“The news of the day are, that the Neapolitans are full of energy. The public spirit here is certainly well kept up. The ‘Americani’ (a patriotic society here, an under branch of the ‘Carbonari’) give a dinner in the Forest in a few days, and have invited me, as one of the Ci. It is to be in the Forest of Boccacio’s and Dryden’s ‘Huntsman’s Ghost;’ and, even if I had not the same political feelings (to say nothing of my old convivial turn, which every now and then revives), I would go as a poet, or, at least, as a lover of poetry. I shall expect to see the spectre of ‘Ostasio degli Onesti’ (Dryden has turned him into Guido Cavalcanti—an essentially different person, as may be found in Dante) come ‘thundering for his prey’ in the midst of the festival. At any rate, whether he does or no, I will get as tipsy and patriotic as possible.
“Within these few days I have read, but not written.
