If any thing in England seem to excite their wonder and ill-placed compassion, it is our coal fires, which they persist in thinking strangely unwholesome—and a melancholy proof that we are grievously devoid of wood,
before we can prevail upon ourselves to dig the bowels of old earth for fewel, at the hazard of our precious health, if not of its certain loss; nor could I convince the wisest man I tried at, that wood burned to chark is a real poison, while it would be difficult by any process of chemistry to force much evil out of coal. They are steadily of opinion, that consumptions are occasioned by these fires, and that all the subjects of Great Britain are consumptively disposed, merely because those who are so, go into Italy for change of air: though I never heard that the wood smoke helped their breath, or a brazierfull of ashes under the table their appetite. Mean time, whoever seeks to convince instead of persuade an Italian, will find he has been employed in a Sisyphean labour; the stone may roll to the top, but is sure to return, and rest at his feet who had courage to try the experiment. Logic is a science they love not, and I think steadily refuse to cultivate; nor is argument a style of conversation they naturally affect—as Lady Macbeth says, "Question enrageth him;" and the dialogues of Socrates would to them be as disgusting as the violence of Xantippe.
Well, here we are at Padua again! where I will run, and see once more the places I was before so pleased with. The beautiful church of Santa Giustina, the ancient church adorned by Cimabue, Giotto, &c. where you fancy yourself on a sudden transported to Dante's Paradiso, and with for Barry the painter, to point your admiration of its sublime and extraordinary merits; but not the shrine of St. Anthony, or the tomb of Antenor, one rich with gold, the other venerable with rust, can keep my attention fixed on them, while an Italian May offers to every sense, the sweets of nature in elegant perfection. One view of a smiling landschape, lively in verdure, enamelled with flowers, and exhilarating with the sound of music under every tree,
Where many a youth and many a maid
Dances in the chequer'd shade;
And young and old come forth to play,
On a sun-shine holiday;
drives Palladio and Sansovino from one's head; and leaves nothing very strongly impressed upon one's heart but the recollection of kindness received and esteem reciprocated.
Those pleasures have indeed pursued me hither; the amiable Countess Ferris has not forgotten us; her attentions are numerous, tender, and polite. I went to the play with her, where I was unlucky enough to miss the representation of Romeo and Juliet, which was acted the night before with great applause, under the name of Tragedia Veronese. Monsieur de Voltaire was then premature in his declarations, that Shakespear was unknown, or known only to be censured, except in his native country. Count Kinigl at Milan took occasion to tell me that they acted Hamlet and Lear when he was last at Vienna; and I know not how it is, but to an English traveller each place presents ideas originally suggested by Shakespear, of whom nature and truth are the perpetual mirrors: other authors remind one of things which one has seen in life—but the scenes of life itself remind one of Shakespear. When I first looked on the Rialto, with what immediate images did it supply me? Oh, the old long-cherished images of the pensive merchant, the generous friend, the gay companion, and their final triumph over the practices of a cruel Jew. Anthonio,
Gratiano, met me at every turn; and when I confessed some of these feelings before the professor of natural history here, who had spent some time in London; he observed, that no native of our island could sit three hours, and not speak of Shakespear: he added many kind expressions of partial liking to our nation, and our poets: and l'Abate Cesarotti good-humouredly confessed his little skill in the English language when he translated their so much-admired Ossian; but he had studied it pretty hard since, he said, and his version of Gray's Elegy is charming.
Gray and Young are the favourite writers among us, as far as I have yet heard them talked over upon the continent; the first has secured them by his residence at Florence, and his Latin verses I believe; the second, by his piety and brilliant thoughts. Even Romanists are disposed to think dear Dr. Young very near to Christianity—an idea which must either make one laugh or cry, while
Sweet peace, and heavenly hope, and humble joy,
Divinely beam on his exalted soul.
But I must tell what I have been seeing at the theatre, and should tell it much