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not call forth a printed and circulated sonnet. a physician or a lawyer take his degree, or a clergyman preach his maiden sermon, has a surgeon perfor-med an operation, would a harlequin aunounce his departure or his benefit, are you to be congratulated on a marriage, or a birth, or a lawsuit, the Muses are invoked to furnish the same number of syllables, and the individual triumphs blaze abroad in virgin white or party-coloured placards on half the corners of the capital.

The last curtsey of a favourite "prima donna " brings down a shower of these poetical tributes from those upper regions, from which, in our theatres, nothing but cupids and snow storms are accustomed to descend. There is a poetry in the very life of a Venetian, which, in its common course, is varied with those surprises and changes so recommendable in fiction, but so different from the sober monotony of northern existence; amusements are raised into duties, duties are softened into amusements, and every object being considered as equally making a part of the life, is announced and performed with the same earnest indifference and gay assiduity. The Venetian gazette constantly closes its columns with the following triple advertissement.

Charade.

Exposition of the most Holy Sacrament in the church

of St.

Theatres.

St. Moses, opera.

St. Benedict, a comedy of characters

St. Luke, repose.

When it is recollected what the Catholics believe their consecrated wafer to be, we may perhaps think it worthy of a more respectable niche than between poetry and the playhouse.

Note 4, pag. 98, line 5.

Sparta hath many a worthier son than he

The answer of the mother of Brasidas to the stran¬ gers who praised the memory of her son,

Note 5, page 96, line 14.

St. Mark yet sees his lion where he stood
Stand,

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The lion has lost nothing by his journey to the Invalides, but the gospel which supported the paw that is now on a level with the other foot. The horses also are returned to the ill-chosen spot whence they set out, and are, as before, half hidden under the porch window of St. Mark's church.

Their history, after a desperate struggle, has been satisfactorily explored. The decisions and doubts of Erizzo and Zanetti, and lastly, of the Count Leopold Cicognara, would have given them a Roman extraction, and a predigree not more ancient than the reign of Nero. But M. de Schlegel stepped in to teach the Venetians the value of their own treasures, and a Greek vindicated, at last and for ever, the pretension of his countrymen to this noble production. Mr. Mustoxidi has not been

Sui quattro cavalli della Basilica di S. Marco in Venezia. Lettera di Andrea Mustoxidi Corcirese. Padua per Bettoni e comp. 1816.

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left without a reply; but, as yet, he has received no answer. Itshould seem that the horses are irrevocably Chian, and were transferred to Constantinople by Theodosius. Lapidary writing is a favourite play of the Italians, and has conferred reputation on more than one of their literary characters. One of the best specimens of Bodoni's typography is a respectable volume of inscriptions, all written by his friend Pacciaudi. Several were prepared for the recovered horses, It is to be hoped the best was not selected, when the following words were ranged in gold letters above the cathedral porch.

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Nothing shall be said of the Latin, but it may be permitted to observe, that the injustice of the Venetians in transporting the horses from Constantinople was at least equal to that of the French in carrying them to Paris, and that it would have been more prudent to have avoided all allusions to either robbery. An apostolic prince should, perhaps, have objected to affixing over the principal entrance of a metropolitan church, an inscription having a reference to any other triumphs than those of religion. Nothing less than the pacification of

the world can excuse such a solecism.

Note 6, page 99, lines 1 and 2.

The Suabian sued, and now the Austrian reigns —
An Emperor tramples where an Emperor knelt.

After many vain efforts on the part of the Italians entirely to throw off the yoke of Frederic Barbarossa, and as fruitless attemps of the Emperor to make himself absolute master throughout the whole of his Cisalpine dominions, the bloody struggles of four and twenty years were happily brought to a close in the city of Venice. The articles of a treaty had been previously agreed upon between Pope Alexander III. and Barbarossa, and the former having received a safe conduct, had already arrived at Venice from Ferrara, in company with the ambassadors of the king of Sicily and the consuls of the Lombard league. There still remained, however, many points to adjust, and for several days the peace was believed to be impracticable. At his juncture it was suddenly reported that the Emperor had arrived at Chioza, a town fifteen miles from the capital. The Venetians rose tumultuously, and insisted upon immediately conducting him to the city. The Lombards took the alarm, and departed towards Treviso. The Pope himself was apprehensive of some disaster if Frederic should suddenly advance upon him, but was reassured by the prudence and address of Sepastian Liani, the doge. Several embassies passed between Chioza and the capital, until, a last, the Emperor relaxing somewhat of his pretensions, "laid aside his leonine ferocity, and put on the mildness of the lamb." I

On Saturday the 23d of July, in the year 1177, six Venetian galleys transferred Frederic, in great pomp, from

1 "Quibus auditis, imperator, operante eo, qui corda principium sicut vult e quando vult humiliter inclinat, leonina feritate deposita, ovinam mansuetudinem induit." Ro'mualdi Salernitani. Chronicon. apud Script. Rer. Ital. Tom. VII. p. 229.

Chioza to the island of Lido, a mile from Venice. Early the next morning the Pope, accompained by the Sicilian ambassadors, and by the envoys of Lombardy, whom he had recalled from the main land, together with a great concourse of people, repaired from the patriarchal palace to Saint Mark's church, and solemnly absolved the Emperor and his partisans from the excommunication pronounced against him. The Chancellor of the Empire, on the part of his master, renounced the anti-popes and their schismatic adherents. Immediately the Doge, with a great suite both of the clergy and laity, got on board the galleys, and waiting on Frederic, rowed him in mighty state from the Lido to the capital. The Emperor descen ded from the galley at the quay of the Piazzetta. The doge, the patriarch, bishops and clergy, and the people of Venice with their crosses and their standards, marched in solemn procession befere him to the church, of Saint Mark's. Alexander was seated before the vestibule of the basilica, attended by his bishops and cardinals, by the patriarch of Aquileja, by the archbishops and bishops of Lombardy, all of them in state, and clothed in their church robes. Frederic approached 66 moved by the Holy Spirit, venerating the Almighty in the person of Aleyander, laying aside his imperial dignity, and throwing off his mantle, he prostrated himself at full length at the feet of the Pope. Alexander, with tears in his eyes, raised him benignantly from the ground, kissed him, blessed him; and immediately the Germans of the train sang, with a loud voice, 'We praise thee, O Lord.' The Emperor then taking the Pope by the right hand, led him to the church, and having received

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