Our purpose has been to let others, if possible, look through our eyes; and whether we have succeeded or not, or whether they would have obtained a very interesting view if they did, we leave the reader to judge. Descriptions of galleries of art, paintings, etc., have been avoided, as possessing interest to those only who have travelled over the same ground, and become familiar with the details necessary to make those descriptions clear. We have attempted, also, to give some idea of the condition of the inhabitants, especially of the lower classes, as they are topics seldom referred to in passing over the most classic land on the globe. It was designed at first to publish these Letters in numbers, and the first number was issued, but the plan was immediately abandoned, and the publication of the remainder deferred till the whole could be issued in a volume. The first number embraced only Genoa and a portion of Naples-the least interesting part of Italy. Rome, Florence, Milan, the provinces, etc., are included in the remainder. VII. CARNIVAL CLARA NOVELLO-PERSECUTION OF A PAINTER THE THEATRE LEGHORN-CIVITA VECCHIA-NAPLES XLII. STROLL THROUGH FLORENCE-DOMINICAN FRIAR LETTERS FROM ITALY. LETTER I. A Voyage to Italy-Sea-Sickness-Squalls-A Man Lost Overboard-Peril of the Crew. AT SEA, Sept. 15, 1842. DEAR E.-Why not begin my letter at sea? It is now no more travel-worn than Arabia Petræa. I hate this skipping over the ocean as "not worth mentioning" to burst on the reader from the middle of some Continent. It was a beautiful day when we left New York, but it did seem cruel that you were not there to bid me good-bye. The laughter and mirth amid which my fancy painted you, your wife, and cousin A- at Saratoga, seemed a mockery of my grief, as I floated away from the shore on which my heart lay, and refused to come to me. But when the pilot-boat left us, and the last thread of communication was cut off between me and the land that never seemed so dear before, I thought perhaps after all it was better to part so. It was easier to fling you an adieu up the Hudson, than to squeeze your hand over the vessel's side, when the tongue could not utter the farewell the heart spoke so loudly the while. Our vessel was a beautiful Mobile Packet, and Mr. L., consul to Genoa, his wife, two children, myself, and a servant, constituted one family, and the entire corps of passengers, with the exception of Mr. S of New York, who, like myself, was in search of health. We sat grouped on deck, trying to laugh and appear indifferent, but it would not do. It was like boys whistling in the dark to keep off danger. But the overwhelming grief I expected to feel as I saw the last blue hill of my father-land sink into the western sky, never came. Nothing ever seemed to me more poetic or pathetic than Byron's farewell to the land of his birth; “Adieu, adieu-my native land Fades o'er the waters blue," &c. And as I saw the dim shores die away in the distance, I expected the thousand fond recollections of home and its quiet joys, perhaps to be mine no more for ever-the deep yearning of heart toward the land I had trod from my infancy, and now left an invalid, together with the uncertainty and solitude of the sea, would quite unman me. But nothing could be farther from the truth. The sadness I had felt when drifting down the bay was fast disappearing, and the slow, heavy rolling of the vessel, soon after we were fairly at sea, brought on that strange sensation in one's head and stomach which entirely upsets his poetry-and by the time Never-sink began to sink beyond the waters, I cared for neither home nor country. Yet as the setting sun left his farewell on the waters, and the blue sky seemed to bend so lovingly over the land I loved, I thought it was quite too Pagan to feel no sadness. So I began to repeat to myself those sweet lines of Byron, but I made more rhymes than the illustrious poet himself. If uttered aloud they would have run: "Adieu, adieu-my native land (ugh, ugh,) I could get no farther, and even when the broad round moon rode up the gorgeous night-heavens, making the sea a floor of silver, the effort was no more successful. Not the sweet moon and sweeter stars, nor the broad heaving sea, nor fading Neversink itself could whip up any sentiment. I fully agreed with Plato for the time that the soul was located in the stomach-at least they sympathized like two brothers. For a whole week we were a most dolorous group. The ladies below sat around the cabin pale and languid the two gentlemen above lay rolled up like caterpillars to die. Sometimes stretched out in the jolly boat, some |