In all hot countries, however, flowers and weeds shoot up to enormous growth: in colder climes, where poison can scarce be feared, perfumes can seldom be boasted.
Verona is the gayest looking town I ever lived in; beautifully situated, the hills around it elegant, the mountains at a distance venerable: the silver Adige rolling through the Valley, while such a glow of blossoms now ornament the rising grounds, and such cheerfulness smiles in the sweet countenances of its inhabitants, that one is tempted to think it the birth-place of Euphrosyne, where
Zephyr with Aurora playing,
As he met her once a maying, &c.
Fill'd her with thee a daughter fair,
So buxom, blythe, and debonair—
as Milton says. Here are vines, mulberries, olives; of course, wine, silk, and oil: every thing that can seduce, every thing that ought to satisfy desiring man. Here then in consequence do actually delight to reside mirth and good-humour in their holiday dress. A verona mezzi matti[The people at Verona are half out of their wits], say the Italians themselves of them, and I see nothing seemingly go forward here but Improvisatori, reciting stories or verses to entertain the populace; boys flying kites, cut square like a diamond on the cards, and called Stelle; men
amusing themselves at a game called Pallamajo, something like our cricket, only that they throw the ball with a hollow stick, not with the hand, but it requires no small corporal strength; and I know not why our English people have such a notion of Italian effeminacy: games of very strong exertion are in use among them; and I have not yet felt one hot day since I left France.
They shewed us an agreeable garden here belonging to some man of fashion, whose name I know not; it was cut in a rock, yet the grotto disappointed me: they had not taken such advantages of the situation as Lomellino would have done, and I recollected the tasteful creations in my own country, Pains Hill and Stour Head.
The Veronese nobleman shewed however the spirit of his country, if we let loose the genius of ours. The emperor had visited his improvements it seems, and on the spot where he kissed the children of the house, their father set up a stone to record the honour.
Our attendant related a tender story to me more interesting, which happened in this garden, of an English gentleman, who having
hired the house, &c. one season, found his favourite servant ill there, and like to die: the poor creature expressed his concern at the intolerant cruelty of that fact which denies Christians of any other denomination but their own a place in consecrated ground, and lamented his distance from home with an anxious earnestness that hastened his end: when the humanity of his master sent him to the landlord, who kindly gave permission that he might lie undisturbed under his turf, as one places one's lap-dog in England; and there, as our Laquais de place observed, he did no harm, though he was a heretic; and the English gentleman wept over his grave.
I never saw cypress trees of such a growth as in this spot—but then there are no other trees; inter viburna cypressi came of course into one's head: and this noble plant, rich in foliage, and bright, not dusky in colour, looked from its manner of growing like a vast evergreen poplar.