'I should like to know what harm my (6 poeshies" have done? I can't tell what people mean by making me a hobgoblin.'

LETTER 381.

TO MR. MURRAY.

'Ravenna, August 31st, 1820.

I have "put my soul" into the tragedy (as you if 'it); but you know that there are d-d souls as well 'as tragedies. Recollect that it is not a political play, though it may look like it: it is strictly histo'rical. Read the history and judge.

'Ada's picture is her mother's. I am glad of it— 'the mother made a good daughter.. Send me Gif'ford's opinion, and never mind the Archbishop. I 'can neither send you away, nor give you a hundred 'pistoles, nor a better taste: I send you a tragedy, ' and you ask for "facetious epistles;' a little like 'your predecessor, who advised Dr. Prideaux to put some more humour into his Life of Mahomet." Bankes is a wonderful fellow. There is hardly ' one of my school or college contemporaries that has 'not turned out more or less celebrated. Peel, 'Palmerstone, Bankes, Hobhouse, Tavistock, Bob 'Mills, Douglas Kinnaird, &c. &c., have all talked ' and been talked about.

6.66

'We are here going to fight a little next month, if 'the Huns don't cross the Po, and probably if they 'do. I can't say more now. If any thing happens, you have matter for a posthumous work in MS.; so pray be civil. Depend upon it, there will be savage 'work, if once they begin here. The French courage proceeds from vanity, the German from phlegm, the 6 Turkish from fanaticism and opium, the Spanish 'from pride, the English from coolness, the Dutch

VOL. III.

C

'from obstinacy, the Russian from insensibility, but 'the Italian from anger; so you'll see that they will spare nothing.'

'Ravenna, August 31st, 1820. 'D—n your "mezzo cammin *"-you should say "" the prime of life," a much more consolatory phrase. Besides, it is not correct. I was born in 1788, and consequently am but thirty-two. You are mistaken ' on another point. The "Sequin Box" never came ' into requisition, nor is it likely to do so. It were 'better that it had, for then a man is not bound, you know. As to reform, I did reform-what would you 'have? "Rebellion lay in his way, and he found it. 'I verily believe that nor you, nor any man of poetical 'temperament, can avoid a strong passion of some 'kind. It is the poetry of life. What should I have 'known or written, had I been a quiet, mercantile politician, or a lord in waiting? A man must travel and turmoil, or there is no existence. Besides, I only meant to be a Cavalier Servente, and had no idea it would turn out a romance, in the Anglo 'fashion.

'However, I suspect I know a thing or two of Italy '-more than Lady Morgan has picked up in her posting. What do Englishmen know of Italians beyond their museums and saloons-and some hack (** en passant? Now, I have lived in the heart of 'their houses, in parts of Italy freshest and least in'fluenced by strangers,-have seen and become (pars magna fui) a portion of their hopes, and fears, and

,

* I had congratulated him upon arriving at what Dante calls the mezzo cammin' of life, the age of thirty-three.

passions, and am almost inoculated into a family. This is to see men and things as they are.

'You say that I called you 'collect any thing of the sort.

' are always in scrapes.

"quiet *”—I don't reOn the contrary, you

'What think you of the Queen? I hear Mr. Hoby says, "that it makes him weep to see her, she

' reminds him so much of Jane Shore."

Mr. Hoby the bootmaker's heart is quite sore

For seeing the Queen makes him think of Jane Shore ;
And, in fact,

Pray excuse this ribaldry.

'about? Write and tell me all

*

What is your Poem about it and you. 'Yours, &c.

'P.S. Did you write the lively quiz on Peter Bell? It has wit enough to be yours, and almost 'too much to be any body else's now going. It was ' in Galignani the other day or week.'

• Ravenna, September 7th, 1820. 'In correcting the proofs you must refer to the 'manuscript, because there are in it various readings. Pray attend to this, and choose what Gifford thinks 'best. Let me hear what he thinks of the whole.

'You speak of Lady's illness: she is not of 'those who die :-the amiable only do; and those 'whose death would do good live. Whenever she is pleased to return, it may be presumed she will take "her" divining rod" along with her: it may be of use to her at home, as well as to the "rich man" of 'the Evangelists.

Pray do not let the papers paragraph me back to

* I had mistaken the concluding words of his letter of the 9th of June.

England. They may say what they please, any 'loathsome abuse but that. Contradict it.

My last letters will have taught you to expect an explosion here it was primed and loaded, but they ' hesitated to fire the train. One of the cities shirked 'from the league. I cannot write more at large for a 'thousand reasons. Our "puir hill folk" offered to 'strike, and raise the first banner, but Bologna paused; and now 'tis autumn, and the season half over. "O Jerusalem! Jerusalem!" The Huns are ' on the Po; but if once they pass it on their way to Naples, all Italy will be behind them. The dogs'the wolves-may they perish like the host of Senna'cherib! If you want to publish the Prophecy of Dante, you never will have a better time.'

LETTER 384.

TO MR. MURRAY.

'Ravenna, Sept. 11th, 1820. Here is another historical note for you. I want to be as near truth as the drama can be.

'Last post I sent you a note fierce as Faliero him'self*, in answer to a trashy tourist, who pretends 'that he could have been introduced to me. Let me have a proof of it, that I may cut its lava into some shape.

'What Gifford says is very consolatory (of the First • Act). English, sterling genuine English, is a desi'deratum amongst you, and I am glad that I have got so much left; though Heaven knows how I ' retain it I hear none but from my valet, and his is Nottinghamshire: and I see none but in your new

*The angry note against English travellers appended to this tragedy, in consequence of an assertion made by some recent tourist, that he (or as it afterwards turned out, she) had repeatedly declined an introduction to Lord Byron while in Italy.'

publications, and theirs is no language at all, but jargon. Even your * * * * is terribly stilted and affected, with "very, very" so soft and pamby.

Oh! if ever I do come amongst you again, I will give you such a " Baviad and Mæviad!" not as good as the old, but even better merited. There never was such a set as your ragamuffins (I mean not yours only, but every body's). What with the Cockneys, ' and the Lakers, and the followers of Scott, and Moore, and Byron, you are in the very uttermost ' decline and degradation of literature. I can't think ' of it without all the remorse of a murderer. 'that Johnson were alive again to crush them!'

I wish

Ravenna, Sept. 14th, 1820. 'What! not a line? Well, have it your own way. 'I wish you would inform Perry, that his stupid paragraph is the cause of all my newspapers being stopped in Paris. The fools believe me in your in'fernal country, and have not sent on their gazettes, 'so that I know nothing of your beastly trial of the Queen.

'I cannot avail myself of Mr. Gifford's remarks, ́ because I have received none, except on the first act. 'Yours, &c.

P.S. Do, pray, beg the editors of papers to say any thing black guard they please; but not to put me amongst their arrivals. They do me more mischief ' by such nonsense than all their abuse can do.'

• So you are at your old tricks again. This is the 'second packet I have received unaccompanied by a