be of this opinion. I am the more confirmed in this by having lately gone over some of our classics, particularly Pope, whom I tried in this way: I took Moore's poems and my own and some others, and went over them side by side with Pope's, and I was really astonished (I ought not to have been so) and mortified at the ineffable distance in point of sense, harmony, effect, and even imagination, passion, and invention, between the little Queen Anne's man and us of the Lower Empire. Depend upon it, it is all Horace then, and Claudian now, among us; and if I had to begin again, I would mould myself accordingly. Crabbe's the man, but he has got a coarse and impracticable subject; and [Rogers] is retired upon half-pay, and has done enough, unless he were to do as he did formerly."

TO MR. MURRAY.

"My dear Mr. Murray,

You're in a damn'd hurry

"Venice, January 8, 1818.

To set up this ultimate Canto;

But (if they don't rob us)

You'll see Mr. Hobhouse

Will bring it safe in his portmanteau.

"For the Journal you hint of,

As ready to print off,

No doubt you do right to commend it;

But as yet I have writ off,

The devil a bit of

Then you've Sotheby's Tour,

No great things, to be sure,

You could hardly begin with a less work ;

For the pompous rascallion,

Who don't speak Italian

Nor French, must have scribbled by guess-work.

"You can make any loss up

With 'Spence' and his gossip,

A work which must surely succeed;

Then Queen Mary's Epistle-craft,
With the new 'Fytte' of 'Whistlecraft,
Must make people purchase and read.

"Then you've General Gordon,

Who girded his sword on,

To serve with a Muscovite master,

And help him to polish

A nation so owlish,

They thought shaving their beards a disaster.

"For the man, 'poor and shrewd,'
With whom you'd conclude

A compact without more delay,
Perhaps some such pen is
Still extant in Venice;

But please, sir, to mention your pay.

TO MR. ROGERS.

"Venice, March 3, 1818.

"I have not, as you say, 'taken to wife the Adriatic.' I heard of Moore's loss from himself in a letter which was delayed upon the road three months. I was sincerely sorry for it, but in such cases what are words?

"The villa you speak of is one at Este, which Mr. Hoppner (Consul-general here) has transferred to me. I have taken it for two years as a place of villeggiatura. The situation is very beautiful, indeed, among the Euganean hills, and the house very fair. The vines are luxuriant to a great degree, and all the fruits of the earth abundant. It is close to the old castle of the Estes, or Guelphs, and within a few miles of Arqua, which I have visited twice, and hope to visit often.

"Last summer (except an excursion to Rome) I passed upon the Brenta. In Venice I winter, transporting my horses to the Lido, bordering the Adriatic (where the fort is), so that I get a gallop of some miles daily along the strip of beach which reaches to Malamocco, when in health; but within these few weeks I have been unwell. At present I am getting better. The Carnival was short, but a good one. I don't go out much, except during the time of masques ; but there are one or two conversazioni, where I go regularly, just to keep up the system, as I had letters to their givers, and they are particular on such points; and now and then, though very rarely, to the Governor's.

"It is a very good place for women. I like the dialect and their manner very much. There is a naïveté about them which is very winning, and the romance of the place is a mighty adjunct; the bel sangue is not, however, now amongst the dame or higher orders; but all under i fazzioli, or kerchiefs (a white kind of veil which the lower orders wear upon their heads); - the vesta zendale, or old national female costume, is no more. The city, however, is decaying daily, and does not gain in population. However, I prefer it to any other in Italy; and here have I pitched my staff, and here do I purpose to reside for the remainder of my life, unless events, connected with business not to be transacted out of England, compel me to return for that purpose; otherwise I have few regrets, and no desires to visit it again for its own sake. I shall probably be obliged to do so, to sign papers for my affairs, and a proxy for the Whigs, and to see Mr. Waite, for I can't find a good dentist here, and every two or three years one ought to consult one. About seeing my children, I must take my chance. One I shall have sent here; and I shall be very happy to see the legitimate one, when God pleases, which he perhaps will some day or other. As for my mathematical -, I am as well without her.

"Your account of your visit to Fonthill is very striking: could you beg of him for me a copy in MS. of the remaining Tales?* I think I deserve them, as a strenuous and public admirer of the first one. I will return it when read, and make no ill use of the copy, if granted. Murray would

* A continuation of "Vathek," by the author of that very striking and powerful production. The "Tales" of which this unpublished sequel consists are, I understand, those supposed to have been related by the Princes in the Hall of Eblis.

send me out anything safely. If ever I return to England, I should like very much to see the author, with his permission. In the meantime, you could not oblige me more than by obtaining me the perusal I request, in French or English, all's one for that, though I prefer Italian to either. I have a French copy of 'Vathek' which I bought at Lausanne. I can read French with great pleasure and facility, though I neither speak nor write it. Now, Italian I can speak with some fluency, and write sufficiently for my purposes, but I don't like their modern prose at all; it is very heavy, and so different from Machiavelli.

"They say Francis is Junius; - I think it looks like it.* I remember meeting him at Earl Grey's at dinner. Has not he lately married a young woman? and was not he Madame Talleyrand's cavaliere servente in India years ago?

"I read my death in the papers, which was not true. I see they are marrying the remaining singleness of the royal family. They have brought out Fazio with great and deserved success at Covent Garden: that's a good sign. I tried, during the directory, to have it done at Drury Lane, but was overruled. If you think of coming into this country, you will let me know perhaps beforehand. I suppose Moore won't move. Rose is here. I saw him the other night at Madame Albrizzi's: he talks of returning in May. My love to the Hollands. "Ever, etc.

"P.S.-They have been crucifying Othello into an opera

* See Mr. Taylor's "Identity of Junius with a distinguished living Character established," and a review of it in the Edinburgh Review, vol. xxix. p 94. The reviewer (Lord Brougham) says, "That this work proves Sir Philip Francis to be Junius, we will not affirm; but this we can safely assert, that it accumulates such a mass of circumstantial evidence, as renders it extremely difficult to believe he is not; and that, if so many coincidences shall be found to have misled us in this case, our faith in all conclusions drawn from proofs of a similar kind may henceforth be shaken. All the evidence which can be drawn from a comparison of Junius's Letters and Sir Philip's Life and Writings points him out as the author: there is no circumstance which does not tally with this conclusion, and no difficulty which it does not explain."

(Otello, by Rossini): the music good, but lugubrious; but as for the words, all the real scenes with Iago cut out, and the greatest nonsense instead; the handkerchief turned into a billet-doux, and the first singer would not black his face, for some exquisite reasons assigned in the preface. Singing, dresses, and music very good."

TO MR. MOORE.

"Venice, September 19, 1818.

"An English newspaper here would be a prodigy, and an opposition one a monster; and except some extracts from extracts in the vile, garbled Paris gazettes, nothing of the kind reaches the Venoto-Lombard public, who are, perhaps, the most oppressed in Europe. My correspondences with England are mostly on business, and chiefly with my, who has no very exalted notion, or extensive conception, of an author's attributes; for he once took up an Edinburgh Review, and, looking at it a minute, said to me, 'So, I see you have got into the magazine,' - which is the only sentence I ever heard him utter upon literary matters, or the men thereof.

"My first news of your Irish Apotheosis has, consequently, been from yourself. But, as it will not be forgotten in a hurry, either by your friends or your enemies, I hope to have it more in detail from some of the former, and, in the meantime, I wish you joy with all my heart. Such a moment must have been a good deal better than Westminster Abbey, -besides being an assurance of that one day (many years hence, I trust), into the bargain.

"I am sorry to perceive, however, by the close of your letter, that even you have not escaped the 'surgit amari,' etc., and that your damned deputy has been gathering such 'dew from the still vext Bermoothes 'or rather vexatious. Pray, give me some items of the affair, as you say it is a serious one; and, if it grows more so, you should make a