bad an account of them as I could, answering, as the false ‘Solomon Lob’ does to ‘Totterton’ in the farce, ’all gone dead,’ and damned by a satire more than twenty years ago; that the name of their extinguisher was Gifford; that they were but a sad set of scribes after all, and no great things in any other way.  He seemed, as was natural, very much pleased with this account of his old acquaintances, and went away greatly gratified with that and Mr. Forsyth’s sententious paragraph of applause in his own (Pindemonte’s) favour.  After having been a little libertine in his youth, he is grown devout, and takes prayers, and talks to himself, to keep off the devil; but for all that, he is a very nice little old gentleman.

     “I forgot to tell you that at Bologna (which is celebrated for
     producing popes, painters, and sausages) I saw an anatomical
     gallery, where there is a deal of waxwork, in which * *.

“I am sorry to hear of your row with Hunt; but suppose him to be exasperated by the Quarterly and your refusal to deal; and when one is angry and edites a paper, I should think the temptation too strong for literary nature, which is not always human.  I can’t conceive in what, and for what, he abuses you:  what have you done? you are not an author, nor a politician, nor a public character; I know no scrape you have tumbled into.  I am the more sorry for this because I introduced you to Hunt, and because I believe him to be a good man; but till I know the particulars, I can give no opinion.

     “Let me know about Lalla Rookh, which must be out by this time.

“I restore the proofs, but the punctuation should be corrected.  I feel too lazy to have at it myself; so beg and pray Mr. Gifford for me.—­Address to Venice.  In a few days I go to my villeggiatura, in a cassino near the Brenta, a few miles only on the main land.  I have determined on another year, and many years of residence if I can compass them.  Marianna is with me, hardly recovered of the fever, which has been attacking all Italy last winter.  I am afraid she is a little hectic; but I hope the best.

     “Ever, &c.

     “P.S.  Torwaltzen has done a bust of me at Rome for Mr. Hobhouse,
     which is reckoned very good.  He is their best after Canova, and by
     some preferred to him.

     “I have had a letter from Mr. Hodgson.  He is very happy, has got a
     living, but not a child:  if he had stuck to a curacy, babes would
     have come of course, because he could not have maintained them.

     “Remember me to all friends, &c. &c.

“An Austrian officer, the other day, being in love with a Venetian, was ordered, with his regiment, into Hungary.  Distracted between love and duty, he purchased a deadly drug, which dividing with his mistress, both swallowed.  The ensuing pains were terrific, but the pills were purgative, and not poisonous, by the contrivance of the unsentimental apothecary; so that so much suicide was all thrown away.  You may conceive the previous confusion and the final laughter; but the intention was good on all sides.”

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