 Chapter 9 Part 2 of Glimpses of Italian Society in the 18th Century by Hester Lynch Piozzi I wish to exceedingly to purchase here the genuine account of Mars and Yellows, far famed sedition and revolt, more dreadful in a certain way than any of the earthquakes which have a different time shaken this hollow founded country. But my friends here tell me it was suppressed and burned by the hands of the common executioner, with many chastisements beside bestowed upon the writer who tried to escape, but found it more prudent to submit to justice. Thomas Aniello was the unluckily adapted name of the mad fisherman who headed the mob on that truly memorable occasion. But it is not an unusual thing here to cut off the first syllable and by the figure Ephereesis alter the appellation entirely. By that device of dropping the toe he has been called Mars and Yellow. And this is one of their methods to render the patois of Naples as unintelligible to us as if we had never seen Italy till now. Everyone is above all things tormented with their way of pronouncing names. Here are Don and Donner again at this town as at Milan. However, because the king of Spain or re-Catolicos these people always call him has still much influence, and they seem to think nearly as respectfully of him as of their own immediate sovereign, who is however greatly beloved among them. And so he ought to be, for he is the representative of them all. He rides and roes and hunts the wild boar, and catches fish in the bay and sells it in the market. As dear as he can to, but gives away the money they pay him for it, and that directly, so that no suspicion of meanness or of anything worse than a little rough merriment can be ever attached to his truly honest, open, undesigning character. Stories of monarchs seldom give me pleasure who am seldom persuaded to give credit to tales told of persons few people have any access to, and his behaviour towards those few is circumscribed within the laws of insipid and dull routine. But this prince lives among his subjects with the old Roman idea of a window before his bosom, I believe. They know the worst of him is that he shoots at the birds, dances with the girls, eats macaroni, and helps himself to it with his fingers, and roes against the waterman in the bay, till one of them bursts data bleeding at the nose last week with his uncaughtly efforts to outdo the king. He won the trifling wage by this accident, conquered, laughed, and leaped on shore amidst the acclamations of the populace who azide him home to the palace. From whence he sent double the sum he had won to the waterman's wife and children with other tokens of kindness. Meantime, while he resolves to be happy himself, he is equally determined to make no man miserable. When the emperor and the Grand Duke talked to him of their new projects for reformation in the church, he told them he saw little advantage they brought into their states by these new fangled notions, that when he was at Florence and Milan, the ducer neapolitan could he find in either, while his capital was crowded with refugees from thence, that in short they might do their way, but he would do his, and that he had not now an enemy in the world public or private, and that he would not make himself any for the sake of propagating doctrines he did not understand, and would not take the trouble to study, that he should say his prayers as he used to do, and had no doubt of their being heard while he only begged blessings on his beloved people. So if these wise brothers in law would learn of him to enjoy life instead of shortening it by unnecessary cares, he invited them to see him the next morning play a great match of tennis. The truth is, the jolly neapolitan's lead a course life, but it is an unimpressed one. Never sure was there in any town a greatest show of abundance, no settled market in any given place, I think, but every third shop, full of what the French call so properly, amnition de bouche, where whole bores, kids and small calves dangle from a sort of neat scaffolding with all their skins on, and to make a pretty appearance, polterers hang their animals in the feathers to not lay them on the boards plucked, as at London or Venice. The Strade del Toledo is at least as long as Oxford Road, and straight as Bond Street. Very wide, too. The houses all of stone, and at least eight storeys high. Over the shops live people of fashion, I'm told, but the persons of particularly high quality have their palaces in other parts of the town. Which town at last is not a large one, but full as an egg. And Mr Clark, the antiquarian who resides here always, informed me that the latest stresses in Calabria had driven many families to Naples this year beside single wanderers innumerable, which wonderfully increased the daily throng one sees passing and repassing. To hear the Lazarone shout and bawl about the streets night and day, one would really fancy oneself in a semi-barbarous nation. And a millenese officer, who has lived long among them, protested that the manners of the great corresponded in every respect with the idea given of them by the little. It is, however, observable and surely very praiseworthy that if the Italians are not ashamed of their crimes, neither are they ashamed of their contrition. I saw this very morning an odd-seener church, which though new to me appeared perhaps from its frequent repetition to strike no one but myself. A lady with a long white dress and veiled came in her carriage which waited for her at the door with her own arms upon it, and three servants better dressed than his common here followed and put a lighted taper in her hand. On Cetà, as the French say, she moved slowly up the church, looking like Jane Shaw in the last act, but not so feeble, and being arrived at the steps of the High Otter threw herself quite upon her face before it, remaining prostrate there at least five minutes in the face of the whole congregation, who equally to my amazement neither stared nor sneered, neither laughed nor lamented, but minded their own private devotions, no mass was saying, till a lady rose, kissed the steps, and bathed them with her tears, mingled with sobs of low-affected or hypocritical penitence, I'm sure, retiring afterwards to her own seat where she waited with others, the commencement of the sacred office, having extinguished her candle and apparently lighted her heart. I felt mine quite penetrated by her behavior. Let not this story however mislead anyone to think that more general decorum or true devotion can be found in churches of the Romish persuasion than on ours, quite the reverse. This burst of penitential piety was in itself an indecorous thing, but it is the nature ingenious of the people not to mind small matters. Dogs are suffered to run about and dirty the churches all the time divine services performing, while the crying of babies and the most indecent methods taken by the women to pacify them give one still juster offence. There is no treading for spittle and nastiness of one sort or another in all the churches of Italy, whose inhabitants allow the filthiness of Naples, but endeavour to justify the disorders of other cities, though I'd believe nothing ever equal to the chiesa de cavaliere at Pisa in any Christian land. Santa Justina at Padua, the Redentore at Venice, St. Peter's at Rome and some of the least frequented churches at Milan are exceptions. They are kept very clean and do not by the scandalous neglect of those appointed to keep them disgrace the beauty of their buildings. Here has however been a dreadful accident, which puts such slight considerations out of one's head. A friar has killed a woman in the church just by the crocelle in, for having refused him favours he suspected she had granted to another. No step is taken though towards punishing the murderer because he is a religioso e di pio cavaliere. What a miracle that more such outrages are not daily committed in a country where profession of sanctity and real high birth are protections from law and justice. Surely nothing but perfect sobriety and a great goodness of disposition can be alleged as a reason why worse is not done every day. I said so, to a gentleman just now, who assured me the criminal would not escape very severe castigation and that perhaps the convent would inflict such severities upon that gentleman as would amply supply the want of activity in the exertion of civil power. It is a stupid thing not to mention the common dress of the ordinary women here, which ladies likewise adopt if they venture out on foot desiring not to be known. Two black silk petticoats then serve entirely to conceal their own vigour as when both are tied around their waist one is suddenly turned up and as they pull it quick over their heads a loose trimming of narrow black gauze drops over the face while a hook and eye fastens all close under the chin and gives them an air not unlike our country wenches who throw the gown tail over their heads to protect them from a summer shower. The holiday dresses meantime of the peasants around Naples are very rich and cumbersome. One often sees a great coarse raw-boned fellow on a Sunday panting for heat under a thick blue velvet coat comically enough. The females in a scarlet cloth petticoat with a broad gold lace at the bottom a jacket open before but charged with heavy ornaments and the head not unbecomingly dressed with an embroidered haggature from Turkey exactly as one sees them represented here in prints which they sell dear enough God knows and ask as I am informed by the purchases not twice or thrice but four or five times more than at last they take as indeed for everything one buys here one portrait is better however than a thousand words when single figures are to be delineated but of the grotto del carne description gives a complete her idea than drawing both are perhaps nearly unnecessary indeed when speaking of a place so often and so accurately described what surprised me most among the ceremonies of this extraordinary place was at the pent up vapor shut in an excavation of the rock should upon opening the door gradually move forwards a few yards but not rise up above a foot from the surface nor by what I could observe ever dissipate in there I think we left it hovering over the favorite spot where the poor cursed nose had been possibly held in it for a minute or two but he took care after his recovery to keep a very judicious distance spotting with animal life is always highly offensive and the fellows account that his dog was used to the operation and had already gone through a date times that it did him no harm etc. I consider it as words used merely to quiet our impatience of the experiment which is infinitely more amusing when tried upon a lighted flambeau extinguishing it most completely in a moment what connection there is between flame and vitality those who know more of the matter than I do must expand the Christmas season here at Naples is very pleasingly observed the Italians are peculiarly ingenious in adorning their shops I think and setting out their wares every grosser frutera etc. now mingles orange and lemon and myrtle leaves them under goods exposed at his door as we do greens in the churches of England but with infinitely more taste and this device produces a very fine effect upon the whole as one drives along last rather delta later which all morning looks showy from these decorations and all evening splendid from the profusion of tortoise flambeau etc. that shine with less regularity indeed but with more luster and greater appearance of expensive gaiety than our neat clean steady London lamps some odd pretty movable coffee houses to eliminate shops set on wheels and adorned according to the possesses taste with gilding painting etc. and covered with Isis or Geats and other refreshments as in emulation each of the other and in a strange variety of shapes and forms too exquisitely well imagined for the most part help forward the finery of Naples exceedingly I have counted 30 of these galante shops on each side of the street which with their necessary illuminations make a brilliant figure by candlelight till 12 o'clock when all the show is over and everybody puts out their lights and quietly lies down to rest till at our however few things can exceed the tumultuous merriment of Naples while the valantes or running footman dressed like tumblers before a show proceed all characters of distinction and endeavor to keep the people from being run over yet whilst they are listening to Balachinello's jokes or to some such street orators dr. Moore describes with equal truth and humor they often get crushed and killed yet as Pope says see some strange comfort every state attend the lads are only who has his child run over by the coach of a man of quality has a regular claim upon him for no less than 12 carolines about five shillings English if it is his wife that meets with the accident he gets two duckets live or die and for the master of the family house he has none three is the regular compensation and no words pass here about trifles truth is human life is lower rated in all parts of Italy than with us they think nothing of an individual but see him perish accepting by the hand of justice as a cat or dog a young man fell from our carriage at Milan one evening he was not a servant of ours but a friend which after we were gone home the coachman had picked up to go with him to the fireworks which were exhibited that night near the Corso there was a crowd and an umbrella and the fellow tumbled off and died upon the spot and nobody even spoke or I believe thought about the matter except one woman he supposed that he had neglected to cross himself when he got up behind there is a work about peculiar to the city and attempted in no other on which surprising sums of money are lavished by many of the inhabitants who connect or associate to this amusement ideas of piety and devotion the thing when finished is called a preceptor and is composed in honor of this sacred season after which all is taken to pieces and arranged after a different manner next year in many houses a room in some whole suite of apartments in others the terrace upon the house top is dedicated to this very uncommon show consisting of a miniature representation in sycamore wood properly coloured of the house at Bethlehem with the Blessed Virgin St. Joseph and our Saviour in the manger with a tent and angels etc as in pictures of the nativity the figures are about six inches high and dressed with the most exact propriety this however though the principal thing intended to attract the spectator's notice is kept back so that sometimes I scarcely saw it at all while a general and excellent landscape with figures of men at work women dressing dinner a long road in real gravel with rocks hills rivers cattle camels everything that can be imagined fill the other rooms so happily disposed to for the most part the light introduced so artfully the perspective kept so surprisingly one wonders and cries out it is certainly but a baby house at best yet managed by people whose heads naturally turned towards architecture and design give them power thus to defy a travel and not to fill the lighter with the general effect but if every single figure is not capitalally executed and nicely expressed beside the proprietor is truly miserable and will cut a new cow or bury the horse's attitude against next Christmas could cook and perhaps I should not have said so much about the matter if they had not been shown me within this last week but a sepios which have cost their possesses 1500 or 2000 English pounds and rather than relinquish or sell them many families have gone to ruin I have wrote the sums down in letters not figures for fear of the possibility of a mistake one of these play things had to the journey of the three kings represented in it and the presents were all of real gold and silver finally worked nothing could be better or more lively finished but so today why do you dress up one of the wise men with a turban and crescent six hundred years before the birth of Mohammed who first put that mark in the forehead of his followers the Easter mage I were not Turks this is a breach of costume my gentleman paused and thanked me and said he would inquire if there was nothing heretical in the objection and if all was right it should be changed next year without fail a young lady here of English parents just ten years old asked me very pertinently why this pretty sight was called a presepio but said she'd suddenly answering herself I suppose it is because it is preceptive end of chapter 9 part 2 chapter 9 part 3 of glimpses of Italian society in the 18th century by Hester Lynch Piozzi this LibriVox recording is in the public domain Naples part 3 let me now tell about the two assemblies or Sio conversazione where one goes in search of amusement as to the rooms of bar thought ton bridge exactly only that one of these places is devoted to the no-build tar the other is called the Bony Amici and such as the state of subordination in this country that there the great people may come among the little ones and be sure of the grossest speculation a merchant's wife shining in diamonds being obliged to stand up reverentially before the chair of accountess who does her the honor to speak to her the poor Amici are totally excluded from the subscription of the nobles nor dare even to return the salutation of a superior should a good-natured person of that rank be tempted from frequently seeing them at the rooms to give them a kind nod in the street or elsewhere all this seems comical enough to us and I had much ado to look grave while a beautiful and well-educated wife of a rich banker here confessed herself not fit company for an ignorant mean-looking woman of quality but those such unintelligible doctrines make one for a moment ashamed both of one sex and species that ladies knowledge of various languages her numerous accomplishments in a thousand methods of passing time away with innocent elegance and the sort of studied address never observed in Italy before gave me an infinite delight in her society and daily increased my suspicion that she was a foreigner till nearer intimacy discovered her a German Lutheran with a singular head of the blonde hair so unlike those I see around me we grew daily better acquainted and she showed me but not indignantly at all some ladies from the higher assembly sitting among these very low dressed indeed a knotting bag and counters in that up to show their contempt of the company well such as spoke to them stood before they see like children before a governor's in England as long as the conversation lasted our Duke and Duchess of Cumberland have made all Naples adored them though by going richly dressed and behaving with infinite courtesy and good humor at the assembly or ball given in the lower rooms as the English comically called them a young Palermitan prince applauded them for it exceedingly so I took the liberty to express my wonder or reply to he we're not ignorant how much English manners differ from our own I have already there but just 18 years old as sovereign of my own state under the king of both Sicilies condemned a man to death because he was a rascal but the law and the people govern in England I know my desire of hearing about Sicily which we could not contrive to visit made me happy to cultivate Prince Fenimilia's acquaintance he was very studious very learned of his age and uncommonly clever told me of the antiquities his island had to boast with great intelligence and a surprising knowledge of ancient history it is wonderfully mortifying to think how little information after all can be obtained of anything new or anything strange though so far from one's own country what I picked up most curious and diverting from our conversation was his expression of surprise when at our house one day he read a letter from his mother telling him that such a lady naming her remained still unmarried and even unbetrothed though now past 10 years old she will said I perhaps break through old customs and choose for herself as she is an orphan and has no one whom she need to consult impossible madam was the reply but tell me Prince for information's sake if such a lady this girl for example should venture to assert the rights of humanity and make a choice somewhat unusual what would come of it by nothing in the world would come of it answered he the last would be immediate liberty again for no man so circumstanced can be permitted to leave the country alive you know nor would her folly benefit his family at all as their estate will be immediately a judge to the next air no person of inferior rank in our country would therefore unless absolutely mad set his life to hazard for the sake of a frolic the event of which is so well known beforehand I will mention another talk I had with the Sicilian lady we met at the house of the Swedish minister monsieur Andre uncle to the lamented officer who perished now sovereign service in America and while the rest of the company were entertaining themselves with cards and music I began laughing in myself adhering the gentleman and lady who sat next to me called by others Don Rafael and Donna Camilla because those two names bring jublar into one's head they're agreeable and interesting conversation however soon gained my mind a more serious turn when discoursing on the liberal premiums now offered by the king of Naples to those who are willing to rebuild and reap people in the scene of Donna Camilla politely introduced me to a very sick but pleasing looking lady who she said was going to return to them at which she at which she starting cried oh god forbid different in an accent that made me think she had already suffered something from the concussions that overwhelmed that city in the year 1783 her inviting manner has softened interesting eyes whose languid glances seem to show beauty sunken sorrow and spirit oppressed by calamity engaged my utmost attention while Don Rafael pressed her to indulge the foreigners curiosity with some particulars of the distresses she had shared her own feelings for all she could relate she said and those confusingly you see that girl there pointing to a child of about seven or eight years old who stood listening to the harpsichord she escaped I cannot for my soul guess how but we were not together at the time where were you madam at the moment of the fatal accident who me and her eyes lighted up with recollected terror I was in the nursery with my maid employed in taking stains out of some Brussels lace upon abrasion two babies neither of them four years old playing in the room the eldest boy dear lad had just left us and was in his father's country house today grew so dark all of a sudden and the brazier oh lord jesus I felt the brazier slide from me and I saw it run down the long room on its three legs the maid screamed and I shut my eyes and knelt at a chair we thought all over but my husband came and snatching me up cried run run I know not how nor where but all amongst falling houses it was the people shrieked so there was such a noise my poor son he was 15 years old he tried to hold me fast in the crowd I remember kissing him dear lad dear lad I said I could speak just then but the throng at the gate oh that gate thousands at once I thousands thousands at once and my poor old confessor too I knew him I threw my arms about his aged neck Padre mio I said Padre mio down he dropped a great stone struck his shoulder I saw it coming and my boy pulled me he saved my life dear dear lad but the crash of the gate the screams of the people the heat such a heat I felt no moron though I saw no moron I waked in bed this girl by me and her father giving me cordials we were on shipboard they told me coming to Naples to my brother's house here and do you think I'll ever go back there again oh no that's a person place I lost my son in it never never will I see it more all my friends try to persuade me but the sight of it would do my business if my poor boy were alive indeed but he our poor lad he loved his mother he held me fast no no I'll never see that place again God has cursed it now I'm sure he has a narrative so melancholy so tender and so true could not fail of its effect I ran for refuge to the harpsichord where a lady was singing divinely I could not listen though her grateful sweetness who told the dismal story followed me did her she had seen my ill suppressed tears and followed to embrace me the tales she had told saddened my heart and the news we heard returning to the cartel it did not contribute to lighting its weight well an amiable young Englishman who had long lain ill there was now breathing his last far from his friends his country or their customs all easily dispensed with perhaps derided during the bustle of a journey and the madness of superfluous health but sure to be sighed after when life's last twilight shuts in precipitately closer and closer around a man and leaves him only the nearer objects to repose and dwell on such was captain dasher's situation he had none but a foreign servant with him we thought it might soothe him to hear can I do anything for you sir in an English voice so I sent him my maid he had no commands he said he could not eat the jelly she had made him he wished some clergyman could be found that he might speak to such a one was vainly inquired for till it was discovered that ill health had driven Miss Dement said enables who kindly administered the last consolation a Christian can receive and heard the next day when combined himself to bed of his countrymen's being properly thrust by the banker into the book of protestante so they contemptuously call a dirty garden one drives by in this town we're not less than a hundred people small and great from our island annually resort leaving 50 or 60 000 pounds behind them at a moderate computation though if their bodies are obliged to take perpetual apartments here no better place has been hitherto provided for them than this kitchen ground on which go cabbages cauliflower's etc sold to their country folks for double price citra the remaining part of the season 20th of january 1786 here are the most excellent the most incomparable fish i ever ate red mullets larger sa mackerel and of singularly high flavor besides the calamaro or ink fish dainty worthy of imperial luxury almond and even apple trees in blossom to delight those who can be paid for coarse manners and confined notions by the beauties of a brilliant climate here are all the hedges in blow as you drive towards ponzwally and a snow of white mayflowers clustering round Virgil's tomb so strong was the sun's heat this morning even before 11 o'clock that i carried an umbrella to defend me from his rays as we saunted about the walks which are spacious and elegant laid out much in the style of st james's park but with the sea on one side of you the broad street called kiaja on the other what trees are planted there however either do not grow up so as to afford shade or else they cut them and trim them about to make them in pretty shapes for sooth as we did in england half a century ago the castle on this hill called the castles and Elmo would be much my comfort that i fix at Naples for here are 8 000 soldiers constantly kept to secure the city from sudden insurrection his majesty most wisely trusting their command only to Spanish or German officers or some huge gentleman from the northern states of Italy that no personal tenderness for any in the town below may intervene if occasion for sudden severity should arise we went today and saw their garrison comfortably and even elegantly kept and i was wicked enough to rejoice that the soldiers were never but with the very utmost difficulty permitted to go among the townsmen for a moment tomorrow we mount the volcano whose present peaceful disposition is tempted us to inspect it more nearly though it appears little less than presumption thus to profane with eyes of examination the favorite olympic of nature while the great work of projection is carrying on guarded as all its secret caverns are too with every contradiction snow and flame solid bodies heated into liquefaction and rolling gently down one of its sides while fluids congeal and harden into ice on the other nothing can exceed the curiosity of its appearance now the lava is less rapid and stiffens as it flows stiffens too in ridges very surprisingly and gains an odd aspect not unlike the pasteboard waves representing seater theater but black because this year's eruption has been mingled with coal the connoisseur's here know the different degrees dates and shades of lava to a perfection that amazes me and sir william hamilton's courage learning and perfect skill in these matters is more people's theme here than the volcano itself but at holomeo the cycle officer visceria says he has called studies its effects and operations too with much attention and philosophical exactness relating the adventures he's had with our minister on the mountain to every Englishman that goes up with great success the way one climbs is by tying a broad sash with long ends around this botolomeo letting him walk before one and holding it fast as far as the hermitage there is no great difficulty and to that place some choose to ride on us but i thought walking safer and there you are sure of a welcome and refreshment from the poor good old man who sets up a little cross wherever the fire has stopped near his cell shows you the place with a sort of polite solemnity that impresses spreads his scanty provisions before you kindly and tells the past and present the state of the eruption accurately inviting you to partake of his rushy couch his frugal fair his blessing and repose goldsmith this hermit is a frenchman j'ai dansé dans mon lit tendefois c'est dit the expression was not sublime when speaking of an earthquake to be sure i looked among his books however and found bruyère would not the duke the rush will go down better said i did i never see you before madame said he is sure i have and dressed you too when i was a hairdresser in london and lived with ms matinot and i dressed pretty miss wind too in the same street vitae long core vitae long core vitae long core i'm old now continuity i remember when black pins first came up that the situation of the crater changed in this last eruption is of little consequence it will change and change again i suppose the wonder is that nobody gets killed by venturing so near while red hot stones are flying about them so the bishop of dairy did very nearly get his arm broke and the italians are always recounting the exploits of these rash brittans who look into the crater and carry their wives and children up to the top while we are with equal justice amazed at the courageous neapolitan's who build little snug villages and dwell with as much confidence at the foot of a sirius as our people do in pannington or hornsey when i inquired of an inhabitant of these houses how she managed and whether she was not frightened when the volcano raged least it should carry away her pretty little habitation let it go said she we don't mind now if it goes tomorrow so as we can make an answer by raising our vines oranges etc against you for three years our fortune is made before the fourth arrives and then if the red river comes we can always run away scupper beer ourselves and hang the property we only desire three years use of the mountain as a hot wall or forcing house and then we are above the world thanks be to god and saint januaryus end of chapter nine part three chapter nine part four of glimpses of italian society in the 18th century by hister lynch piontsy this livery box recording is in the public domain naples part four these dear people at roman naples do live so in the very hulk of shipwrecked or rather founded paganism have their habitation so at the very bottom of the cask can it fail to retain the scent when the leaves as guess yet dried up clean or evaporated that an odd jumble of past and present days past and present ideas of dignity events and even manner of portioning out their time still confuse their heads may be observed in every conversation with them and when a few weeks ago we revisited in company of some newly arrived english friends the old bars of baye lockereen lake etc to buyers who wrote us over bitters observed the up in way under the water where indeed it appears quite clearly even to the tracks of wheels on its old pavement made of very large stones and seeing me perhaps particularly attentive yes madam city i do assure you that don horris and don virgil of whom we hear such a deal used to come from rome to their country seats here in a day over this very road which is now overflowed as you see it by repeated earthquakes but which was then so good and so unbroken that if they rose early in the morning could easily gallop hither against the ave Maria it was very observable in our second visit paid to the stupe san germano that they had increased prodigiously in heat since mount visuvius had ceased throwing out fire though at least 14 miles from it and a vast portion of the sea between them it vexed me to have no thermometer again but by what one's immediate feelings could inform us there are many degrees of difference i could not now bear my hand on any part of them for a moment the same luckless dog was again produced and again restored to life like the lady in dryden's fables who was condemned to be hunted to killed recovered and set on foot again for the amusement of her tormentors a story borrowed from the italian solfaterra burned my fingers as i plucked an incrustation of which allured me by the beauty of its colors and roared with more violence than when i was there before this horrible volcano is by no means extinguished yet but seems pregnant with wonder's principally combustible and likely to break with one at every step all the earth rounder being hollow as a drum and i should think of no great thickness neither so plainly does one hear the sighings underneath which some of the country people imagine to be tortured spirits howling with agony it is supposed that leg annano with a dog is flung in if the dewy grass do not suffice to recover him with its humidity and freshness as it often does is but another crater of another volcano long ago self-destroyed by scorpion-like suicide and it is like enough it may be so there is not wanting however those that think or say at least how a subterraneous or subacquist city remains even now under that lake but lies too deep for inspection though surrounded by such terrifying objects the neapolitans are not i think disposed to cowardly though easily persuaded to devotional superstitions they're not afraid of spectres or supernatural apparitions but sleep tentatively and soundly in small rooms made for the ancient dead and now actually in the occupation of old roman bodies the catacombs belong to whom are still very impressive to the fancy and i have known many an english gentleman who would not endure to have his courage impeached by living white his imagination would notwithstanding have disturbed his slumbers not a little had he been obliged to pass one night where these poor women sleep securely wishing only for that money which travelers are not unwilling to bestow and perhaps a walk among these hollow caves of death these sad repositories of what was once animated by valor and illuminated by science strikes one much more than all the urns and lacrimaturies of portage the queen of naples is delivered and we are all to make merry the castello dovo just under our windows is to be eliminated and from the cartesian convent on the hill to my poor solitary old acquaintance the hermit and hairdresser who inhabits a cliff in mount viscerius all resolved to be happy and to rejoice in the felicity of a prince that loves them shouting and candles and torches and colored lamps and palatinello above all the rest did their best to drive forward the general joy and make known the birth of the royal baby for many miles around the capital and there was a splendid opera the next night in this finest of all fine theaters that adam elan pleases me better as i prefer the elegant curtains which first stood it over the boxes there to our heavy guild ornaments here at naples and their boasted looking glasses never cleaned have no effect as i perceive towards helping forward the enchantment a fest the diballo or masquerade given here however was exceedingly gay and the dresses surprisingly rich our party a very large one all italians retired at one in the morning to quite the finest supper of its size i ever saw fish of various sorts incomparable in their kinds composed eight dishes of the first course we had 38 set on the table in that course 49 and the second with wines and dessert truly magnificent for all of which mr peodzi protested to me that we paid only three shillings and six months ahead english money but for the truth of that he must answer we sat down 22 persons to supper and i observed there were numbers of these parties made in different taverns or apartments adjoining to the theater wither after refreshment we returned and danced till daylight the theater is a vast building even when not inhabited or set off by lights and company all of stone too like that of melanne but particularly defended from fire by st anthony who has an altar and chapel erected to his honor and surely decorated at the door and on sunday night january the 22nd there were fireworks exhibited in honor of himself and his pig which was placed on the top and illuminated with no small ingenuity the fire catching hold of his tail first con rispetto as c'est la tige ronnet but il ray l'ir et il souhait très filier is advertised and i'm sick tonight and cannot go my loss however is somewhat compensated for though i could not see our own shakespeare's play acted at navels i went some days after to one of the charming theaters this town is entertained by every evening and saw a play which struck me exceedingly the plot was simply this an englishman appears dressed precisely as a quaker his hat on his head and his hands in his pockets and with a very pence of air says he will take that pistol producing one and shoot himself for this is he the politics go wrong at home now and i hate the ministerial party so england does not please me i tried france but the people there laughed so about nothing and sung so much out of tune i could not bear france so i went over to holland those dutch dogs are so covetous and hard-hearted they think of nothing but their money i could not endure a place where one who knows sound in the whole country but frogs croaking and ducats chinking maledetti so i went to spain where i narrowly escaped a sunstroke for the sake of seeing those idle beggarly dons that if they do condescend to cobble a man's shoe think they must do it with a sword by their side i came here to naples therefore and though it is so fine a country one can get no fox hunting only running after a wild pig yes yes i must shoot myself the world is so very dull i'm tired aren't he then coolly prepares matters for the operation when a young woman bursts into his apartment bewails her fate for a moment then paints away our countryman lays by his pistol brings the lady to life and having heard part of his story sets her in a place of safety more confusion follows a gentleman enters storming with rage at a treacherous friendly hints at a defaults mistress the Englishman gravely advises him to shoot himself no no replies the war battalion i'll shoot them though if i can catch them but one of money hinders me from prosecuting the search that however is now instantly supplied by the generous britain who enters into their affairs detects and punishes the rogue who had betrayed them all settles the marriage and reconciliation of his new friends adds himself something to the good girl's fortune and concludes the peace with saying that he has altered his intentions and will think no more of shooting himself while life may be in all countries rendered pleasant to him who will employ it in the services of his fellow creatures and finishes with these words that such are the sentiments of an Englishman but i'm called for my observations and reflections to see what the neapolitans call the triumpho di palicinello the first of whom they profess peculiar value harlequin and briguella here scarcely share the fondness of an audience while at malan venus etc much pleasantry is always cast into their characters the triumph was a pageant of prodigious size set on four broad wheels like our wagons but larger it consisted of a pyramid of men 28 in number placed with wonderful ingenuity all of one size something like what one has seen at saddler's wells the royal circus etc dressed in one uniform namely the white habit and puce colored mask of caro palicinello disposed to with that skill which tumblers alone can either display or describe a single figure still in the same dress crowning the hole and forming a point at the top by standing fixed on the shoulders of his companions and playing merrily on the fiddle while 12 oxen live a beautiful white color and trapped with many shining ornaments drew the whole slowly over the city amidst the acclimations of innumerable spectators that followed and applauded the performance with shouts what i have learned from this show and many others of the same kind is of no greater value than the derivation of his name who is so much the favorite of naples but from the maski appears in cut and colored so as exactly to resemble a flea with hook nose and wrinkles like the body of that animal his employment to being ever ready to hop and to skip and jump about with that vacation of uncommon elasticity giving his neighbors a slight pinch from time to time all these circumstances added to the very intimate acquaintance and connection all the neapolitan's have with this the least offensive of all the innumerable insects that infest them and last of all his name which corrupted how we please was originally bulli chanello leaves me persuaded that the appellation is merely little flea van vitelli's aqueduct is a prodigiously beautiful magnificent and what is more a useful performance having the finest models of antiquity is said to have surpassed the more why such superb and expensive methods should still be used to conduct water up and down italy any more than other nations or why they are not equally necessary in france and england nobody informs me madame de bocage inquired long ago when she was taken to see the fountain travier roam why they had no water at paris but the same i think the question so natural that one wishes to repeat it and one great reason little urged by others incites me to look with envy on the delicious and almost innumerable gushes of water that cool the air of naples and roam and pour their pollucid tides through almost every street of those luxurious cities it is this that i consider them as a preservative against the dreadfulest of all maladies canine madness a distemper which knocked withstanding the excess of heat has here scarcely a name sure it is the plenty of drink the dogs meet at every turn that must be the sole cause of a blessing so desirable my stay has always been much shorter than i wished in every great town of italy but here when numberless wonders strike the sense without fatiguing it i do feel double pleasure and among all the new ideas i have acquired since england lessened to my sight upon the sea those gained at naples will be the last to quit me me everyone who leaves her carries off the same sensations i have asked several inhabitants of other italian states what they like best in italy except home it was naples always dear delightful naples end of chapter nine part four chapter ten of glimpses of italians aside in the 18th century by hester lynch piodzzi this debris box recordings in the public domain roam revisited we have come here just in time to see the three last days of the carnival and very drawl it is to walk or drive and see the people run about the streets all in some gay disguise or other and masked and patched and painted to make sport the torso is now quite a scene of distraction the coachman on the boxes pretending to be drunk and throwing sugar plums at the women which it goes hard to find out in the crowd and confusion is the evening which shuts in early is the fest of our and there is some little hazard in parading the streets less than accident might happen though a temporary rail and trottoir are erected to keep the carriages off our high joke however seems to consist in the men putting on girls clothes a woman is somewhat a rarity at home and strangely superfluous as it should appear by the extraordinary substitutes found for them on the stage it is more than wonderful to see great strong fellows dancing the women's parts in these fashionable dramas pastoral and heroic ballets as they call them soprano singers did not so surprise me with their feminine appearance in the opera these clumsy figure irons or stout coarse-looking men kicking about in hooped petticoats but to me irresistibly ridiculous the gentleman with me however both italians and english were too much disgusted to laugh while la premier danseuse acted the coquette beauty or distracted mother with a black beard which no art could subdue and destroyed every illusion of the pantomime at a glance all this struck nobody but us foreigners after all tumultuous and often tender applause is from the pit convinced us of their heart to felt approbation and in the part air sat gentlemen much celebrated at roam for their taste and refinement as their exhibition did not please our party notwithstanding its singularity we went but once to the theater except when a festival was advertised to begin at 11 o'clock or night but detained the company waiting on its stairs for two hours at least beyond the time for my own part i was better amused outside the doors than in masquerades can of themselves give very little pleasure except when they are new things what was most my delight and wonder to observe was the sight of perhaps 200 people of different ranks all in my mind strangely ill treated by a nobleman who having a private supper in the room prevented their entrance who paid for admission all mortified all crowded together in an inconvenient place all suffering much from heat and more from disappointment yet all imperfect good humor with each other and with the gentleman who detained in longing and ardent but not impatiently expressed expectation such a number of romans who as i could not avoid remarking certainly deserve to rule over all the world once more if as we often read in history command is to be best learned from the practice of obedience the masquerade was carried on when we had once begun it with more taste and elegance here than either at Naples or Milan so it was at Florence i remember more dresses of contrivance and fancy being produced yet a very pretty device last night of a man who pretended to carry statues about as if the sale the gentleman and ladies who personated the figures were incomparable from the choice of attitudes and skill in coloring but il carnaval e morto as the women of quality told us last night from their coaches in which they carried little transparent lanterns of a round form red blue and green etc to help forward the shine and these they throw at each other as they did sugar plums in the other towns while the millions of small thin bougie candles held in every hand and stuck up at every balcony make the strada del popolo as light as day and produce a wonderfully pretty effect gay natural and pleasing the unstudied hilarity of Italians is very rejoicing to the heart from one's consciousness that it is the result of cheerfulness really felt not a mere incentive to happiness hoped for the death of carnavale who was carried to his grave with so many candles suddenly extinguished at 12 o'clock last night has restored to us a tranquil possession of ourselves and to an opportunity to examine the beauties of nature and art that surround one nothing can look very grand in Saint Peter's church and though I saw the general benediction given I hope I took it upon east today my constant impression was that the people were below the place no pop no glare no dub and glory on the chair of state but what looked too little for the area that contained them sublimity disdains to catch the vulgar eye she elevates the soul nor can long drawn processions or splendid ceremonies suffice to content those travelers who seek for images that never tarnish and for truths that never can decay pious sex does in his morning dress paying his private devotions at the altar without any pageantry and very few attendance struck me more a thousand and a thousand times than when a raid in gold in colors and diamonds he was carried to the front of a balcony big enough to contain the conclave and they're shaded by two white fans which they're really enormous looked no larger than that a girl carries in her pocket pronounced words which on account of the height they came from were difficult to hear all this is known and felt by the managers of these theatrical exhibitions so certainly that they judiciously can find great part of them to the capella sestina which being large enough to impress the mind with its solemnity and not spacious enough for the priest's congregation and all to be lost in it is well adapted for those various functions that really make Rome a scene of perpetual garl during the holy week which as an English friend he protested to me he had never spent with so little devotion in his life before the misery has however a strong power over one's mind the absence of all instrumental music the steadiness of so many human voices the gloom of the place the picture of Michelangelo's last judgment covering its walls with the morning dress of the spectators is altogether calculated with great ingenuity to give a sudden stroke to the imagination and kindle that temporary blazer diversion that is wisely enough intended to excite but even this has much of its effect destroyed from the admission of too many people crowd and bustle and struggle for places leave no room for any ideas to range themselves and least of all serious ones nor would the opening of our sacred music in Westminster Abbey when 900 performers joined to celebrate messiah's praises make that impression which it does upon the mind were not the king and court and all the audience as still as death when the first notice taken the ceremony of washing the pilgrim's feet is a pleasing one it is seen in high perfection here at Rome where all of the Pope personally performs is done with infinite grace and with an era of mingled majesty and sweetness difficult to hit but singularly becoming in him who is both priest of God and sovereign of his people but how said Cyrus shall I make men think me more excellent than themselves by being really so replies Xenophon putting his words into the mouth of Cambyses pious sex does takes no deeper method I believe it all acknowledge his superior merit no prince can less affect state nor no clergyman can less adopt hypocritical behavior the Pope powders his hair like any other of the cardinals and is it seems the first to has ever done so when he takes the air it is in a fashionable carried with a few very few guards on horseback and is by no means desirous of making himself a show now and then an old woman begs his blessing as he passes but I almost remember the time when our bishop of Bangor and St Asif were followed by the country people in north wales will as much or more and with just the same feelings one man in particular we used to talk of who came from a distant part of our mountainous province with much expense in proportion to his abilities poor fellow and terrible fatigue it was a tenant of my father's who asked him how he ventured to undertake so troublesome a journey it was to get my good lord's blessing replied the farmer I hope it will cure my rheumatism kissing the slipper at Rome will probably in a hundred years more be a thing to be thus faintly recollected by a few very old people and it is strange to me that it should have lasted so long no man better knows than the present learned and pious successor of St Peter that St Peter himself would permit no act of adoration to his own person and that he severely reproved Cornelius for kneeling to him charging him to rise and stand upon his feet adding these remarkable words seeing I also am a man footnote surge et eco ipser homosum valdet end footnote surely it will at last be found out among them that such a ceremony is inconsistent with the pope's character as a christian priest however it may suit state matters to continue it in the character of a sovereign the roads he is now making on every side is capital to facilitate foreigners approach the money he has laid out on the conveniences of the Vatican the desire he feels of reforming a police much in want of reformation joined to an immaculate character for private virtue and elegant taste for the fine arts must make everyone wish for a long continuance of his health and dignity though the wits and jokers when they see his arms up as they're often placed in galleries etc about the palace and consist of a zepo blowing on a flower a pair of eagles wings and a few stars have invented this epigram to say that when the emperor has got his eagle back the king of france his flurly and the stars are gone to heaven brusky will have nothing left him but the wind these verses were given me by an agreeable menodict and friar member of a convent belonging to st paul's war delimura he was a learned man a native of ragusa had been particularly intimate with wartley montague whose variety of requirements had impressed him exceedingly he showed us the curiosities of his church the finest in rome next to st peters and had silver gates but the plating has worn off and only the brass remains there is an old egyptian candlestick above five feet high preserved here and many other singularities adorn the church here is an altar supported by four pillars of red porphyry and here are the pictures of all the popes san peter first and our present brusky last it is given much occasion for chat that there should now be no room left to hang a successors portrait and that he who now occupies the church is painted in powdered hair and a white headdress such as he wears every day to the great affliction of his courtiers who recommended the usual stape diadem but no no said he there have been red cap popes enough mine shall be only white and white it is this beautiful edifice was built by the emperor theodosius and there is an old picture at the top of our saviour giving the benediction in the form that all the greek priests give it now apropos there have been many sects of oriental christians dropped into the church of rome within these latter years a very venerable old armenian says greek mass regularly in saint peters church every day before one particular altar his long black dress and white beard attracted much of my notice he saw it did and now whenever we meet in the street by chance he kindly stands still to bless me but the syriac or marinates have a church to themselves just by the bokeh de la verita and extremely curious we thought it to see their ceremonies upon palm sunday when their aged patriarch not less than 93 years old and richly a tide with an inconvenient weight of drapery and a mitre shaped like that of eran in our bibles exactly was supported by two other colored orientals but he pronounced a benediction on the tree that stood near the altar and was at least 10 feet high the attendant clergy habited after their own eastern taste and very superbly had broad phylacteries bound on their foreheads after the fashion of the jews and carried long strips of parchment up and down the church with the law written on them in syriac characters while they formed themselves into a procession and led their truly reverent principal back to his place an exhibition so striking with the view of many monuments around the world sacred to the memory of such and such a vision of Damascus gave so strong an impression of asiatic manners to the mind that one felt glad to find europe round one ongoing out again the fireworks exhibited on the castle of san angelo on Easter day are the completest things of their kind in the world three thousand rockets all sent up into the air at once make a wonderful burst indeed and a service of pretty imitation of the civius the lighting up of the building too on a sudden with firepots had a new and beautiful effect you all liked the entertainment vastly the vekia is here at Rome the common phrase when speaking of our only female servant a person not unlike an oxford or cambridge bedmaker in appearance and much amazed was i two days ago at the answer of our vekia when curiosity prompted me to ask her age oh madam i am a very aged woman was the reply and have two grandchildren married i'm 42 years old i told an italian gentleman who dined with the swat catarina had said and begged him to ask the lack of applause who waited on a table a similar question he appeared a large well-looking sturdy fellow about 38 years old but said he was guess 22 that he had been married six years and had five children how old was your wife when you met 13 sir answered carlo so all is kept even at least for if they end life sooner than in colder climates they begin it earlier it is plain yet such things seem strange to us said with thousand which occur in these warm countries in the commonest life brick floors for example with hangings of a dirty printed cotton affording no bad shelter for spider's bugs etc a table in the same room and custard with their antique very fine and worthy of wilton house with some exceeding good copies of the finest pictures here at rome formed the furniture of our present lodging and now we have got the little casement windows clean to look at it i pass whole hours admiring even in the copy of laurius descent from the cross by daniel default era pyre sextus has had a legacy left him within these last years to the prejudice of some nobleman's ears who loudly lamented their fate and his tyranny who could take advantage as they expressed it of their relations caprice the pope did not give it them back because they behaved so ill he said but neither did he seize what was left to him by dint of despotic authority he went to law with the family for it which i thought a very strange thing and lost his cause which i thought are still stranger pillar albany is the most dazzling of any place yet and the carry-outed pillars the finest things in it they replete with wonders and distract him with objects each worthy a whole day's attention here is an antique list of uribides plays in marble as those tell me who can read the greek inscriptions i lose infinite pleasure every day for want of deeper learning what has most struck me here is a real improvement upon social and civil life was the school of abate silvestre who upon the plan of monsieur le paix at paris teaches the deaf and dumb people to speak read write and cast accounts he likewise teaches them the principles of logic and instructs them in the sacred mysteries of our holy religion i am not naturally credulous nor apt to take payment in words for meanings much of my life has been spent and all my youth in the tuition of babies i was of course less likely to be deceived and i can safely say that they did appear to have learned all that he taught them that appearance too if it were no more is so difficult to obtain the patience required from the master is so very great and the good he is doing to mankind so extensive that i did not like offensively to detect the difference between knowing a synergism and appearing to know it with regard to morality the pupils have certainly gained many precognita while the capital scholars were showing off to another party i addressed a girl who's had working in the window and perceived that she could explain the meaning of the commandments competently well to prove the truth i pretended to pick a gentleman's pocket who stood near me feckato said the wench to stick the she was about 10 years old perhaps but a little boy of seven was deservedly the master's favorite he really possessed the most intelligent and interesting countenance i ever saw and when to explain the major minor and consequence he put the two first together into his hat with an air of triumph we were enchanted with him someone to tease him said he had red hair he instantly led them to a picture of our saviour which hung in the room said it was the same color as his and ought to be respected the Italians seem to find out i know not why that it is a good thing the Jesuits are gone that they steadily endeavour to retain those principles of despotism which was their peculiar province to inspire and confirm and whilst all men must see that the work of education goes on worse in other hands indeed nothing can be wilder than committing use to the tuition of monks and nuns and less like them they were intended for the cloister we have been led to reflections of this sort by a view of girls portioned here at Rome once a year some for marriage and others for a nunnery the last set for the handsomest and fewest and the and the people I converse with say that every day makes an almost visible diminution in the number of monks and nuns i know not however whether Italy will go on much the better for having so few convents some should surely be left now some must be left in a country where it is not possible for every man to obtain a decent livelihood by labour as in England no army no navy very little commerce possible to the inland states and very little need of it in any little study of the law too where the prince or barons lips pronounced on the decision of property what must people do where so few professions are open can they all be physicians priests or shopkeepers where little physics is taken and few good sport there are already more clergy than can live and I saw an abate with the petit collet at Lucca playing in the orchestra at the opera for 18 pence pay now with regard to the present state of morals at Rhone one must not judge from steering stories told one it is like heliagabalus's method of computing the number of his citizens from the weight of their cobwebs it is wonderful to me that the people are no worse when no methods are taken to keep them from being bad as to the society I speak not from myself for I saw nothing of it some English liked it but more complained wanting amusement however can be no complaint even without society in a city so pregnant with wonders so productive of reflections and if the roman nobles are haughty who can wonder when one sees doors of agate and chimney pieces of amethyst one can scarcely be surprised at the possessor's pride should they in contempt turn their backs upon a foreigner whom they are early taught to consider as the turks consider women creatures formed for their use only or at best amusement and devoted to certain destruction of the hour of death with such principles the hatred and scorn they naturally feel for a protestant will easily swell into superciliousness or burst out into arrogance the moment it is unrestrained by the necessity of forms among the rich and the desire of pillage in the poor but I shall be glad now to exchange lapis lazuli for violets and ferrantique for green fields here are more amethysts about Rome than lilacs and the laburnum which at this gay season adorns the environs of london I look for in vain about the port of del popolo the proud purple tulip which decorates the ground here about supposed the british hair bell is italy and england again but the hair bell by cultivation becomes a hyacinth the tulip remains where it began we are now at the 16th of april yet I know not how or why it is although the oaks young small and straggling as they are have the leaves come out all broad and full already though the fig is bursting out every day and hour and the mulberry tree so tardy and hour climate that I've often been unable to see scarcely a bud upon them even in May is here completely furnished apple trees are yet emblosing about their city and the few elms that can be found up at just unfolding common shrubs continue their wintery appearance and in the general look of spring little is gained the hedges now of Kent and Surrey are filled with fragrance I'm sure and prim roses in the remote provinces torment the sportsman with spoiling the dragon a soft senting morning white limes horse chestnuts etc contribute to produce an effect not inferior to that fostered by Italian sunshine as I expected to find it why the first breath the far distant summer should thus affect the oak and fig yet leave the elm and apple as with us the botanists must tell few advances have been made in vegetation since we left Naples that is certain the hedges were as forward near Podswally two full months ago and here are no china oranges to be bought no nor a cherry or strawberry to be seen by every man of fashions table in London is covered with them and all the shops of Covent Garden and St James's street hang out their luxurious temptations of fruit to prove the proximity of summer and the advantages of industrious cultivation our eating pleased me more at every town than this where however a man might live very well I believe a sixpence a day and lodge for twenty pounds a year and whoever has no attachment to religion friends or country no prejudices to plague his neighbors with and no dislike to take the world as it goes for six or seven years of his life may spend them profitably at Rome if either his business or his pleasure be made out of the works of art as an income of two or indeed one hundred pounds per animal purchase a man more refined delights of that kind here than as many thousands in England nor need he want society at the first houses palaces one ought to call them as Italians measure no man's merit by the weight of his pose they know how to reverence even poverty and soften all its sorrows with an appearance of respect when they find it unfortunately connected with noble birth his own country folks neglect as they pass through would indeed be likely enough to disturb his felicity and lessen the kindness of his Roman friends who having no idea of a person's being shunned for any other possible reason except the want of a pedigree would conclude that his must be essentially deficient and lament the having laid out so many caresses on an imposter the air of the city is unwholesome to foreigners but if they pass the first year the remainder goes well enough many English seem very healthy who are established here without even the smallest intention of returning home to great Britain for which place we are setting out tomorrow 19th of April 1786 and quit a town that still retains so many just pretenses to be styled the first among the cities of the earth to which almost as many strangers are now attracted by curiosity as were dragged thither by violence in the first stage of its dominion impelled by superstitious zeal in the second the rage for antiquities now seems to have spread its contagion of connoisseurship over all those people whose predecessors tore down levelled and destroyed or buried underground or buried underground their statues pictures every work of art Poles, Russians, Swedes and Germans innumerable block daily dither in this age to admire with rapture the remains of those very fabrics which their own barbarous ancestors pulled down 10 centuries ago and give for the head of Olivia or probes or galienus what emperors and queens could not then use with any efficacy for the preservation of their own persons now grown sacred by rust and valuable from their difficulty to be deciphered the English were going to be the only travellers of Europe the only dupes too in this way but desire of distinction is diffused among all the northern nations and our Romans here have it more in their power with that prudence to assist them which it is said they do not want if not to conquer their neighbors once again at least to ruin them by dint of digging up their dead heroes and calling in the assistance of their old pagan deities now useful to them in a new manner and ever propitious to this city end of chapter 10 chapter 11 part one of glimpses of Italian society in the 18th century by Hester Lynch Piazzi this livery box recording is in the public domain return to Milan Loretto the richest treasures of Europe stand in the most delicious district of it the number of beggars offended me because I hold it next to impossibility that they should want in a country so luxuriously abundant and their prostrations as they kneel and kiss the ground before you I'm more calculated to reduce disgust from British travellers than compassion nor can I think these vagabonds distressed in earnest at this time above all others when their sovereign provides them with employment on the beautiful new road he is making and insists on their being well paid who are found willing to work but the town itself of Loretto claims my attention so clear are its streets so numerous and cheerful and industrious are its inhabitants one would think they had resolved to rob passengers of the trite remark which the sight of dead wealth always inspires that the money might be better bestowed upon the living poor for here there are very few poor families and fewer idlers someone expects to see in place were not business but devotion is the leading characteristic so quiet too and in offence of other folks here that's guessing any robberies or murders or any but very petty infringements of the law are ever committed among them yet people grieve to see that wealth collected which once diffused would certainly make many happy and those treasures lying dead which well disposed might keep thousands alive it was curious to see the devotees drag themselves around the holy house upon their knees but the Santa scholar at Rome had shown me the same operation performed with more difficulty and a written injunction at bottom less agreeable for Italians to comply within any possible prostration namely that no one should spit as he went up or down except in his pocket hangative the lamps which burn night and day before the black image here at Loretto are of solid gold and there is such a crowd of them I scarcely could see the figure for my own part and that one may see still less the attendant cannons throw a veil over one's face going in the confessionals where all may be heard in their own language is not peculiar to this church I met with it somewhere else but have forgotten where though I much esteemed the establishment it is very entertaining here too to see inscriptions in 12 different tongues giving an account of the miraculous removal and arrival here at the Santa Casa I was delighted with the Welsh one and our conductor said there came not unfrequently pilgrims from the Vale of Quinn who in their turns told the wonders of their holy well I told a learned ecclesiastic at Rome that we should return home by the way of Loretto there is no need said he to caution a native of your island against credulity but pray do not believe that we are ourselves satisfied with the tale you will read there no man of learning but knows that Adrian destroyed every trace and vestige of Christianity that he could find in the east and he was a cute and diligent and powerful the Empress Helene along after him with piety that equalled even his profaneness could never hear of this holy house how then should it have waited till so many long years after Jesus Christ truth is Pope Boniface VIII who canonized St Louis who instituted the Jubilee who quarreled with Philippe Lebel about a new crusade and who at last fretted himself to death though he had conquered all his enemies because he feared some loss of power to the church desired to give mankind a new object of attention and encouraged an old visionary in the year 1296 to propagate the tale he half believed himself how the Blessed Virgin had appeared to him and related the story you will read upon the walls which was then first committed to paper in consequence of this intelligence Boniface sent men into the east that he could best depend upon and they brought by just such particulars as would best please the Pope and in those days you can scarce think how quick the blaze of superstition caught and communicated itself no one wished to deny what his neighbour was willing to believe and what he himself would then have gained no credit by contradicting positive evidence of what the house really was or whence it came it was in a few years impossible to obtain nor did Boniface the eighth know it himself i suppose much less the old visionary who first set the matter of going meantime the house itself has no foundation whatever the story may have it is a very singular house as you may see it has been venerated by the best and wisest among Christians now for 500 years even the Turks who have the same method of honouring their prophet with gifts as we do the Virgin Mary respect the very name of Loretto why then should the place be to any order of thinking beings a just object of insult or mockery here he ended his discourse the recollection of which never left me once we remained at the place but we must leave Loretto to proceed along the side of this lovely sea hearing the pilgrims sing most sweetly as they go along in troops towards the town was now and then a female voice peculiarly distinguished from the rest by this means a new image is presented to one's mind the sight of such figures to half alarm the fancy and given air of distance from England which nothing has here the two inspired half so strongly this charming Adriatic gulf beside though more than delicious to drive by does not like the Mediterranean convey homish or familiar ideas one feels that it belongs exclusively to Venice one knows that ancient Greece is on the opposite shore here are plenty of nightingales but they do not sing as well as in Hertfordshire birds gain in color as you approach the topic but they lose in song under the torrid zone I've heard they never sing at all with us in England the latest leave off by mid-summer when the work of incubation goes forward and the parental duties begin the nightingale too chooses the coolest hour and though I have yet heard her in Italy only sing in the mornings Virgil knew she sung in the night to hear birds it is however indispensably necessary that there should be high trees and except in these parts of Italy and those of our genera and sienna no timber of any good growth can I find the Rocolo too and other methods taken to catch small birds which many delight in eating and more in taking less than the quantity of natural music thick satiously enough well gaudy insects ill supplied their place and sharpened their stings at pleasure when deprived of their greatest enemies we are here less tormented than usual however while the prospects are varied so that every look produces a new and beautiful landscape and kona and kona is a town perfectly agreeable to strangers from the good humor with which every nation is received and every religion patiently endured here are good fish and to say true everything eatable is much imperfection as possible I could never since I arrived that you're in find real cause of complaint serious complaint I mean except at that savage looking place called a larigofani and some other petty town in Tuscany near sienna where I ate too many eggs and grapes because there was nothing else nice accommodations must not be looked for and need not be regretted where so much amusement during the day gives one good disposition to sleep sound at night the worst is men and women servants and masters must often mess together and if one frets about such things it is better to stay at home the italians like traveling in england know better than the english do traveling in italy whilst an exorbitant expense is incurred by the journey not well repaid and by the waiters white chitlins tambour weskets and independent no sir echoed round a well furnished inn or tavern which puts them but in the place of socrates at the fair who cried out how many things have these people gathered together that I do not want a noble florentine complained exceedingly to me once of the english hotels where he was made to help pay for those good gold watches the fellows who attended him do from their pockets so he set up his quarters comically enough at the wagoners full moon upon the old rigid bath to be quit at the ski avid tool as he called it of living like a gentleman where he says I am not known to be one the truth is a continental nobleman can have little heart of a country where to be treated as a man of fashion he must absolutely behave as such his rank is ascertained at home and people's deportment to him regulated by long established customers nor can it be supposed flattering to its prejudices to feel himself jostled in the street or driven against upon the road by rich trader while he is contriving the cheapest method of going to look over his manufacturing wealth diffused makes all men comfortable and leaves no man splendid gives everybody two dishes but nobody 200 objects of show are therefore infrequent in england and a foreigner who travels through our country in search of positive sights will after much money spent go home but poorly entertained there is neither charisma will he say no carnavale in any sense of the word among those insipid islanders for he who does not love our government and taste our manners which result from it can never be delighted in england by the inhabitants of our nation may always be amused in theirs without any esteem of it at all i know not how and kona produced all these tedious reflections it is a trading place and a seaport town men working in chains upon the new mold did not please me though and their insensibility shocks one give a poor thief something master says one impudent fellow son start a ladro padrone note i'm a light-fingered fellow master end note with a grin that such people should be corrupt or course however is no wonder what surprised me most was that when one of our company spoke of this conduct to a man of the town well what would you have so replies the person applied to when the poor creature is castigato it is enough sure no need to make him be melancholy too and added with true italian good nature siamo tutti peccatori note we are all sinners you know end note padua we dined at a lovely villa belonging to an amiable friend upon the margin of the river where the kind embraces of the padrone di casa added to the fragrance of her garden and a sweet breath of oxen drawing in her team revived me once more to the enjoyment of cheerful conversation by restoring my natural health and proving beyond a possibility of doubt that my late disorder was of the putrid kind we dined in a grotto like room and partook the evening refreshments cake ice and lemonade under a tree by the riverside helps my own feelings reminded me of the sailors delight described in ansons forages when they landed at one finandes night was best disposed of in the barge and i observed as we entered padua early in the morning how surprisingly quick had been the progress of summer but in these countries vegetation is so rapid that everything makes haste to come and more to go scarce have you tasted green peas or strawberries before they are out of season and if you do not swallow your pleasures as madame la président said you'll have a chance to miss of getting any pleasures at all here is no mediocrity in anything no moderate weather no middle rank of life no twilight whatever is not night is day and whatever is not love is hatred and that the english should eat peaches in may and green peas in october sounds to italian ears as a miracle they comfort themselves however by saying that they must be very insipid while we know that fruits forced by strong fire are at least many of them higher in flavor than those produced by sun the pineapple particularly which west indians confess it's better with us than with them pigs and cherries however defy a hot house and grapes raised by art of worth little except for show peaches nectarines and ananas are the glory of a british gardener and no country but england can show such our morning passed at the villa of the senator quirini set us on this train of thinking for every cold excellence adorned it and brought to my mind while chair's description of poco garanti in kondid faults only in the ostentation and there the character fails misled by a french idea that pleasure is nothing without the delight of showing that you are pleased like the old adage or often quoted passage about learning she read to a nichelest note my knowledge is nothing till other men know that they know is to end note avanishin has no such notions by force of mind and dint of elegance inherent in it he pleases himself first and finds everybody else delighted of course nor would quit his own country except for paradise while in english nobleman clumps his trees and twists his river to comply with his neighbor's taste when perhaps he has a none of his own and feels disgusted with all he has done and runs away to live in italy the evening of this day was spent at the theater where i was glad the audience were no better pleased for the plaudits of an italian platter at an air they like when one's nerves are weak and the weather very hot are all but totally insupportable end of chapter 11 part one