Before the fall of Napoleon the Princess Elisa Baciocchi his sister was sovereign of Lucca, and she it was who has embellished the outside of the city with some beautiful promenades.  She devoted her whole time, talents and resources to the good of her subjects and is highly esteemed and much regretted by them.  The present Duchess of Lucca has no other character but that which seems common to the Royal families of France, Spain and Naples; viz., of being very weak and priest-ridden.  Lucca furnishes excellent female servants who are remarkable for their industry and probity.  Their only solace is their lover or amoroso, as they term him; and when they enter into the service of any family, they always stipulate for one day in the week on which they must have liberty to visit their amoroso, or the amoroso must be allowed to come to the house to visit them.  This is an ancient custom among them and has no pernicious consequences, nor does it interfere with their other good qualities.  At the back of Lucca is an immense mountain which stands between it and Pisa, and intercepts the reciprocal view of the two cities which are only ten miles distant from each other.  This mountain and its peculiarity is the very one mentioned by Dante in his Inferno in the episode of Ugolino: 

  Cacciando il lupo e i lupicini AL MONTE,
  PER CHE i Pisan veder Lucca NON ponno.[101]

I started from Lucca in a cabriolet and in two hours arrived at Pisa, putting up at the Tre Donzelle on the Quai of the Arno.  Between Lucca and Pisa are the Bagni di Lucca, a favorite resort for the purpose of bathing and drinking the mineral waters.

Pisa is one of the most beautiful cities I have seen in Italy.  The extreme elegance and comfort of the houses, the spacious Quai on the Arno which furnishes a most agreeable promenade, the splendid style of architecture of the Palazzi and public buildings, the cleanliness of the streets, the salubrity of the climate, the mildness of the winter, the profusion and cheapness of all the necessaries of life, and above all the amenity and simplicity of the inhabitants, combine to make Pisa an agreeable and favorite residence.  Yet the population having much decreased there appears an air of melancholy stillness about the city and grass may be seen in some of the streets.  This decay in population causes lodgings to be very cheap.

The most striking object in Pisa is the leaning tower (Torre cadente) and after that the Cathedral, Baptistery, and Campo Santo which are all close to the tower and to each other.  Imagine two fine Gothic Churches in a square or place like Lincoln’s Inn Fields; a large oblong building nearly at right angles with the churches and inclosing a green grass plot in its quadrangle and a leaning tower of cylindrical form facing the churches:  and then you will have a complete idea of this part of Pisa.