of body declined, 
 these acquired fresh vigour ; and his temper at length became so out- 
 rageously violent, as to injure himself, and annoy every one around him. 
 He eagerly wished fot death. After leaving England, I believe that he 
 seldom courted the muse. He was accompanied by a friend of mine, 
 Mr. Severn, a young painter, w-ho will, I think, one day be the Cory- 
 phaeus of the English school. He left all, and sacrificed every prospect, 
 to accompany and watch over his friend Keats. For many weeks pre- 
 vious to his death, he would see no one but Mr. Severn, who had 
 almost risked his own life, by unwearied attendance upon his friend, 
 who rendered his situation doubly unpleasant by the violence of his 
 passions exhibited even towards him, so much, that he might be judged 
 insane. His intervals of remorse, too, were poignantly bitter. I believe 
 that JMr. Severn, the heir of what little Keats left behind iiim at Rome, 
 
296 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 gination would have overpowered the senti- 
 ment. 
 
 As it is, I have finished my Elegy ; and this 
 day I send it to the press at Pisa. You shall have 
 a copy the moment it is completed. I think it 
 will please you. I have dipped my pen in con- 
 suming fire for his destroyers ; otherwise the style 
 is calm and solemn. 
 
 Pray, when shall we see you ? Or are the streams 
 of Helicon less salutary than sea-bathing for the 
 nerves I Give us as much as you can before you 
 go to England, and rather divide the term than 
 not come soon. 
 
 Mrs. * * * wishes that none of the books, 
 <lesk, &c., should bs packed up with the piano; 
 but that they should be sent, one by one, by Pepi. 
 Address them to me at her house. She desired 
 me to have them addressed to 7ne, why I know 
 not. 
 
 A droll circumstance has occurred. Queen Mah, 
 a poem written .by me when very young, in the 
 most furious style, with long notes against Jesus 
 Christ, and God the Father, and the king, and 
 
 has only come into possession of very few nianusciipts of his friend. 
 Yon will be plenscd with the information that the poctieal volume, which 
 was the inseparable companion of Keats, and which he took for his most 
 darling model in composition, was, the Minor Poems of Shakspcare.' " 
 
BAGNI DI PISA. 297 
 
 bishops, and marriage, and the devil knows what, 
 is just published by one of the low booksellers in 
 the Strand, against my wish and consent, and all 
 the people are at loggerheads about it. H. S. 
 gives me this account. You may imagine how 
 much I am amused. For the sake of a dignified 
 appearance, however, and really because I wish to 
 protest against all the bad poetry in it, I have given 
 orders to say that it is all done against my desire, 
 and have directed my attorney to apply to Chan- 
 cery for an injunction, which he will not get. 
 
 I am pretty ill, I thank you, just now ; but I 
 liopc you arc better. 
 
 Most affectionately yours, 
 
 P. B. S. 
 
 Pisa. Salurdat/, 
 {June Uth, 1821.) 
 
 LETTER XLIX. 
 
 To Mr. and Mrs. GISBORNE. 
 
 Bagni, Friday Night, 
 {July Uth, 1821.) 
 
 ]My dear Friends, 
 I HAVE been expecting every day a writ to attend 
 at your court at Guebhard's, whence you know 
 it is settled that I should conduct you hither to 
 o3 
 
298 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 spend your last days in Italy. A thousand thanks 
 for your maps ; in return for which I send you the 
 only copy o£»Adonais the printer has yet delivered. 
 I wish I could say, as Glaucus could, in the ex- 
 change for the arms of Diomed, — kKaroixjiioi ivvea- 
 
 * * * * * 
 
 I will only remind you of Faust ; my desire for 
 the conclusion of which is only exceeded by my 
 desire to welcome you. Do you observe any traces 
 of him in the poem I send you ? Poets — the best 
 of them, are a very camcleonic race ; they take 
 the colour not only of what they feed on, but of 
 the very leaves under which they pass. 
 
 Mary is just on the verge of finishing her novel; 
 but it cannot be in time for you to take to 
 England. — Farewell. 
 
 Most faithfully yours, P. B. S. 
 
 LETTER L. 
 
 To Mr. and Mrs. GISBORNE. 
 
 My dearest Friends, 
 
 I AM fully repaid for the painful emotions from 
 
 which some verses of my poem sprung, by your 
 
 sympathy and approbation — which is all the reward 
 
 I expect— and as much as I desire. It is not for 
 
FLORENCE. 299 
 
 me to judge whether, in the high praise your feel- 
 ings assign me, you are right or wrong. The poet 
 and the man are two different natures; though 
 they exist together, they may be unconscious of 
 each other, and incapable of deciding on each 
 other's powers and efforts by any reflex act. The 
 decision of the cause, whether or no / am a poet, 
 is removed from the present time to the hour when 
 our posterity shall assemble ; but the court is a 
 very severe one, and I fear that the verdict will 
 be, "Guilty— death!" 
 
 I shall be with you on the first summons. I hope 
 that the time you have reserved for us, " this bank 
 and shoal of time," is not so short as you once 
 talked of. 
 
 In haste, most affectionately yours, 
 
 P. B. S. 
 
 Bagni, July \dth. 
 
 LETTER LI. 
 
 To Mrs. SHELLEY. 
 
 (bAGM DI PISA.) 
 
 Tuesday, Lione Bianco, Florence^ 
 (^M^Msns^l82L) 
 
 My dearest Love, 
 I SHALL not return this evening ; nor, unless I 
 have better success, to-morrow. I have seen many 
 
30Q LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 houses, but very few M-itliin the compass of our 
 powers ; and, even in those which seem to suit, 
 nothing is more difficult than to bring the proprie- 
 tors to terms. I congratulate myself on having 
 taken the season in time, as there is great expec- 
 tation of Florence being full next winter, I shall 
 do my utmost to return to-morrow evening. You 
 may expect me about ten or eleven o'clock, as I 
 shall purposely be late, to spare myself the exces- 
 sive heat. 
 
 The Gisbornes (four o'' clock, Tuesday,) are just 
 set out in a diligence-and-four, for Bologna. They 
 have promised to write from Paris. I spent three 
 hours this morning principally in the contemplation 
 of the Niobe, and of a favourite Apollo ; all M'orldly 
 thoughts and cares seem to vanish from before 
 the sublime emotions such spectacles create ; and 
 I am deeply impressed with the great difference of 
 happiness enjoyed by those who live at a distance 
 from these incarnations of all that the finest minds 
 have conceived of beauty, and those who can resort 
 to their company at pleasure. What should we 
 think if we were forbidden to read the great writers 
 who have left us their works i And yet to be for- 
 bidden to live at Florence or Rome, is an evil of 
 the same kind, of scarcely less magnitude. 
 
 I am delighted to hear that the W.'s arc with 
 
BOLOGNA. oOl 
 
 you. I am convinced that Williams must perse- 
 vere in the use of the doccia. Give my most affec- 
 tionate remembrances to them. I sliall know all 
 tlie houses in Florence, and can give W. a good 
 account of them all. You have not sent my pass- 
 port, and I must get home as I can. I suppose 
 you did not receive my note. 
 
 I grudge my sequins for a carriage ; but I 
 have suffered from the sun and the fatigue, and 
 dare not expose myself to that which is necessary 
 for house-hunting. 
 
 Kiss little babe, and how is he ? but I hope to 
 see him fast asleep to-morrow night. And pray, 
 dearest Mary, have some of your novel prepared 
 for my return. 
 
 Your ever affectionate 
 
 S. 
 
 LETTER LII. 
 
 To Mrs. SHELLEY, 
 
 (bAGNI DI PISA.) 
 
 Bologna, Agosto 6. 
 Dearest mine, 
 
 I A.M at Bologna, and the caravella is ordered 
 
 for Ravenna. I have been detained, by having 
 
302 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 made an embarrassing and inexplicable arrange- 
 ment, more than twelve hours ; or I should have 
 arrived at Bologna last night instead of this 
 morning. 
 
 Though I have travelled all night at the rate 
 of two miles and a half, an hour, in a little open 
 calesso, I am perfectly well in health. One would 
 think that I were the spaniel of Destiny, for the 
 more she knocks me about, the more I fawn on 
 her. I had an overturn about day-break; the 
 old horse stumbled, and threw me and the fat 
 vetturino into a slope of meadow, over the hedge. 
 My angular figure stuck whore it was pitched ; 
 but my vetturino's spherical form rolled fairly to 
 the bottom of the hill, and that with so few symp- 
 toms of reluctance in the life that animated it, 
 that my ridicule (for it was the drollest sight in 
 the world) was suppressed by my fear that the 
 poor devil had been hurt. But he was very well, 
 
 and we continued our journey with great success. 
 
 ******* 
 
 My love to the Williams's. Kiss my pretty one, 
 and accept an affectionate one for yourself from 
 me. The chaise waits. 1 will write the first 
 night from Ravenna at length. 
 
 Yours ever, 
 
 S. 
 
RAVENNA. 303 
 
 LETTER LTII. 
 
 To Mrs. SHELLEY. 
 
 Ravenna, August 1, 1821 . 
 My dearest Mary, 
 
 I ARRIVED last night at ten o'clock, and sate 
 up talking with Lord Byron until five this morning. 
 I then went to sleep, and now awake at eleven, 
 and having despatched my breakfast as quick as 
 possible, mean to devote the interval imtil twelve, 
 when the post departs, to you. 
 
 Lord Byi'on is very well, and was delighted to 
 see me. He has in fact completely recovered his 
 health, and lives a life totally the reverse of that 
 which he led at Venice. He has a permanent sort 
 of liaison with Contessa Giuccioli, who is now at 
 Florence, and seems from her letters to be a very 
 amiable woman. She is waiting there until some- 
 thing shall be decided as to their emigration to 
 Switzerland or stay in Italy ; which is yet unde- 
 termined on either side. She was compelled to 
 escape from the Papal territory in great haste, as 
 measures had already been taken to place her in 
 a convent, where she would have been unrelent- 
 ingly confined for life. The oppression of the 
 marriage contract, as existing in the laws and 
 opinions of Italy, though less frequently exercised, 
 
304 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 is far severer than that of England. I tremble 
 to think of what poor Emilia is destined to. 
 
 Lord Byron had almost destroyed himself in 
 Venice: his state of debility was such that he was 
 unable to digest any food, he was consumed by hectic 
 fever, and would speedily have perished, but for this 
 attachment, which has reclaimed him from the 
 excesses into which he threw himself from care- 
 lessness and pride, rather than taste. Poor fellow ! 
 he is now quite well, and immersed in politics and 
 literature. He has given me a number of the 
 most interesting details on the former subject, but 
 we will not speak of them in a letter. Fletcher is 
 here, and as if like a shadow, he waxed and 
 waned with the substance of his master : Fletcher 
 also has recovered his good looks, and from amidst 
 the unseasonable grey hairs, a fresh harvest of 
 flaxen locks put forth. 
 
 We talked a great deal of poetry, and such 
 matters last night ; and as usual differed, and I 
 think more than ever. He affects to patronize a 
 system of criticism fit for the production of medio- 
 crity, and although all his fine poems and passages 
 have been produced in defiance of this system, yet 
 I recognise the pernicious effects of it in the Doge 
 of Venice ; and it will cramp and limit his future 
 efforts however great they may be, unless he gets 
 
RAVENNA. 805 
 
 rid of it. I have read only parts of it, or rather 
 lie himself read them to me, and gave mo the plan 
 
 of the whole. 
 
 ******* 
 
 Lord Byron has also told me of a circumstance 
 that shocks me exceedingly ; because it exhibits a 
 degree of desperate and wicked malice for which I 
 am at a loss to account. A\'hcn I hear such things 
 my patience and my philosophy are put to a severe 
 proof, whilst I refrain from seeking out some obscure 
 hiding-place, where the countenance of man may 
 never meet me more. 
 
 * * * * Imagine my despair of 
 
 good, imagine how it is possible that one of so weak 
 and sensitive a nature as mine can run further the 
 gauntlet througli this hellish society of men. You 
 should write to the Hoppners a letter refuting the 
 charge, in case you believe, and know, and can 
 prove that it is false ; stating the grounds and 
 proofs of your belief. I need not dictate what you 
 should say ; nor, I hope, inspire you with warmth 
 to rebut a charge, which you only can effectually 
 rebut. If you will send the letter to me here, I 
 will forward it to the Hoppners. Lord Byron is 
 not up, I do not know the Hoppners"* address, and 
 I am anxious not to lose a post. 
 
306 LETTERS FROM ITALY, 
 
 LETTER LIV. 
 
 To Mks. SHELLEY. 
 
 Thursday ^th August. 
 IMy DEAREST MaRY, 
 
 I AVROTE to you yesterday, and I begin another 
 letter to-day, without knowing exactly when I can 
 send it, as I am told the post only goes once a week. 
 I dare say the subject of the latter half my letter 
 gave you pain, but it was necessary to look the affair 
 in the face, and the only satisfactory answer to the 
 calumny must be given by you, and could be given 
 by you alone. This is evidently the source of the 
 violent denunciations of the Literary Gazette, in 
 themselves contemptible enough, and only to be 
 regarded as effects, which show us their cause, 
 which until we put off our mortal nature, we never 
 despise — that is the belief of persons who have 
 known and seen you, that you are guilty of crimes. 
 * # * * * 
 
 After having sent my letter to the post yesterday, 
 I went to see some of the antiquities of this place ; 
 which appear to be remai^kable. This city was once 
 of vast extent, and the traces of its remains are 
 to be found more than four miles from the gate of 
 the modern town. The sea, which once came close 
 to it, has now retired to the distance of four miles, 
 
EAVENNA. 
 
 307 
 
 leaving a melancholy extent of marshes, interspersed 
 with patclies of cultivation, and towards the sea 
 shore with pine forests, which have followed the 
 retrocession of the Adriatic, and the roots of which 
 are actually washed by its waves. The level of the 
 sea and of this tract of country correspond so 
 nearly, that a ditch dug to a few feet in depth is 
 immediately filled up with sea water. All the 
 ancient buildings have been choked up to the height 
 of from five to twenty feet by the deposit of the 
 sea, and of the inundations, which are frequent in 
 the winter. I went in L. B/s carriage, first to the 
 Chiesa San Vitalc, which is certainly one of the 
 most ancient churches in Italy. It is a rotunda 
 supported upon buttresses and pilasters of white 
 marble ; the ill effect of which is somewhat relieved 
 by an interior row of columns. The dome is very 
 high and narrow. The whole church, in spite of 
 the elevation of the soil, is very high for its breadth, 
 and is of a very peculiar and striking construction. 
 In the section of one of tlie large tables of marble 
 with which the church is lined, they showed me the 
 -perfect figure^ as perfect as if it had been painted, 
 of a capuchin friar, which resulted merely from the 
 shadings and the position of the stains in the marble. 
 This is what may be called a pure anticipated cog- 
 nition of a Capuchin. 
 
308 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 I then went to the tomb of Theodosius, which 
 has now been dedicated to the Virgin, without 
 however any change in its original appearance. 
 It is about a mile from the present city. This 
 building is more than half overwhelmed by the 
 elevated soil, although a portion of the lower 
 story has been excavated, and is filled with brackish 
 and stinking waters, and a sort of vaporous dark- 
 ness, and troops of prodigious frogs. It is a 
 remarkable piece of architecture, and without 
 belonging to a period when the ancient taste yet 
 survived, bears nevertheless a certain impression 
 of that taste. It consists of two stories; the lower 
 supported on Doric arches, and pilasters, and a 
 simple entablature. The other circular within, and 
 polygonal outside, and roofed with one single mass of 
 ponderous stone, for it is evidently one, and Heaven 
 alone knows how they contrived to lift it to that 
 height. It is a sort of flattish dome, rough-wrought 
 within by the chisel, from which the Northern con- 
 querors tore the plates of silver that adorned it, 
 and polished without, with things like handles 
 appended to it, which were also wrought out of the 
 solid stone, and to which I suppose the ropes were 
 applied to draw it up. You ascend externally into 
 the second story by a flight of stone-steps, which 
 are modern. 
 
RAVENNA. 309 
 
 The next place I went to, was a church called 
 la chiesa cli SanC AppoUinare,\\\\\ch. is a Basilica, and 
 built by one, I forget whom, of the Christian Em- 
 perors ; it is a long church, with a roof like a barn, 
 and supported by twenty-four columns of the finest 
 marble, with an altar of jasper, and four columns 
 of jasper and giallo antico, supporting the roof of 
 the tabernacle, which are said to bo of immense 
 value. It is something like that church (I forget 
 the name of it) we saw at Rome, fuore delle mura.* 
 I suppose the emperor stole these columns, which 
 seem not at all to belong to the place they occupy. 
 Within the city, near the church of San Vitale, 
 there is to be seen the tomb of the Empress Galla 
 Placidia, daughter of Theodosius the Great, toge- 
 ther with those of her husband Constantius, her 
 brother Honorius, and her son Valentinian — all 
 Emperors. The tombs are massy cases of marble, 
 adorned with rude and tasteless sculpture of lambs, 
 and other Christian emblems, with scarcely a trace 
 of the antique. It seems to have been one of the 
 first effects of the Christian religion, to destroy the 
 power of producing beauty in art. These tombs 
 are placed in a sort of vaulted chamber, wrought 
 over with rude mosaic, which is said to have been 
 built in 1300. I have yet seen no more of Ravenna. 
 
 * San Paolo fuore delle mura — burnt down, and its beautiful 
 columns calcined bv the fire, in 1823 — now rebuilt. 
 
310 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 Friday. 
 
 We ride out in the evening, through the pine 
 forests which divide this city from the sea. Our way 
 of life is this, and I have accommodated myself to 
 it Avithout much difficulty : — L. B. gets up at two, 
 breakfasts ; we talk, read, &c., until six ; then we 
 ride, and dine at eight ; and after dinner sit talking 
 till four or five in the morning. I get up at twelve, 
 and am now devoting the interval between my 
 rising and his, to you. 
 
 L. B. is greatly improved in every respect. In 
 genius, in temper, in moral views, in health, in 
 happiness. The connection with la Guiccioli has 
 been an inestimable benefit to him. He lives in 
 considerable splendour, but within his income, 
 which is now about £4000 a year, £100 of which 
 he devotes to purposes of charity- He has had 
 mischievous passions, but these he seems to have 
 subdued, and he is becoming, what he should be, a 
 virtuous man. The interest which he took in the 
 politics of Italy, and the actions he performed in 
 consequence of it, are subjects not fit to be ivritten, 
 but are such as will delight and surprise you. He 
 is not yet decided to go to Switzerland — a place, 
 indeed, little fitted for him: the gossip and the 
 cabals of those anglicised coteries would torment 
 him, as they did before, and might exasperate him 
 
RAVENNA. 311 
 
 into a relapse of libertinism, which he says he 
 plunged into not from taste, but despair. La 
 Guiccioli and her brother (who is L. B.'s friend 
 and confidant, and acquiesces perfectly in her con- 
 nection with him,) \vish to go to Switzerland ; as 
 L. B. says, merely from the novelty of the pleasure 
 of travelling. L. B. prefers Tuscany or Lucca, 
 and is trying to persuade them to adopt his views. 
 He has made me write a long letter to her to enjjaffe 
 her to remain — an odd thing enough for an utter 
 stranger to write on subjects of the utmost delicacy 
 to his friend"'s mistress. But it seems destined 
 that I am always to have some active part in every 
 body's affairs whom I approach. I have set down 
 in lame Italian, the strongest reasons I can think 
 of against the Swiss emigration— to tell you truth, 
 I should be very glad to accept, as my fee, his 
 estabhshment in Tuscany. Kavenna is a miserable 
 place ; the people are barbarous and wild, and 
 their language the most infernal patois that you 
 can imagine. He would be, in every respect, 
 better among the Tuscans. I am afraid he would 
 not like Florence, on account of the English 
 there. 
 
 ***** 
 
 There is Lucca, Florence, Pisa, Siena, and I 
 tliink nothing more. What think you of Prato, 
 
312 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 or Pistoia, for him ? — no Englishman approaches 
 those towns ; but I am afraid no house could be 
 found good enough for him in that region. 
 
 He has read to me one of the unpublished cantos 
 of Don Juan, which is astonishingly fine. It sets 
 him not only above, but far above, all the poets of 
 the day — every word is stamped with immortality. 
 I despair of rivalling Lord Byron, as well I may, 
 and there is no other with whom it is worth con- 
 tending. This canto is in the style, but totally, 
 and sustained with incredible ease and power, 
 like the end of the second canto. There is not a 
 word which the most rigid asscrtor of the dignity 
 of human nature would desire to be cancelled. It 
 fulfils, in a certain degree, what I have long 
 preached of pi'oducing — something wholly new and 
 relative to the age, and yet surpassingly beauti- 
 ful. It may be vanity, but I think I see the trace 
 of my earnest exhortations to him to create some- 
 thing wholly new. He has finished his life up to 
 the present time, and given it to INIoore, with 
 liberty for Moore to sell it for the best price he can 
 get, with condition that the bookseller should 
 publish it after his death. Moore has sold it to 
 Murray for hco tlioiisand -pounds. I have spoken to 
 him of Hunt, but not with a direct view of demand- 
 ing a contribution ; and, though I am sure that if 
 
RAVENNA. 813 
 
 asked it would not be refused — yet, there is some- 
 thing in me that makes it impossible. Lord Byron 
 and I are excellent friends, and were I reduced to 
 poverty, or were I a writer who had no claims to 
 a higher station than I possess — or did I possess a 
 higher than I deserve, we should appear in all 
 things as such, and I would freely ask him any 
 favour. Such is not the case. The demon of 
 mistrust and pride lurks between two persons in 
 our situation, poisoning the freedom of our inter- 
 course. This is a tax and a heavy one, which we 
 must pay for being human. I think the fault is 
 not on my side, nor is it likely, I being the weaker. 
 I hope that in the next world these things will be 
 better managed. What is passing in the heart of 
 another, rarely escapes the observation of one who 
 is a strict anatomist of his own. 
 
 Write to me at Florence, where I shall remain 
 a day at least, and send me letters, or news of 
 letters. How is my little darling ? And how are 
 you, and how do you get on with your book ? Be 
 severe in your corrections, and expect severity 
 from me, your sincere admirer. I flatter myself 
 you have composed something unequalled in its 
 kind, and that, not content with the honours of 
 your birth and your hereditary aristocracy, you 
 will add still higher renown to your name. Expect 
 
 vor,. II. p 
 
814 LETTKRS FROM ITALY. 
 
 me at the end of my appointed time. I do not 
 think I shall be detained. Is C. with you, or is she 
 coming? Have you heard anything of my poor 
 EmiHa, from whom I got a letter the day of my 
 departure, saying, that her marriage was deferred 
 for a very short time, on account of the illness 
 of her sposo. How are the Williams"'s, and 
 Williams especially ? Give my very kindest love to 
 them. 
 
 Lord B.has here splendid apartments in the house 
 of his mistress"'s husband, who is one of the richest 
 men in Italy. She is divorced, with an allow^ance 
 of 1200 crowTis a-year, a miserable pittance from a 
 man who has 120,000 a-year. — Here are two 
 monkeys, five cats, eight dogs, and ten horses, all 
 of whom, (except the horses), walk about the 
 house like the masters of it. Tita the Venetian 
 is here, and operates as my valet ; a fine fellow, 
 with a prodigious black beard, and who has 
 stabbed two or three people, and is one of 
 the most good-natured looking fellows I ever 
 saw. 
 
 We have good rumours of the Greeks here, and 
 a Russian war. I hardly wish the Russians to 
 take any part in it. My maxim is with Jischylus : 
 — TO bvcro-ejSes — uera ij.^v irXeiOva tlktsl, (T(f)(Tepa 
 
KAVENNA. 315 
 
 8etKora yevva. There is a Greek exercise for you. 
 How should slaves produce anything but tyranny — 
 even as the seed produces the plant l 
 Adieu, dear Mary. 
 
 Yours affectionately, 
 
 S. 
 
 LETTER LV. 
 
 To Mrs. SHELLEY. 
 
 Saturday — Ravenna. 
 
 My dear Mary, 
 
 You will he surprised to hear that L. B. has 
 decided upon coming to Pisa^ in case he shall be 
 able, with ray assistance, to prevail upon his mistress 
 to remain in Italy, of which I think there is little 
 doubt. He wishes for a large and magnificent 
 house, but he has furniture of his own, which hf) 
 would send from Ravenna. Enquire if any of the 
 large palaces are to be let. We discussed Praio, 
 Pistoia, Lucca, &c., but they would not suit him 
 so well as Pisa, to which, indeed, he shows a decided 
 preference. So let it be ! Florence he objects to, 
 on account of the prodigious influx of English. 
 
 I don't think this circumstance ought to make 
 any difference in our own plans with respect to this 
 winter in Florence, because we could easily reas- 
 p 2 
 
;)16 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 sume our station, with the spring, at Pugnano or 
 the baths, in order to enjoy the society of the noble 
 lord. But do you consider this point, and write 
 to me your full opinion, at the Florence pcst- 
 o3\ce. 
 
 I suffer much to-day from the pain in my side, 
 brought on, I believe, by this accursed water. In 
 other respects, I am pretty well, and my spirits 
 are much improved ; thoy had been improving, 
 indeed, before I left the baths, after the deep 
 dejection of the early part of the year. 
 
 I am reading Anastasius. One would think that 
 L. B. had taken his idea of the three last cantos 
 of Don Juan from this book. That, of course, has 
 nothing to do with the merit of this latter, poetry 
 having nothing to do with the invention of facts. 
 It is a very powerful, and very entertaining novel, 
 and a faithful picture, they say, of modern Greek 
 manners. I have read L. B.*'s letter to Bowles — 
 some good things — but he ought not to write proso 
 criticism. 
 
 You will receive a long letter, sent with some of 
 L. B.'s, express to Florence. 
 
 I write this in haste. — Yours most affectionately, 
 
 s/ 
 
RAVENXA. 317 
 
 LETTER LVI. 
 
 To Mrs. SHELLEY. 
 Ravenna, Tuesday^ August \hth, 1S'2I. 
 My dearest Love, 
 I ACCEPT your kind present of your picture, and 
 wish you would get it prettily framed for me. I 
 will wear, for your sake, upon my heart this image 
 which is ever present to my mind. 
 
 I have only two minutes to write, the post is just 
 setting off. I shall leave this place on Thursday or 
 Friday morning. You would forgive me for my 
 longer stay, if you knew the fighting I have had 
 to make it so short. I need not say where my own 
 feelings impel me. 
 
 It still remains fixed that L. B. should come to 
 Tuscany, and, if possible, Pisa; but more of that 
 to-morrow. 
 
 Your faithful and affectionate 
 
 S. 
 
 LETTER LVIL 
 
 To :\Irs. SHELLEY. 
 
 Wednesday, Ravenuu. 
 My DEARt:8T LoVE, 
 
 I WRITE, though 1 doubt whether I shall not 
 arrive before this letter ; as the post only leaves 
 
318 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 Ravenna once a week, on Saturdays, and as I hope 
 to set out to-morrow evening by the courier. But 
 as I must necessarily stay a day at Florence, and 
 as the natural incidents of travelling may prevent 
 me from taking my intended advantage of the 
 couriers, it is probable that this letter will arrive 
 first. Besides, as I will explain, I am not yet quite 
 my own master. But that by and bye. I do not 
 think it necessary to tell you of my impatience to 
 return to you and my little darling, or the disap- 
 pointment with which I have prolonged my absence 
 from you. I am happy to think that you are not 
 quite alone. 
 
 Lord Byron is still decided upon Tuscany ; and 
 such is his impatience, that he has desired me — 
 IIS if I should not arrive in time — to write to you 
 to inquire for the best unfurnished palace in Pisa, 
 and to enter upon a treaty for it. It is better not 
 to be on the Lung"* Arno ; but, in fact, there is no 
 such hurry, and as I shall see you so soon, it is 
 not worth while to trouble yourself about it. 
 
 I told you I had written by L. B.'s desire to la 
 Guiccioli, to dissuade her and her family from 
 Switzerland. Her answer is this moment arrived, 
 and my representation seems to have reconciled 
 
RAVENNA. 
 
 319 
 
 them to the unfitness of that step. At the con- 
 clusion of a letter, full of all the fine things she 
 says she has heard of me, is this request, which 
 I transcribe ; — " Signore — la vostra hontd mi fa 
 ardita di chiedervi unfavore — me lo accorderete voi ? 
 Non partite da Ravenna scnza Milord." Of course, 
 being now, by all the laws of knighthood, captive 
 to a lady's request, I shall only be at liberty on 
 imj parole., until Lord Byron is settled at Pisa. 
 T shall reply, of course, that the boon is granted, 
 and that if her lover is reluctant to quit Ravenna, 
 after I have made arrangements for receiving him 
 at Pisa, I am bound to place myself in the same 
 situation as now, to assail him with importunities 
 to rejoin her. Of this there is, fortunately, no 
 need ; and I need not tell you there is no fear that 
 this chivalric submission of mine to the great 
 general laws of antique courtesy, against which I 
 never rebel, and which is my religion, should in- 
 terfere with my quick returning, and long remain- 
 ing with you, dear girl. 
 
 1 have seen Dante's tomb, and worshipped the 
 sacred spot. The building and its accessories are 
 comparatively modern, but, the urn itself, and the 
 tablet of marble, with his portrait in relief, are 
 evidently of equal antiquity with his death. The 
 countenance has all the marks of being taken from 
 
320 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 his own ; the hues are strongly marked, far more 
 than the portraits, which, however, it resembles ; 
 except, indeed, the eye, which is half closed, and 
 reminded me of Pacchiani. It was probably taken 
 after death. I saw the library, and some speci- 
 mens of the earliest illuminated printing from the 
 press of Faust. They are on vellum, and of an 
 execution little inferior to that of the present 
 day. 
 
 "VVe ride out every evening as usual, and practise 
 pistol-shooting at a pumpkin ; and I am not sorry 
 to observe, that I approach towards my noble 
 friend''s exactness of aim. The water here is vil- 
 lanous, and I have suffered tortures; but I now drink 
 nothing but alcalescent Avater, and am much re- 
 lieved. I have the greatest trouble to get away ; 
 and L. B., as a reason for my stay, has urged, that 
 without either me or the Guiccioli, he will certainly 
 fall into his old habits. I then talk, and he listens 
 to reason ; and I earnestly hope that he is too 
 well aware of the terrible and degrading conse- 
 quences of his former mode of life, to be in danger 
 from the short interval of temptation that will be 
 left him. L. B. speaks with great kindness and 
 interest of you, and seems to wish to see you. 
 
RAVENXA. 321 
 
 Thursday, Ravenna. 
 
 I HAVE received your letter with that to Mrs. 
 Hoppner. I do not wonder, my dearest friend, 
 that you should have been moved. I was at 
 first, but speedily regained the indifference which 
 the opinion of anything, or anybody, except 
 our own consciousness, amply merits ; and day 
 by day shall more receive from me. T have not 
 recopied your letter ; such a measure would destroy 
 its authenticity, but have given it to Lord Byron, 
 who has engaged to send it with his own comments 
 to the Hoj)pners. People do not hesitate, it 
 seems, to make themselves panders and accom- 
 plices to slander, for the Hoppners had exacted 
 from Lord Byron that these accusations should be 
 concealed from me. Lord Byron is not a man to 
 keep a secret, good or bad ; but in openly confess- 
 ing that lie has not done so, he must observe a 
 certain delicacy, and therefore he wished to send 
 the letter himself, and indeed this adds weight to 
 your representations. Have you seen the article 
 iu the Literary Gazette on me ? They evidently 
 allude to some story of this kind — however cautious 
 the Hoppners have been in preventing the calumni- 
 ated person from asserting his justification, you 
 know too much of the world not to be certain that 
 p3 
 
322 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 this was the utmost hmit of their caution. So 
 much for nothing. 
 
 Lord Byron is immediately coming to Pisa. He 
 will set off' the moment I can get him a house. Who 
 would have imagined this ? Our first thought ought 
 
 tobe , our second our own plans. The hesitation 
 
 in your letter about Florence has communicated 
 itself to me ; although I hardly see what we can do 
 about Horace Smith, to whom our attentions are so 
 due, and would be so useful. If I do not arrive before 
 this long scrawl, write something to Florence to 
 decide me. I shall certainly, not without strong 
 reasons, at present sign the agreement for the old 
 codger"'s house; although the extreme beauty and 
 fitness of the place, should we decide on Florence, 
 might well overbalance the objection of your deaf 
 visitor. Onething — with Lord Byron and the people 
 we know at Pisa, we should have a security and 
 protection, which seems to be more questionable 
 at Florence. But I do not think that this consi- 
 deration ought to weigh. What think you of re- 
 maining at Pisa ? The Williams's would probably 
 be induced to stay there if we did ; Hunt would 
 certainly stay, at least this winter, near us, should 
 he emigrate at all; Lord Byron and his Italian 
 friends would remain quietly there; and Lord Byron 
 has certainly a great regard for us — the regard of 
 
RAVENNA. 323 
 
 such a man is worth, — some of the tribute we mus< 
 pay to the base passions of humanity in any inter- 
 course with those within their circle ; he is bettei 
 worth it than those on whom we bestow it from 
 
 mere custom. The are there, and as far as 
 
 soUd affairs are concerned, are my friends. * * * 
 At Pisa I need not distil my water — if I can distil 
 it anywhere. Last winter I suffered less from my 
 painful disorder than the winter I spent at Florence. 
 The arguments for Florence you know, and they 
 are very weighty; judge {I Ji?iow you like the job), 
 which scale is overbalanced. 
 
 My greatest content would be utterly to desert 
 all human society. I would retire with you and 
 our child to a solitary island in the sea, would build 
 a boat, and shut upon my retreat the flood-gates 
 of the world. I would read no reviews, and talk 
 with no authors. If I dared trust my imagina- 
 tion, it would tell me that there are one or two 
 chosen companions beside yourself whom I should 
 desire. But to this I would not listen — where 
 two or three are gathered together, the devil is 
 among them. And good, far more than evil im- 
 pulses, love, far more than hatred, has been to me, 
 except as you have been its object, the source of 
 all sorts of mischief. So on this plan, I would be 
 alone, and would devote either to oblivion or to 
 
o24 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 future generations, the overflowings of a mind 
 which, timely withdrawn from the contagion, 
 should be kept fit for no baser object. But this 
 it does not appear that we shall do. 
 
 The other side of the alternative (for a medium 
 ought not to be adopted) is to form for ourselves 
 a society of our own class, as much as possible ia 
 intellect, or in feelings ; and to connect ourselves 
 with the interests of that society. Our roots never 
 struck so deeply as at Pisa, and the transplanted 
 tree flourishes not. People who lead the lives 
 which we led until last winter, are like a family of 
 Wahabee Arabs, pitching their tent in the midst 
 of London. We must do one thing or the other — 
 for yourself, for our child, for our existence. The 
 calumnies, the sources of which are pi'obably deeper 
 than we perceive, have ultimately, for object, the 
 depriving us of the means of security and sub- 
 sistence. You will easily perceive the gradations 
 by which calumny proceeds to pretext, pretext to 
 persecution, and persecution to the ban of fire and 
 water. It is for this, and not because this or that 
 fool, or the whole court of fools, curse and rail, 
 that calumny is worth refuting or chastising. 
 
PISA. 325 
 
 LETTER LVIII. 
 
 To LEIGH HUNT, &Q. 
 
 Pisa, August •26th, \S2\. 
 My dearest Friend, 
 
 Since I last wrote to you, I have been on a visit 
 to Lord Byron at Ravenna. The result of this 
 visit was a determination, on his part, to come and 
 live at Pisa ; and I have taken the finest palace 
 on the Lung' Arno for him. But the material 
 part of my visit consists in a message which he 
 desires me to give you, and which, I think, ought 
 to add to your determination — for such a one 1 
 hope you have formed, of restoring your shattered 
 health and spirits by a migration to these " regions 
 mild of calm and serene air." 
 
 He proposes that you should come and go shares 
 with him and me, in a periodical work, to be 
 conducted here ; in which each of the contracting 
 parties should publish all their original composi- 
 tions, and share the profits. He proposed it to 
 Moore, but for some reason it was never brought 
 to bear. There can be no doubt that the profits 
 of any scheme in which you and Lord Byron 
 engage, must, from various, yet co-operating rea- 
 sons, be very great. As for myself, I am, for the 
 
326 LETTEKS FROM ITALY. 
 
 present, only a sort of link between you and him, 
 until you can know each other, and effectuate the 
 arrangement ; since (to entrust you with a secret 
 which, for your sake, I withhold from Lord Byron) 
 nothing would induce me to share in the profits, 
 and still less, in the borrowed splendour of such a 
 partnership. You and he, in different manners, 
 would be equal, and would bring, in a different 
 manner, but in the same proportion, equal stocks 
 of reputation and success. Do not let my frank- 
 ness with you, nor my belief that you deserve it 
 more than Lord Byron, have the effect of deterring 
 you from assuming a station in modern literature, 
 which the universal voice of my contemporaries 
 forbids me either to stoop or to aspire to. I am, 
 and I desire to be, nothing. 
 
 I did not ask Lord Byron to assist me in sending 
 a remittance for your journey ; because there are 
 men, however excellent, from whom we would 
 never receive an obligation, in the worldly sense of 
 the word ; and I am as jealous for my friend as for 
 myself; but I suppose that I shall at last make up 
 an impudent face, and ask Horace Smith to add to 
 the many obligations he has conferred on me. I 
 know I need only ask. 
 
 I think I have never told you how very much I 
 like your " Amyntas;" it almost reconciles me to 
 
PISA. 327 
 
 translations. In another sense I still demur. You 
 might have written another such poem as the 
 " Nymphs," with no great access of efforts. I am 
 full of thoughts and plans, and should do some- 
 thing, if the feeble and irritable frame which 
 incloses it was willing to obey the spirit. I fancy 
 that then I should do great things. Before this 
 you will have seen " Adonais." Lord BjTon, 
 I suppose from modesty, on account of his being 
 mentioned in it, did not say a word of " Adonais," 
 though he was loud in liis praise of " Prometheus," 
 and, what you will not agree with him in, censure 
 of the " Cenci." Certainly, if " Marino FaHero" 
 is a drama, the " Cenci " is not — but that between 
 ourselves. Lord B}Ton is reformed, as far as 
 gallantry goes, and lives with a beautiful and sen- 
 timental Italian lady, who is as much attached to 
 him as may be. I trust greatly to his intercourse 
 with you, for his creed to become as pure as he 
 thinks his conduct is. He has many generous and 
 exalted qualities, but the canker of aristocracy 
 wants to be cut out. 
 
)28 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 LETTER LIX. 
 
 To HORATIO SMITH, Esq. 
 
 Pisn.Scpi.Mth, 1821. 
 
 My dear Saiitii, 
 
 I CANNOT express tlic pain and disappointment 
 with which I learn the change in your plans, no less 
 than the afflicting cause of it. Florence will no 
 longer have any attractions for me this winter, and 
 I shall contentedly sit down in this humdrum Pisa, 
 and refer to hope and to chance the pleasure I had 
 expected from your society this winter. AVhat 
 shall I do with your packages, which have now, I 
 believe, all arrived at Guebhard's at Leghorn? Is 
 i t not possible that a favourable change in Mrs. S mith's 
 health might produce a corresponding change in 
 your determinations, and would it, or would it not, 
 be premature to forward the packages to your 
 present residence, or to London ? I will pay every 
 possible attention to your instructions in this 
 regard. 
 
 I had marked down several houses in Florence, 
 and one especially on the Arno, a most lovely 
 place, though they asked rather more than perhaps 
 you would have chosen to pay — yet nothing ap- 
 proaching to an English price. — I do not yet 
 
PISA. 329 
 
 entirely give you up. — Indeed, I should be sorry 
 not to hope that Mrs. Smith's state of health would 
 not soon become such, as to remove your principal 
 objection to this delightful climate. I have not, 
 with the exception of three or four days, suffered 
 in the least from the heat this year. Though, it is 
 but fair to confess, that my temperament approaches 
 to that of the salamander. 
 
 Wo expect Lord Byron here in about a 
 fortnight. I have just taken the finest palace 
 in Pisa for him, and his luggage, and his horses, 
 and all his train, are, I believe, already on their 
 way hither. I dare say, you have heard of 
 the life ho led at Venice, rivalling the wise 
 Solomon almost, in the number of his con- 
 cubines. AVell, he is now quite reformed, and 
 is leading a most sober and decent life, as 
 cavaliere servente to a very pretty Italian woman, 
 who has already arrived at Pisa, with her father 
 and her brother, (such are the manners of Italy,) 
 as the jackals of the lion. He is occupied in 
 forming a new drama, and, with views which I 
 doubt not will expand as ho proceeds, is deter- 
 mined to write a series of plays, in which he will 
 follow the French tragedians and Alfieri, rather 
 than those of England and Spain, and produce 
 something new, at least, to England. This seems 
 
330 LETTERS FROM ITALY, 
 
 to me the wrong road ; but genius like his is des- 
 tined to lead and not to follow. He will shake off 
 his shackles as he finds they cramp him. I believe 
 he will produce something very great ; and that 
 familiarity with the dramatic power of human 
 nature, will soon enable him to soften down the 
 severe and unharmonisinof traits of his " Marino 
 Faliero." I think you know Lord Byron person- 
 ally, or is it your brother ? If the latter, I know 
 that he wished particularly to be introduced to 
 you, and that he will sympathise, in some degree, 
 in this great disappointment which I feel in the 
 change, or, as I yet hope, in the pi-orogation of 
 your plans. 
 
 I am glad you like "Adonais," and, particu- 
 larly, that you do not think it metaphysical, 
 which I was afraid it was. I was resolved to pay 
 some tribute of sympathy to the unhonoured dead, 
 but I wrote, as usual, with a total ignorance of the 
 effect that I should produce. — I have not yet seen 
 your pastoral drama ; if you have a copy, could you 
 favour me with it ? It will be six months before I 
 shall receive it from England. I have heard it 
 spoken of with high praise, and I have the greatest 
 curiosity to see it. 
 
 The Gisbornes promised to buy me some books in 
 Paris, and I had asked you to be kind enough to 
 
PISA. 331 
 
 advance them what they might want to pay for 
 them. I cannot conceive why they did not execute 
 this little commission for me, as they knew how 
 very much I wished to receive these books by the 
 same conveyance as the filtering-stone. Dare I 
 ask you to do mc the favour to buy them ? A 
 complete edition of the loorks of Caldcron, and the 
 French translation of Kant, a German Faust, and to 
 add the Nympholcpt? — I am indifferent as to a little 
 more or less expense, so that I may have them im- 
 mediately. I will send you an order on Paris for 
 the amount, together with the thirty-two francs 
 you were kind enough to pay for me. 
 
 All public attention is now centred on the won- 
 derful revolution in Greece. I dare not, after the 
 events of last winter, hope that slaves can become 
 freemen so cheaply ; yet I know one Greek of the 
 highest qualities, both of courage and conduct, the 
 Prince Mavrocordato, and if the rest be like him, 
 all will go well. — The news of this moment is, that 
 the Russian army has orders to advance. 
 
 Mrs. S. unites with me in the most heartfelt 
 regret, 
 
 And I remain, my dear Smith, 
 
 Most faithfully yours, 
 
 P. B. S. 
 
 If you happen to have brought a copy of Clarke's 
 
832 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 rdition of Queen j\Iab for mc, I should like very 
 well to see it. — I really hardly know what this poem 
 is about, I am afraid it is rather rough. 
 
 LETTER LX. 
 
 To JOHN GISBORNE, Esq. 
 
 Pisa, October 12, 1821. 
 My dear Gisborne, 
 
 At length the post brings a welcome letter from 
 you, and I am pleased to be assured of your health 
 and safe arrival. I expect with interest and 
 anxiety the intelligence of your progress in Eng- 
 land, and how far the advantages there, compen- 
 sate the loss of Italy. I heat from Hunt that he 
 is determined on emigration, and if I thought the 
 letter would arrive in time, I should beg you to 
 suggest some advice to him. But you ought to be 
 incapable of forgiving me the fact of depriving 
 England of what it must lose when Hunt departs. 
 
 Did I tell you that Lord Byron comes to settle 
 at Pisa, and that he has a plan of writing a perio- 
 dical work in conjunction with Hunt I His house, 
 Madame Felichi's, is already taken and fitted up 
 for him, and he has been expected every day these 
 
PISA. 833 
 
 six weeks. La Guiccioli, who awaits him impa- 
 tiently, is a very pretty, sentimental, innocent 
 Italian, who has sacrificed an immense fortune for 
 the sake of Lord Byron, and who, if I know any 
 thing of my friend, of her and of human nature, 
 will hereafter have plenty of leisure and opportu- 
 nity to repent her rashness. Lord Byron is, how- 
 ever, quite cured of his gross habits, as far as 
 habits ; the perverse ideas on which they were 
 formed, are not yet eradicated. 
 
 We have furnished a house at Pisa, and mean 
 to make it our head-quarters. I shall get all my 
 books out, and entrench myself like a spider in a 
 web. If you can assist P. in sending them to 
 Leghorn, you would do me an especial Tavour ; but 
 do not buy me Calderon, Faust, or Kant, as H. S. 
 promises to send them me from Paris, where I 
 suppose you had not time to procure them. Any 
 other books, you or Henry think would accord 
 with my design. Oilier will furnish you with. 
 
 I should like very much to hear what is said of 
 my Adonais, and you would oblige me by cutting 
 out, or making Oilier cut out, any respectable 
 criticism on it, and sending it me ; you know I do 
 not mind a crown or two in postage. The Epipsy- 
 chidlon is a mystery ; as to real flesh and blood, 
 you know that I do not deal in those articles ; you 
 
334 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 might as well go to a gin-shop for a leg of mutton, 
 as expect any thing human or earthly from me. 
 I desired Oilier not to circulate this piece except 
 to the (TvveToi, and even they, it seems, are in- 
 clined to approximate me to the circle of a servant 
 jrirl and her sweetheart. But I intend to write a 
 Symposium of my own to set all this right. 
 
 I am just finishing a dramatic poem, called 
 Hellas, upon the contest now raging in Greece — 
 a sort of imitation of the Persse of ^Eschylus, full 
 of lyrical poetry. I try to be what I might have 
 been, but am not successful. I find that (I dare 
 say I shall quote wrong,) 
 
 " Den herrliclisten, den sich der Gcist emprangt 
 Drangt immcr fiemd and fiemder Stoff sicli an." 
 
 The Edinburgh Review lies. Godwin's answer 
 to Malthus is victorious and decisive ; and that 
 it should not be generally acknowledged as such, 
 is full evidence of the influence of successful evil 
 and tyranny. What Godwin is, compared to 
 Plato and Lord Bacon, we well know ; but com- 
 pared with these miserable sciolists, he is a vulture 
 to a worm. 
 
 I read the Greek dramatists and Plato for ever. 
 You are right about Antigone; how sublime a 
 picture of a woman ! and what think you of the 
 choruses, and especially the lyrical complaints of 
 
PISA. 335 
 
 the godlike victim ? and the menaces of Tiresias, 
 and their rapid fulfihnent ? Some of us have, in a 
 prior existence, been in love with an Antigone, 
 and that makes us find no full content in any 
 mortal tie. As to books, I advise you to live 
 near the British Museum, and read there. I have 
 read, since I saw you, the " Jungfrau von Orleans " 
 of Schiller, — a fine play, if the fifth act did not fall 
 off. Some Greeks, escaped from the defeat in 
 Wallachia, have passed through Pisa to re- 
 embark at Leghorn for the Morea; and the Tuscan 
 Government allowed them, during their stay and 
 passage, three lire each per day and their lodging; 
 that is good. Remember me and Mary most 
 kindly to j\Irs. Gisborne and Henry, and believe 
 me, 
 
 Yours most affectionately, 
 
 P. B. S. 
 
 LETTER LXL 
 
 To JOHN GISBORNE, Esq. 
 
 Pisa, April 10, 1822. 
 
 My deae Gisborne, 
 I HAVE received Hellas, which is px-ettily printed, 
 and with fewer mistakes than any poem I ever 
 
o36 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 published. Am I to thank you for the revision of 
 the press ? or who acted as midwife to this last of 
 my orphans, introducing it to oblivion, and me to 
 my accustomed failure ? May the cause it cele- 
 brates be more fortunate than either ! Tell me 
 how you like Hellas, and give me your opinion 
 freely. It was written without much care, and in 
 one of those few moments of enthusiasm which 
 now seldom visit me, and which make me pay 
 dear for their visits. I know what to think of 
 Adonais, but what to think of those who confound 
 it with the many bad poems of the day, I know 
 not. 
 
 I have been reading over and over again Faust, 
 and always with sensations which no other com- 
 position excites. It deepens the gloom and aug- 
 ments the rapidity of ideas, and would therefore 
 seem to me an unfit study for any person who is a 
 prey to the reproaches of memory, and the delu- 
 sions of an imagination not to be restrained. And 
 yet the pleasure of sympathising with emotions 
 known only to few, altliough they derive their sole 
 charm from despair, and the scorn of the narrow 
 good we can attain in our present state, seems 
 more than to ease the pain which belongs to them. 
 Perhaps all discontent with the less (to use a Pla- 
 tonic sophism,) supposes the sense of a just claim to 
 
PISA. 337 
 
 the greater^ and that we admirers of Faust are on 
 the right road to Paradise. Such a supposition is 
 not more absurd, and is certainly less demoniacal 
 than that of ^Vordsworth, where he says — 
 
 '< Tins earth, 
 AVliich is the world of all of lis, and where 
 We find our happiness, or not at all," 
 
 As if, after sixty years'" suffering here, we were to 
 bo roasted alive for sixty million more in hell, or 
 charitably annihilated by a coup- de-grace of the 
 bungler who brousiht us into existence at first ! 
 
 Have you read Caldcron's Magico Prodigioso ? 
 I find a striking similarity between Faust and 
 this drama, and if I were to acknowledge Cole- 
 ridge's distinction, should say Goethe was the 
 greatest philosopher, and Calderon the greatest 
 poet. Cyprian evidently furnished the germ of 
 Faust, as Faust may furnish the germ of other 
 poems ; although it is as different from it in 
 structure and plan as the acorn from the oak. I 
 have — imagine my presumption — translated several 
 scenes from both, as the basis of a paper for our 
 journal. I am well content with those from Cal- 
 deron, which in fact gave me very little trouble ; 
 but those from Faust — I feel how imperfect a re- 
 presentation, even with all the licence I assume to 
 figure to myself how Goethe would have written. 
 
 VOL. II. Q 
 
338 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 in English, my words convey. No one but Cole- 
 ridge is capable of this work. 
 
 We have seen here a translation of some scenes, 
 and indeed the most remarkable ones, accompany- 
 ing those astonishing etchings which have been 
 published in England from a German master. It 
 is not bad — and faithful enough — but how weak ! 
 how incompetent to represent Faust ! I have 
 only attempted the scenes omitted in this transla- 
 tion, and would send you that of the Walpurgis- 
 nacht, if I thought Oilier would place the postage 
 to my account. What etchings those are ! I am 
 never satiated with looking at them ; and, I fear, it 
 is the only sort of translation of which Faust is 
 susceptible. I never perfectly understood the 
 Hartz Mountain scene, until I saw the etching ; 
 and then, Margaret in the summer-house with 
 Faust ! The artist makes one envy his happiness 
 that he can sketch such things with calmness, 
 which I only dared look upon once, and which 
 made my brain swim round only to touch the leaf 
 on the opposite side of which I knew that it was 
 figured. Whether it is that the artist has sur- 
 passed Faust, or that the pencil surpasses language 
 in some subjects, I know not, or that I am more 
 affected by a visible image, but the etching certainly 
 excited me far more than the poem it illustrated. 
 
PISA. 339 
 
 Do you remember the fifty-fourth letter of the first 
 part of the " Nouvelle Heloise V Goethe, in a sub- 
 sequent scene, evidently had that letter in his mind, 
 and this etching is an idealism of it. So much 
 for the world of shadows ! 
 
 What think you of Lord Byron's last volume ? 
 In my opinion it contains finer poetry than has 
 appeared in England since the publication of 
 Paradise Regained. Cain is apocalj-ptic— it is a 
 revelation not before communicated to man. I 
 write nothing but by fits. T have done some of 
 Charles I. ; but although the poetry succeeded very 
 well, I cannot seize on the conception of the subject 
 as a whole, and seldom now touch the canvas. 
 You know I don't think much about Reviews, nor 
 of the fame they give, nor that they take away. It 
 is absurd in any Review to criticise Adonais, and 
 still more to pretend that the verses are bad. 
 Prometheus was never intended for more than five 
 or six persons. 
 
 And how arc you getting on ? Do your plans 
 still want success ? Do you regret Italy ? or any 
 thing that Italy contains ? And in case of an 
 entire failure in your expectations, do you think of 
 returning here ? You see the first blow has been 
 made at funded- property : — do you intend to con- 
 fide and invite a second ? You would already have 
 q2 
 
340 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 saved something per cent., if you had invested 
 your property in Tuscan land. The next best 
 thing would be to invest it in English, and reside 
 upon it. I tremble for the consequences, to you 
 personally, from a prolonged confidence in the 
 funds. Justice, policy, the hopes of the nation 
 and renewed institutions, demand your ruin, and I, 
 for one, cannot bring myself to desire what is in 
 itself desirable, till you are free. You see how 
 liberal I am of advice ; but you know the motives 
 that suggest it. What is Henry about, and how 
 are his prospects ? Tell him that some adventurers 
 are engaged upon a steam -boat at Leghorn, to 
 make the ti^ajet we projected. I hope he is chari- 
 table enough to pray that they may succeed better 
 
 than we did. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 Remember me most affectionately to Mrs. Gis- 
 borne, to whom, as well as to yourself, I consider 
 that this letter is written. How is she, and how are 
 you all in health I And pray tell me, what arc 
 your plans of life, and how Henry succeeds, and 
 whether he is married or not ? How can I send 
 you such small sums as you may want for postages, 
 &c. for I do not mean to tax with my unreasonable 
 letters both your purse and your patience ? We 
 go this summer to Spezzia ; but direct as ever to 
 
PISA. 341 
 
 Pisa, — Mrs. will forward our letters. If you 
 
 see anything which you think would particularly 
 interest me, pray make Oilier pay for sending it 
 out by post. Give my best and affectionate regards 
 to H — ■ — , to whom I do not write at present, 
 imagining that you will give him a piece of this 
 letter. 
 
 Ever most faithfully yours, 
 
 P. B. S. 
 
 LETTER LXII. 
 
 To C. T., Esq, 
 
 Pisa, April Uih, 1822. 
 !My dear T' , 
 
 I HAVE, as yet, received neither the * * *, nor 
 his metaphysical companions — Thne^ my Lord, has 
 a xcallct on his hack^ and I suppose he has bagged 
 them by the way. As he has had a good deal of 
 alms for oblivion out of me, I think he misrht as 
 well have favoured me this once ; I have, indeed, 
 just dropped another mite into his treasury, called 
 Hellas, which I know not \\o\y to send to you ; but 
 I dare say, some fury of the Hades of authors will 
 bring one to Paris. It is a poem written on the 
 
342 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 Greek cause last summer — a sort of l}Tical, dra- 
 matic, nondescript piece of business. 
 
 You will have heard of a row we have had here, 
 which, I dare say, will grow to a serious size 
 before it arrives at Paris, It was, in fact, a 
 trifling piece of business enough, arising from an 
 insult of a drunken dragoon, offered to one of our 
 party, and only serious, because one of Lord B.'s 
 servants wounded the fellow dangerously with a 
 pitchfork. He is now, however, recovering, and 
 the echo of the affair will be heard long after the 
 original report has ceased. 
 
 Lord Byron has read me one or two letters of 
 Moore to him,* in which Moore speaks with great 
 kindness of me ; and, of course, I cannot but feel 
 flattered by the approbation of a man, my in- 
 feriority to whom I am proud to acknowledge. — 
 Amongst other things, however, Moore, after 
 giving Lord B. much good advice about public 
 opinion, &c., seems to deprecate my influence on 
 his mind, on the subject of religion, and to attri- 
 bute the tone assumed in " Cain" to my suggestions. 
 Moore cautions him against my influence on this 
 particular, with the most friendly zeal ; and it is 
 
 * For Mr. Moore's account of Ibis incident, and bis own feelings 
 and opinions on the subject — those imputed to him by Shelley being 
 purely conjectural — see Moore's Life of Byron, Vol. II. p. 584, first 
 edition. 
 
PISA. 343 
 
 plain that his motive springs from a desire of bene- 
 fitting Lord B., without degrading me. I think 
 you know Moore. Pray, assure him, that I have 
 not the smallest influence over Lord Byron, in this 
 particular, and if I had, I certainly should employ 
 it to eradicate from his great mind the delusions of 
 Christianity, which, in spite of his reason, seem 
 perpetually to recur, and to lay in ambush for the 
 hours of sickness and distress. " Cain" was con- 
 ceived many years ago, and begun before I saw him 
 last year at Ravenna. How happy should I not 
 be to attribute to myself, however indirectly, any 
 participation in that immortal work ! — I differ 
 with Moore in thinking Christianity useful to the 
 woi'ld ; no man of sense can think it true ; and the 
 alliance of the monstrous superstitions of the popu- 
 lar worship with the pure doctrines of the Theism 
 of such a man as JNIoorc, turns to the profit of the 
 former, and makes the latter the fountain of its 
 own pollution. I agree with him that the doc- 
 trines of the French, and Material Philosophy, are 
 as false as they are pernicious ; but, still, they are 
 better than Christianity, inasmuch as anarchy is 
 better than despotism ; for this reason, that the 
 former is for a season, and that the latter is eternal. 
 My admiration of the character, no less than of the 
 genius of Moore, makes me rather wish that he 
 should not have an ill opinion of me. 
 
o4J< LETTERS FROM ITALY, 
 
 Where are you ? We settle this summer near 
 Spezzia; Lord B)Ton at Leghorn, ]\Iay not I 
 hope to see you even for a trip in Italy ? I hope 
 your wife and little ones are well. Mine grows a 
 line boy, and is quite well. 
 
 I have contrived to get my musical coals at New- 
 castle itself. — My dear T , believe me, 
 
 Faithfully yours, 
 
 P. B. S. 
 
 LETTER LXIIL 
 
 To Mrs, SHELLEY. 
 (at spezzia.) 
 \_Lerici, Sunday, Jpril -ISlh, 1822.] 
 
 Dearest Maky, 
 
 I AM this moment arrived at Lerici, where I am 
 necessarily detained, waiting the furniture, which 
 left Pisa last night at midnight ; and as the sea has 
 been calm, and the wind fair, I may expect them 
 every moment. It would not do to leave affairs 
 here in an impiccio, great as is my anxiety to see 
 you. — How are you, my best love ? How have 
 you sustained the trials of the journey 1 Answer 
 me this question, and how my little babe and 
 C * * * are. 
 
 Now to business : — Is the Magni House taken ? 
 
LERICI. 345 
 
 if not, pray occupy yourself instantly in finishing 
 the affiiir, even if you are obliged to go to Sarzana, 
 and send a messenger to me to tell me of your 
 success. I, of course, cannot leave Lerici, to which 
 place the boats, (for we were obliged to take two,) 
 are directed. But you can come over in the same 
 boat that brings this letter, and return in the 
 evening. 
 
 I ought to say that I do not think that there is 
 accommodation for you all atthis inn; and that, even 
 if there were, you would bo better off at Spezzia; 
 but if the Magni House is taken, then there is no 
 possible reason why you should not take a row 
 over in the boat that will bring this — but don't 
 keep the men long. I am anxious to hear from 
 
 you on every account.* 
 
 Ever yours, 
 
 S. 
 
 * I insert a few extracts from the Journal of Williams, as affording 
 a picture of Sliellcv's habits during these last months of his life. How 
 full he was of hope, life and love, when lost to us for ever ! 
 
 " Sunday, April 28th. 
 *' Fine. Arrive at Lerici at 1 o'clock — the harbour-master called. 
 Not a house to be had. On our telling him we had brought our fur- 
 niture, his face lengthened considerably, for he informed us that the 
 dogana would amount to £300 English, at least. Dined, and resolved 
 on sending our things back without unlading — in fact, found ourselves 
 in a devil of a mess. S. wrote to JIary, whom we heard was at Spezzia. 
 
 " Monday, 2Dth. 
 " Cloudy. Accompanied the harbour-master to the chief of the 
 Q 3 
 
§46 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 LETTER LXIV. 
 
 To HORATIO SMITH, Esq. 
 
 (yersailles.) 
 
 Lerici, May, 1822. 
 My dear Smith, 
 
 It is some time since I have heard from you ; 
 
 are you still at Versailles? Do you still cling 
 
 customs at Spezzia. Found him exceedingly polite, and willing to do 
 all that lay in his power to assist us. He will, therefore, take on him- 
 self to allow the furniture to come on shore when the boats arrive, and 
 then consider our house as a sort of depot, until further leave from the 
 Genoa government. Returned to Lerici somewhat calmed. Heard 
 from Mary at Sai-zana, that she had concluded for Casa Magni — but 
 
 for ourselves no hope. 
 
 " Wednesday, May \st. 
 
 '' Cloudy, with rain. Came to Casa Magni after breakliist ; the 
 
 Shelleys having contrived to give us rooms. Without them, heaven 
 
 knows what we should have done. Employed all day putting the 
 
 things away. All comfortably settled by four. Passed the evening in 
 
 talking over our folly and our troubles. 
 
 " Thursday, May Id. 
 
 " Cloudy, with intervals of rain. Went out with Shelley in the 
 
 boat — fish on the rocks — bad sport. Went in the evening after some 
 
 wild ducks — saw nothing but sublime scenery, to which the grandeur 
 
 of a storm greatly contributed. 
 
 " Friday, May M. 
 
 " Fine. The captain of the port despatched a vessel for Shelley's 
 boat. Went to Lerici with S., being obliged to market there ; the servant 
 having returned from Sarzana without being able to procure anything. 
 
 " Saturday, May ith. 
 
 " Fine. Went fishing with Shelley. No sport. Loitered away 
 the whole day. In the evening tried the rocks again, and had no 
 less than thirty baits taken off by the small fish. Returned late 
 
LERICI. 347 
 
 to France, and prefer the arts and conveniences of 
 that over- civilised country to the beautiful nature 
 
 — a, heavy swell getting up. I think if there are no tides in the 
 Mediterranean, that there are strong currents, on which the moon, both 
 at the full and at the change, has a very powerful effect ; the swell 
 this evening is evidently caused by her influence, for it is quite calm 
 at sea. 
 
 " Sunday, May 5th. 
 " Fine. Kept awake the whole night by a heavy swell, which made 
 a noise on the beach like tlie discharge of heavy artillery. Tried with 
 Shelley to launch the small flat-bottomed boat through the surf; we 
 succeeded in pushing it through, but shipped a sea on attempting to 
 land. Walk to Lerici along the beach, by a winding path on the moun- 
 tain's side. Delightful evening — the scenery most sublime. 
 
 •' Monday, May 6lh. 
 
 "Fine. Some heavy drops of rain fell to-day, without a cloud 
 being visible. Made a sketch of the western side of the bay. Read a 
 little. Walked with Jane up the mountain. 
 
 After tea walking with Shelley on the terrace, and observing the 
 effect of moonshine on the waters, he complained of being unusuall}' 
 nervous, and stopping short, he grasped me violently by the arm, and 
 stared stcdfastly on the white surf that broke upon the beach under our 
 feet. Observing him sensibly affected, I demanded of him if he were 
 in pain ? But he only answered, by saying, ' There it is again — 
 there!' He recovered after some time, and declared that he saw, as 
 plainly as he then saw me, a naked child, ((he child of a friend who 
 had lately died,) rise from the sea, and clap its hands as in joy, smiling 
 at him. This was a trance that it required some reasoning and philo- 
 sophy entirely to awaken bim from, so forcibly had the vision operated 
 on his mind. Our conversation, which had been at first rather melan- 
 choly, led to this ; and my confirming his sensations, by confessing 
 that I had felt the same, gave greater activity to his ever- wandering and 
 lively imagination. 
 
 " Sunday, May \2th. 
 
 " Cloudy and threatening weather. Wrote during the morning. Mr. 
 
S-iS LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 and mighty remains of Italy ? As to me, like 
 Anacreon's swallow, I have left my Nile, and have 
 
 !Maglian, (harbour-master at Lerici), called after dinner, and while 
 
 Avalking with him on the terrace, we discovered a strange sail coining 
 
 round tlie point of Porto Venere, which proved at length to be Shelley's 
 
 boat. She had left Genoa on Thursday, but had been driven back by 
 
 prevailing bad winds. A Mr. Hcslop, and two English seamen brought 
 
 her round, and they speak most highly of her performances. She docs, 
 
 indeed, excite my surprise and admiration. Shelley and T walked to 
 
 Lerici, and made a stretch off the land to try her, and I find she fetches 
 
 whatever she looks at. lu short, wc have now a perfect plaything for 
 
 the summer. 
 
 " Monday, May VMh. 
 
 " Rain during night in torrents — a heavy gale of wind from SW. 
 and a surf running heavier than ever; at 4 gale unabated, violent squalls. 
 Walked to Lerici with Shelley and went on board. Called on M. 
 Maglian ; and found him anxiously awaiting the moment of a third 
 child's birth. In the evening an electric arch forming in the clouds 
 announces a heavy thunder storm, if the wind lulls. Distant 
 thunder — gale increases — a circle of foam surrounds the bay — dark, 
 rainy, and tempestuous, with flashes of lightning at intervals, which 
 give us no hope of better weather. The learned in these things say, 
 that it generally lasts three days when once it commences as this has 
 done. We .".11 feel as if we were on board ship — and the roaring of 
 the sea brings this idea to us even in our beds. 
 
 " Tuesday, May I4th. 
 
 "Clear weather, and the breeze greatly moderated, contrary to all 
 the expectations and the prophecies of these would-be sailors — these 
 weather-wise landsmen. While dressing this morning, I saw the boat, 
 under easy sail, bearing on and olT land. At 9 we took her down, under 
 top- sails and flying jib, to Spezzia ; and, after tacking round some of the 
 craft there, returned to Lerici in an hour and a half— a distance, they 
 say, of four leagues. On our return, we were hailed by a servant of 
 
 Count S , a minister of the Emperor of Austria, who scut desiring 
 
 to have a sail ; but before he could get on board, the wind had lulled 
 into a perfect calm, and we only got into the swell, and made him sick. 
 
LERICl. 349 
 
 taken up my summer quarters here, in a lonely 
 house close by the sea-side, surrounded by the soft 
 
 " Wednesday, May \hth. 
 " Fine and fresh breeze in puffs from the land. Jane and Mary 
 consent to take a sail. Run down to Porto Vencrc and beat back at 
 1 o'clock. The boat sailed like a witch. After the late gale, the 
 water is covered with purple nautili, or as the sailors call them, 
 'Portuguese men-of-war.' After dinner, Jane accompanied us to the 
 point of the M;igra ; and the boat heat back in wonderful style. 
 
 " Saturday, May 18</(. 
 "Fine fresh breeze. Sailed with Shelley to the outer island, and 
 iind that there is another small one beyond, which we have named the 
 Sirens' rock. This name was chosen in consequence of hearing, at the 
 time we were beating to windward to weather it, a sort of murmuring, 
 which, as if by magic, seemed to proceed from all parts of our boat, now 
 <iu the sea, now here, now there. At length we found that a very small 
 rope (or cord rather) had been fastened to steady the peak when the 
 boat was at anchor, and being drawn extremely tight with the weight 
 of the sail, it vibrated as the wind freshened. Being on the other tack 
 as we approached, it ceased, and again as wc stood off it recommenced 
 its song. Tiie Sirens' ishuid was well named; for standing in close to 
 observe it, from a strong current setting towards it, the boat was actually 
 attracted so close, that we had only lime to tuck, and save ourselves 
 from its alluring voice. 
 
 " Wednesday, May 22d. 
 , "■ Fine, after a threatening night. After breakfast Sliellcy and I 
 amused ourselves with trying to make a boat of canvas and reeds, as 
 light and as small as ]iossiblc — she is to bo eight and a half feet long, 
 and four and a half broad. 
 
 « Sunday, May 26lh. 
 
 " Cloudy. Rose at six, and went with Shelley and Maglian to 
 
 Massa. The landing-place, or rather the beach, which is about three 
 
 miles from the town, affords no kind of shelter, but where there is a 
 
 continued sea running. A little to the left of the second gun-battery, 
 
OOO LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 and sublimo scenery of the gulf of Spezzia. I 
 do not M'rite ; I have lived too long near Lord 
 
 is a shelf running parallel to the beach, at the termination of which 
 five feet water may be had. This shelf is indicated by the shortness 
 and frequency of the surf, and the deep water by a partial cessation of 
 it. It is necessary before any effort is made to work her in — to send 
 a strong stcrnfast on shore for this purpose, as the current of the 
 Magra sets forcibly to the eastward, and sweeps her suddenly into the 
 surf beyond. We dined at Massa, and left it again at ten minutes past 
 four, with a strong westerly wind straight in our teeth. This wind, 
 (the Ponente as it is called) always sends a damp vapour from the sea, 
 which gathers into watery clouds on the mountain tops, and generally 
 sinks with the sun, but strengthens as he declines. To the landing- 
 place it is said to be fifteen miles to Lerici. We left the latter place 
 at a little past eight and arrived at eleven, and returned in seven 
 
 hours. 
 
 " Thursday, June 6th. 
 
 " Calm. Left Villa Magni, at five, on our way to Via Reggio. At 
 eight the wind sprung up, baffling in all directions but the right one. 
 At eleven we could steer our course ; but at one it fell calm, and left 
 us like a log on the water, but four miles to windward of Massa. We 
 remained there till six ; the thunder -clouds gathering on the moun- 
 tains around, and threatening to burst in squalls ; heat excessive. At 
 seven rowed into Massa beach — but on attempting to land, we^ were 
 opposed by the guard, who told us that the head person of the fort (of 
 two rusty gims) being at Festa, that, as he was not able to read, we 
 must wait till the former arrived. Not willing to put up with such 
 treatment, Shelley told him at his peril to detain us, when the fellow 
 brought down two old muskets, and we prepared our pistols, which he 
 no sooner saw we were determined to use, than he called our servant 
 to the beach, and desiring him to hold the paper about a yard from him, 
 he sufi^ered two gentlemen who were bathing near the place to explain 
 who and what we were. Upon this, the fellow's tone changed from 
 presumption to the most cowardly fawning, and we proceeded to 
 Massa unmolested. Slept at Massa, about three miles inland. 
 
LERICI, 351 
 
 Byron, and the sun has extinguished the glow- 
 worm; for I cannot hope, with St. John, that " the 
 light came into the world, and the world knew it 
 noty 
 
 " Friday, 'June 7th. 
 " Left Massa at half-past five — a dead calm, the atmosphere hot aad 
 oppressive. At eight a breeze sprung up, which enabled us to lie up 
 to Magra Point. Beat round the point and reached home at half- 
 past two. 
 
 " Wednesday, June \'2th. 
 
 " Launched the little boat, -which answered our wishes and expecta- 
 tions. She is 86 lbs. English weight, and stows easily on board. 
 Sailed in the evening, but were becalmed in the offing, and left there 
 with a long ground swell, which made Jane little better than dead. 
 Hoisted out our little boat and brought her on shore. Her landing 
 
 attended by the whole village. 
 
 " Thursday, June YZth. 
 
 " Fine. At nine, saw a vessel between the straits of Porto Vencre. 
 like a man-of-war brig. She proved to be the Bolivar, with Roberts 
 and Trelawny on board, who are taking her round to Livorno. On 
 meeting thcni we were saluted by six guns. Sailed together to try the 
 vessels — in speed no chance witli her, but I think we keep as good a 
 wind. She is the most beautiful craft 1 ever saw, and will do more 
 for her size. Slie costs Lord Byron .£750 clear off and ready for sea, 
 with provisions and conveniences of every kind. 
 
 ** Wednesday, June \9th. 
 
 " Fine. The swell continues, and I am now the more persuaded 
 that the moon influences the tides liere, particularly the new moon, on 
 the first week before she makes her appearance. Took the ballast 
 out and hauled the boat on the beach. Cleaned and greased her. 
 
 " Thursday. June 20th. 
 
 " Fine. Shelley hears from Hunt that he is arrived at Genoa : 
 having sailed from England on the 13th ilay. 
 
 " Saturday, June 22d. 
 
 " Calm. Heat overpowering, but in the shade refreshed by the 
 
852 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 The object of my present letter is, however, 
 a request, and as it concerns that most odious of 
 all subjects, money, I will put it in the shortest 
 shape — Godwin's law-suit, he tells us, is decided 
 against him; and he is adjudged to pay 900/. 
 He writes, of course, to his daughter in the 
 greatest distress : but we have no money except 
 our income, nor any means of procuring it. My 
 wife has sent him her novel, which is now finished, 
 the copyright of which will probably bring him 
 o or 400/. — as Oilier offered the former sum for it, 
 but as he i-equired a considerable delay for the 
 payment, she rejected his offer. Now, what I 
 wish to know is, whether you could with conve- 
 nience lend me the 400/. which you once dedicated 
 to this service, and allow Godwin to have it, under 
 the precautions and stipulations which I formerly 
 annexed to its employment. You could not 
 obviously allow this money to lie idle waiting for 
 this event, without interest. I forgot this part of 
 the business till this instant, and now I reflect that 
 
 sea breeze. At seven launclied our boat, witb all Iier ballast in. She 
 floats three inches lighter than before. This ilifFerencc is caused, I 
 imagine, by her planks having dried while on shore. 
 
 " Thursday, June 27th. 
 ' " Fine. The heat increases daily, and prayers are offering for raip. 
 At Parma, it is now so excessive that the labourers are forbidden to 
 •work in the fields after ten and before five, fearful of an epidemic." 
 
LERICI, 353 
 
 1 ought to have assured you of the regular pay- 
 ment of interest, which I omitted to mention, 
 considering it a matter of course. 
 
 I can easily imagine that circumstances may 
 have arisen to make this loan inconvenient or 
 impossible — in any case, believe me, 
 
 My dear Smith, 
 Yours very gratefully and faithfully, 
 
 
 
 p. B. Shelley. 
 
 LETTER 
 
 ToC.T 
 
 My DEAR T., 
 
 # * # 
 
 * * * 
 
 LXV. 
 
 J.erici, June 29lh, 1822. 
 
 * * 
 
 * * 
 
 Phay thank Mooro for his obligini;: messao-e. T 
 wish I could as easily convey my sense of his genius 
 and character. I should have written to him on 
 the subject of my late letter, but that I doubted 
 how far I was justified in doing so ; although, in- 
 deed. Lord Byron made no secret of his commu- 
 nication to me. It seems to me that things have 
 now arrived at such a crisis as requires every man 
 plainly to utter his sentiments on the inefficacy of 
 
354 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 the existing religion, no less than political systems, 
 for restraining and guiding mankind. Let us see 
 the truth, whatever that may be. The destiny 
 of man can scarcely bo so degraded, that he 
 was born only to die ; and if such should be the 
 case, delusions, especially the gross and prepos- 
 terous ones of the existing religion, can scarcely 
 be supposed to exalt it. If every man said what 
 he thought, it could not subsist a day. But all, 
 more or less, subdue themselves to the element 
 that surrounds them, and contribute to the evils they 
 lament by the hypocrisy that springs from them. 
 
 England appears to bo in a desperate con- 
 dition, Ireland still worse ; and no class of those 
 who subsist on the public labour will be persuaded 
 that their claims on it must be diminished. But 
 the government must content itself with less in 
 taxes, the landholder must submit to receive less 
 rent, and the fundholder a diminished interest, or 
 they will all get nothing. I once thought to study 
 these affairs, and write or act in them. I am glad 
 that my good genius said, refrain. I see little 
 public virtue, and I foresee that the contest will 
 be one of blood and gold, two elements which how- 
 ever much to my taste in my pockets and my 
 veins, I have an objection to out of them. 
 
 Lord Byron continues at Leghorn, and has just re- 
 
LERICl. 355 
 
 ceived from Genoa a most beautiful little yacht,which 
 he caused to be built there. He has written two 
 new cantos of Don Juan, but I have not seen them. 
 I have just received a letter from Hunt, who has 
 arrived at Genoa. As soon as I hear that he has 
 sailed, I shall weigh anchor in my little schooner, 
 and give him chase to Leghorn, when I must occupy 
 myself in some arrangements for him with Lord 
 Byron. Between ourselves, I greatly fear that this 
 alliance will not succeed ; for I, who could never 
 have been regarded as moi'o than the link of the 
 two thunderbolts, cannot now consent to be even 
 that ; and how long the alliance may continue, I 
 will not prophecy. Pray do not hint my doubts 
 on the subject to any one, or they might do harm 
 to Hunt ; and they may be groundless. 
 
 I still inhabit this divine bay, reading Spanish 
 dramas, and sailing and listening to the most en- 
 chanting music. We have some friends on a visit 
 to us, and my only regret is that the summer must 
 ever pass, or that Mary has not the same predi- 
 lection for this place that I have, which would 
 induce me never to shift my quarters. 
 
 Farewell. — Believe me ever your 
 Affectionate friend, 
 
 P. B. Shelley. 
 
356 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 LETTER LXVI. 
 
 To :Mrs. WILLIAMS. 
 
 (CASA MAGNI.) 
 
 Pisa, July 4, 1822. 
 
 You will probably sec Williams before I can* 
 disentangle myself from the affairs with which I 
 
 " Alonday, July 1 st. 
 * " Calm and clear. Rose at 4 to get the top-sails altered. At 12 a 
 fine breeze from the westward tempted us to weigh for Leghorn. At 
 2 stretched across to Lcrici to pick up Roberts ; and at half-past found 
 ourselves in the ofBng, with a side wind. At half-past 9 arrived at 
 Leghorn — a run of forty-five to fifty miles in seven hours and 
 a half. Anchored astern the Bolivar, from which we procured cushions 
 and made up for ourselves a bed on board, not being able to get on 
 shore after sunset, on account of the health office being shut at that 
 hour. 
 
 " Tuesday, 2d. 
 
 " Fine weather. We heard this morning that the Bolivar was about 
 to sail for Genoa, and that Lord Byron was quitting Tuscany, on 
 account of Count Gamba's family having again been exiled thence. 
 This, on reaching the shore, I found really to be the case ; for they 
 ]iad just left the police-office, having there received the order. Met 
 Lord Byron at Dunn's, and took leave of him. AVas introduced to Mr. 
 Leigh Hunt, and called on Mrs. Hunt. Shopped and strolled about all 
 day. Met Lieutenant Marsham, of the Rochefort, an old school- 
 fellow and shipmate. 
 
 " Wednesday, ,'](/. 
 
 " Fine strong sea-breeze. 
 
 " Thursday, Ath. 
 
 " Fine. Processions of priests and rcligiosi have for several days 
 been active in tlieir prayers for rain ; but the gods are either angry, or 
 nature is too powerful. 
 
PISA. 357 
 
 am now surrounded. I return to Leghorn to-night, 
 and shall urge him to sail with the first fair wind, 
 without expecting me. I have thus the pleasure 
 of contributing to your happiness when deprived of 
 every other, and of leaving you no other subject 
 of regret, but the absence of one scarcely woiih 
 regretting. I fear you are solitary and melancholy 
 at Villa ]Magni, and, in the intervals of the greater 
 and more serious distress in which T am compelled 
 to sympathise here, I figure to myself the counte- 
 nance which had been the source of such consola- 
 tion to me, shadowed by a veil of sorrow. 
 
 How soon those hours passed, and how slowly 
 they return, to pass so soon again, perhaps for ever, 
 in which we have lived together so intimately, so 
 happily ! Adieu, my dearest friend ! I only write 
 these lines for the pleasure of tracing what will 
 meet your eyes. Mary will tell you all the news. 
 
 S. 
 
358 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 LETTER LXVII. 
 
 To ]Mrs. SHELLEY, 
 
 (CASA MAGNI.) 
 
 Pisa, July 4, 1 G22. 
 
 My Deahest Mary, 
 I have received both your letters, and shall 
 attend to the instructions they convey. I did not 
 think of buying the Bolivar; Lord B. wishes to 
 sell her, but I imagine would prefer ready money. 
 I have as yet made no inquiries about houses near 
 Pugnano — I have no moment of time to spare 
 from Hunt's affairs ; I am detained unwillingly 
 here, and you will probably see Williams in the 
 oat before me, — but that will be decided to- 
 morrow. 
 
 Things are in the worst possible situation with 
 respect to poor Hunt. I find Marianne in a 
 desperate state of health, and on our arrival at 
 Pisa sent for Vacca. He decides that her case is 
 hopeless, and that although it will be lingering, 
 must inevitably end fatally. This decision he 
 thought proper to communicate to Hunt, indicat- 
 ing at the same time, with great judgment and 
 precision, the treatment necessary to be observed 
 for availing himself of the chance of his being 
 deceived. This intelligence has extinguished the 
 
PISA. 359 
 
 last spark of poor Hunt's spirits, low enough 
 before. The children are well and much improved. 
 Lord Byron is at this moment on the point of 
 leaving Tuscany. The Gambas have been exiled, 
 and he declares his intention of following their 
 fortunes. His first idea was to sail to America, 
 which was changed to Switzerland, then to Genoa, 
 and last to Lucca. Everybody is in despair, and 
 everything in confusion. Trelawny was on the 
 point of sailing to Genoa for the purpose of 
 transporting the Bolivar overland to the lake 
 of Geneva, and had already whispered in my 
 ear his desire that I should not influence Lord 
 Byron against this terrestrial navigation. He 
 next received orders to weigh anchor and set sail 
 for Lorici. He is now without instructions, moody 
 and disappointed. But it is the worst for poor 
 Hunt, unless the present storm should blow over. 
 He places his whole dependence upon the scheme 
 of a journal, for which every arrangement has been 
 made. Lord Byron must of course furnish the re- 
 quisite funds at present, as I cannot ; but he seems 
 inclined to depart without the necessary explana- 
 tions and arrangements due to such a situation as 
 Hunt*'s. These, in spite of delicacy, I must procure; 
 he offers him the copyright of the Vision of 
 Judgment for the first number. This offer, if 
 
360 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 
 
 sincere, is more than enough to set up the journal, 
 and, if sincere, will set everything right. 
 
 How are you, my best Mary ? Write especially 
 how is your health, and how your spirits are, and 
 whether you are not more reconciled to staying at 
 Lerici, at least during the summer. 
 
 You have no idea how I am hurried and occu- 
 pied ; I have not a moment's leisure, but will 
 write by next post. 
 
 Ever, dearest Mary, 
 
 Yours affectionately, 
 
 S. 
 
 I have found the translation of the Symposium 
 
 THE END 
 
 LONDON : 
 BKADBURY AND EVANS, PdlKTERS, WIIITEFRIAHS. 
 
n\