THE GATHERER
"I am but a Gatherer and disposer of other men's stuff."—Wotton.
Whoever the following story may be fathered on, Sir John Hamilton was certainly its parent. The duke of Rutland, at one of his levees, being at a loss (as probably most kings, princes, and viceroys occasionally are) for something to say to every person he was bound in etiquette to notice, remarked to Sir John Hamilton that there was "a prospect of an excellent crop:—the timely rain," observed the duke, "will bring every thing above ground." "God forbid, your excellency!" exclaimed the courtier. His excellency stared, whilst Sir John continued, sighing heavily as he spoke:—"yes, God forbid! for I have got three wives under it."—Barrington's Sketches.
It is a singular circumstance that Italia, or, as it is called in English, Italy, has, under all the changes and revolutions to which it has been subjected, always preserved its name. Every other country in Europe is now known to its inhabitants by other names than were given to it by their ancestors in the time of the Romans; but Italia continues to be the name of the country at the present day, and we have no authentic records by which we can ascertain that it ever bore any other.