single line of good, bad, or indifferent. It is strange 'that you have never forwarded any further observa'tions of Gifford's. How am I to alter or amend, if I hear no further? or does this silence mean that it is well enough as it is, or too bad to be repaired? If the last, why do you not say so at once, instead ' of playing pretty, while you know that soon or late you must out with the truth.

'Yours, &c.

P.S. My sister tells me that you sent to her to 'inquire where I was, believing in my arrival, " driv

ing a curricle," &c. &c. into Palace-yard. Do you think me a coxcomb or a madman, to be capable of 'such an exhibition? My sister knew me better, and 'told you, that could not be me. 'well have thought me entering on ' like Death in the Revelations.'

You might as

a pale horse,"

'Ravenna, Sept. 23d, 1820. 'Get from Mr. Hobhouse, and send me a proof '(with the Latin) of my Hints from Horace: it has now 'the nonum prematur in annum complete for its production, being written at Athens in 1811. I have a ' notion that, with some omissions of names and passages, it will do; and I could put my late observa'tions for Pope amongst the notes, with the date of 1820, and so on. As far as versification goes, it is good; and, on looking back to what I wrote about 'that period, I am astonished to see how little I have ' trained on. I wrote better then than now; but that 'comes of my having fallen into the atrocious bad taste of the times. If I can trim it for present pub'lication, what with the other things you have of 'mine, you will have a volume or two of variety at

'least, for there will be all measures, styles, and to'pics, whether good or no. I am anxious to hear what Gifford thinks of the tragedy: pray let me 'know. I really do not know what to think myself.

'If the Germans pass the Po, they will be treated 'to a mass out of the Cardinal de Retz's Breviary. '**'s a fool, and could not understand this: Frere 'will. It is as pretty a conceit as you would wish to see on a summer's day.

'Nobody here believes a word of the evidence against the Queen. The very mob cry shame against 'their countrymen, and say, that for half the money 'spent upon the trial, any testimony whatever may be 'brought out of Italy. This you may rely upon as 'fact. I told you as much before. As to what tra'vellers report, what are travellers? Now I have 'lived among the Italians-not Florenced, and Romed,

and galleried, and conversationed it for a few months, ' and then home again; but been of their families, ' and friendships, and feuds, and loves, and councils, ' and correspondence, in a part of Italy least known 'to foreigners,—and have been amongst them of all 'classes, from the Conte to the Contadine; and you may be sure of what I say to you.

'Yours, &c.'

'Ravenna, Sept. 28th, 1820. 'I thought that I had told you long ago, that it never was intended nor written with any view to the stage. I have said so in the preface too. It is too long and too regular for your stage, the persons 'too few, and the unity too much observed. It is more like a play of Alfieri's than of your stage (I say

'this humbly in speaking of that great man); but 'there is poetry, and it is equal to Manfred, though I 'know not what esteem is held of Manfred.

'I have now been nearly as long out of England as 'I was there during the time I saw you frequently. 'I came home July 14th, 1811, and left again April 25th, 1816: so that Sept. 28th, 1820, brings me 'within a very few months of the same duration of

time of my stay and my absence. 'know nothing of the public taste 'from what I glean from letters, &c. as bad as possible.

In course, I can and feelings, but Both seem to be

'I thought Anastasius excellent: did I not say so? Matthews's Diary most excellent; it, and Forsyth, ' and parts of Hobhouse, are all we have of truth or sense upon Italy. The Letter to Julia very good ' indeed. I do not despise ******; but if she knit blue-stockings instead of wearing them, it would be 'better. You are taken in by that false stilted trashy style, which is a mixture of all the styles of the day, which are all bombastic (I don't except my own-no one has done more through negligence to corrupt the language); but it is neither English nor poetry. 'Time will show.

I am sorry Gifford has made no further remarks 'beyond the first Act: does he think all the English equally sterling as he thought the first? You did

right to send the proofs: I was a fool; but I do really 'detest the sight of proofs: it is an absurdity; but 'comes from laziness.

'You can steal the two Juans into the world quietly, 'tagged to the others. The play as you will-the 'Dante too; but the Pulci I am proud of it is su'perb; you have no such translation. It is the best

thing I ever did in my life. I wrote the play from beginning to end, and not a single scene without interruption, and being obliged to break off in the middle; ' for I had my hands full, and my head, too, just then; so it can be no great shakes-I mean the play; and the head too, if you like.

6.66

'P. S. Politics here still savage and uncertain. However, we are all in our "bandaliers," to join the "Highlanders if they cross the Forth," i. e., to crush 'the Austrians if they cross the Po. The rascals !— and that dog Liverpool, to say their subjects are happy! If ever I come back, I'll work some of these 'ministers.'

6

Sept. 29th.

'I opened my letter to say, that on reading more of the four volumes on Italy, where the author says "declined an introduction," I perceive (horresco re'ferens) it is written by a WOMAN!!! In that case you must suppress my note and answer, and all I have said about the book and the writer. I never 'dreamed of it until now, in my extreme wrath at that precious note. I can only say that I am sorry that a lady should say any thing of the kind. What I would 'have said to one of the other sex you know already. 'Her book too (as a she book) is not a bad one; but

she evidently don't know the Italians, or rather don't ' like them, and forgets the causes of their misery and 'profligacy (Matthews and Forsyth are your men for 'truth and tact), and has gone over Italy in company— always a bad plan: you must be alone with people to know them well. Ask her, who was the " descendant of Lady M. W. Montague," and by whom? by Alga'rotti?

I suspect that, in Marino Faliero, you and yours won't like the politics, which are perilous to you in these times but recollect that it is not a political play, and that I was obliged to put into the mouths of the characters the sentiments upon which they acted. I hate all things written like Pizarro, to represent France, England, and so forth. All I have 'done is meant to be purely Venetian, even to the very prophecy of its present state.

Your Angles in general know little of the Italians, 'who detest them for their numbers and their GENOA 'treachery. Besides, the English travellers have not 'been composed of the best company. How could they?-out of 100,000, how many gentlemen were 'there, or honest men?

'Mitchell's Aristophanes is excellent. the rest of it.

Send me

6 These fools will force me to write a book about Italy myself, to give them "the loud lie." They prate about assassination; what is it but the origin ' of duelling-and "a wild justice," as Lord Bacon calls it? It is the fount of the modern point of ho'nour in what the laws can't or won't reach. Every 'man is liable to it more or less, according to circum'stances or place. For instance, I am living here exposed to it daily, for I have happened to make a powerful and unprincipled man my enemy;-and I 'never sleep the worse for it, or ride in less solitary places, because precaution is useless, and one thinks of it as of a disease which may or may not strike. It is true that there are those here, who, if he did, 'would live to think on 't;" but that would not ' awake my bones: I should be sorry if it would, were they once at rest.'