“As the demon of silence seems to have possessed you, I am determined to have my revenge in postage: this is my sixth or seventh letter since summer and Switzerland. My last was an injunction to contradict and consign to confusion that Cheapside impostor, who (I heard by a letter from your island) had thought proper to append my name to his spurious poesy, of which I know nothing, nor of his pretended purchase or copyright. I hope you have, at least, received that letter.
“As the news of Venice must be very interesting to you, I will regale you with it.
“Yesterday being the feast of St.
Stephen, every mouth was put in motion. There was nothing but fiddling and
playing on the virginals, and all kinds of conceits and divertisements, on every canal
of this aquatic city. I dined with the Countess
Albrizzi and a Paduan and Venetian party, and afterwards went to the
opera, at the Fenice theatre (which opens for the Carnival on that day),—the finest, by
the way, I have ever seen: it beats our theatres hollow in beauty and scenery, and those
of Milan and Brescia bow before it. The opera and its sirens were much like other operas
and women, but the subject of the said opera was something edifying; it turned—the plot
and conduct thereof—upon a fact narrated by Livy of a
hundred and fifty married ladies having
| 66 | NOTICES OF THE | A. D. 1816. |
“I am going on with my Armenian studies in a morning, and assisting and stimulating in the English portion of an English and Armenian grammar, now publishing at the convent of St. Lazarus.
“The superior of the friars is a bishop, and a fine old fellow, with the beard of a meteor. Father Paschal is also a learned and pious soul. He was two years in England.
“I am still dreadfully in love with the Adriatic lady whom I spake of in a former letter (and
not in this—I add, for fear of
mistakes, for the only one mentioned in the first part of this epistle is elderly and
bookish, two things which I have ceased to admire), and love in this part of the world
is no sinecure. This is also the season when every body make up
| A. D. 1817. | LIFE OF LORD BYRON. | 67 |
“And now, if you don’t write, I don’t know what I won’t say or do, nor what I will. Send me some news—good news.
“P.S. Remember me to Mr. Gifford, with all duty.
“I hear that the Edinburgh Review has cut up Coleridge’s Christabel, and me for praising it, which omen, I think, bodes no great good to your forthcome or coming Canto and Castle (of Chillon). My run of luck within the last year seems to have taken a turn every way; but never mind, I will bring myself through in the end—if not, I can be but where I began. In the mean time, I am not displeased to be where I am—I mean, at Venice. My Adriatic nymph is this moment here, and I must therefore repose from this letter.”
