Charles Dickens to Lady Blessington-Verona, Venice, and travel in Italy. overran it. Then they went away. I shut myself up for one month, close and tight, over my little Christmas book, "The Chimes." All my affections and passions got twined and knotted up in it, and I became as haggard as a murderer long before I wrote "The End." When I had done that, like "The Man of Thessaly," who, having scratched his eyes out in a quickset hedge, plunged into a bramble-bush to scratch them in again, I fled to Venice to recover the composure I had disturbed. From thence I went to Verona and to Mantua. And now I am here; just come up from under ground, and earthy all over, from seeing that extraordinary tomb in which the dead saint lies in an alabaster case, with sparkling jewels all about him to mock his dusky eyes, not to mention the twenty-franc pieces which devout votaries were ringing down upon a sort of skylight in the Cathedral pavement above, as if it were the counter of his heavenly shop. You know Verona? You know every thing in Italy, I know. I am not learned in geography, and it was a great blow to me to find that Romeo was only banished five-and-twenty miles. It was a greater blow to me to see the old house of the Capulets, with their cognizance still carved in stone over the gateway of the court-yard. It is a most miserable little inn, at this time ankle deep in dirt, and noisy vetturini and muddy market carts were disputing possession of the yard with a brood of geese, all splashed and bespattered as if they had their yesterday's white trowsers on. There was nothing to connect it with the beautiful story but a very unsentimental middle-aged lady (the Padrona I suppose) in the doorway, who resembled old Capulet in the one particular of being very great indeed in the family-way. The Roman amphitheatre delighted me beyond expression. I never saw any thing so full of solemn, ancient interest. There Charles Dickens to Lady Blessington-Verona, Venice, and travel in Italy. are the four-and-forty rows of seats, as fresh and perfect as if their occupants had vacated them but yesterday; the entrances, passages, dens, rooms, corridors, the numbers over some of the arches. An equestrian troop had been there some days before, and had scooped out a little ring at one end of the arena, and had their performances in that spot. I should like to have seen it, of all things, for its very dreariness. Fancy a handful of people sprinkled over one corner of the great place (the whole population of Verona wouldn't fill it), and a spangled cavalier bowing to the echoes and the grass-grown walls! I climbed to the topmost seat and looked away at the beautiful view for some minutes; when I turned round and looked down into the theatre again, it had exactly the appearance of an immense straw hat, to which the helmet in the Castle of Otranto was a baby; the rows of seats representing the different plaits of straw, and the arena the inside of the crown. I had great expectations of Venice, but they fall immeasurably short of the wonderful reality. The short time I passed there went by me in a dream. I hardly think it possible to exaggerate its beauties, its sources of interest, its uncommon novelty and freshness. A thousand and one realizations of the thousand and one nights could scarcely captivate and enchant me more than Venice. Your old house at Albaro-Il Paradiso-is spoken of as yours to this day. What a gallant place it is! I don't know the present inmate, but I hear that he bought and furnished it not long since with great splendor, in the French style, and that he wishes to sell it. I wish I were rich, and could buy it. There is a third-rate wine shop below Byron's house, and the place looks dull, and miserable, and ruinous enough. Charles Dickens to Lady Blessington-Verona, Venice, and travel in Italy. Old is a trifle uglier than when I first arrived. He has periodical parties, at which there are a great many flowerpots and a few ices; no other refreshments. He goes about constantly, charged with extemporaneous poetry, and is always ready, like tavern dinners, on the shortest notice and the most reasonable terms. He keeps a gigantic harp in his bedroom, together with pen, ink, and paper, for fixing his ideas as they flow; a kind of profane King David, but truly good-natured and very harmless. Pray say to Count D'Orsay every thing that is cordial and loving from me. The travelling purse he gave me has been of immense service; it has been constantly opened. All Italy seems to yearn to put its hand in it. I think of hanging it, when I come back to England, on a nail as a trophy, and of gashing the brim like the blade of an old sword, and saying to my son and heir, as they do upon the stage, "You see this notch, boy? Five hundred francs were laid low on that day for post-horses. Where this gap is, a waiter charged your father treble the correct amount-and got it. This end, worn into teeth like the rasped edge of an old file, is sacred to the custom-houses, boy, this passport, and the shabby soldiers at town gates, who put an open hand and a dirty coat-cuff into the coach windows of all Forestieri. Take it, boy, thy father has nothing else to give!" My desk is cooling itself in a mail-coach somewhere down at the back of the cathedral, and the pens and ink in this house are so detestable that I have no hope of your ever getting to this portion of my letter. But I have the less misery in this state of mind, from knowing that it has nothing in it to repay you the trouble of perusal. CHARLES DICKENS. for Lord Byron to Mr. Murray-Milan. Correspondence of Lucretia Borgia. X.-MILAN-CORRESPONDENCE OF LUCRETIA BORGIA. Lord Byron to Mr. Murray. MILAN, Oct. 15th, 1816. I hear that Mr. Davies has arrived in England, but that, of some letters committed to his care by Mr. Hobhouse, only half have been delivered. This intelligence naturally makes me feel a little anxious for mine, and among them for the MS. which I wished to have compared with them sent by me through the hands of Mr. Shelley. I trust that it has arrived safely; and, indeed, not less so that some little crystals from Mont Blanc, for my daughter and niece, have reached their address. Pray have the goodness to ascertain from Mr. Davies that no accident (by custom-house or loss) has befallen them, and satisfy me on this point at your earliest convenience. If I recollect rightly, you told me that Mr. Gifford had kindly undertaken to correct the press (at my request) during my absence; at least I hope so. It will add to my many obligations to that gentleman. I wrote to you on my way here a short note, dated Martigny. Mr. Hobhouse and myself arrived here a few days ago, by the Simplon and Lago Maggiore routes. Of course, we visited the Borromean islands, which are fine, but too artificial. The Simplon is magnificent in its nature and its art; both God and man have done wonders, to say nothing of the Devil, who must certainly have had a hand (or a hoof) in some of the rocks and ravines, through and over which the works are carried. Milan is striking; the cathedral superb. The city altogether reminds me of Seville, but a little inferior. We had heard divers bruits and took precautions on the road, near the frontier, against Lord Byron to Mr. Murray-Milan. Correspondence of Lucretia Borgia. 66 some worthy fellows (i. e., felons) that were out," and had ransacked some preceding travellers a few weeks ago, near Sesto, or Cesto, I forget which, of cash and raiment, besides putting them in bodily fear, and lodging about twenty slugs in the retreating part of a courier belonging to Mr. Hope. But we were not molested, nor I think in any danger, except in the way of making mistakes in cocking and priming, whenever we saw an old house or an ill-looking thicket, and now and then suspecting the true men, who have very much the appearance of the thieves of other countries. What the thieves may look like I know not, nor desire to know, for it seems they come upon you in bodies of thirty (in buckram and Kendal green) at a time, so that voyagers have no great chance. It is something like poor dear Turkey in that respect, but not so good, for there you can have as great a body of rogues to match the regular banditti; but here the gens-d'armes are said to be no great things, and as for one's own people, one can't carry them about, like Robinson Crusoe, with a gun on each shoulder. I have been to the Ambrosian library; it is a fine collection, full of manuscripts, edited and unedited. I enclose you a list of the former, recently published. These are matters for your literati. For me, in my simple way, I have been most delighted with a correspondence of letters, all original and amatory, between Lucretia Borgia and Cardinal Bembo, preserved there. I have pored over them and a lock of her hair, the prettiest and fairest imaginable; I never saw fairer, and shall go repeatedly to read the epistles over and over, and if I can obtain some of the hair by fair means I shall try. I have already persuaded the librarian to promise me copies of the letters, and I hope he will not disappoint me. They are short but very simple, sweet and |