March 20.—­I went with Miss Talbot and Mr. Lushington and his sister to the great and celebrated church of San Domenico Maggiore, which is the most august of the Dominican churches.  They once possessed eighteen shrines in this part of Naples.  It contains the tomb of St. Thomas Aquinas, and also the tombs of the royal family, which remain in the vestry.  There are some large boxes covered with yellow velvet which contain their remains, and which stand ranged on a species of shelf, formed by the heads of a set of oaken presses which contain the vestments of the monks.  The pictures of the kings are hung above their respective boxes, containing their bones, without any other means of preserving them.  At the bottom of the lofty and narrow room is the celebrated Marquis di [Pescara], one of Charles V.’s most renowned generals, who commanded at the battle of Pavia....  The church itself is very large and extremely handsome, with many fine marble tombs in a very good style of architecture.  The time being now nearly the second week in Lent, the church was full of worshippers.

[While at Naples Sir Walter wrote frequently to his daughter, to Mr. Cadell, Mr. Laidlaw, and Mr. Lockhart.  The latter says, “Some of these letters were of a very melancholy cast; for the dream about his debts being all settled was occasionally broken.”  One may be given here.  It is undated, but was written some time after receiving the news of the death of his little grandson, and shows the tender relations which existed between Sir Walter and his son-in-law:—­

MY DEAR LOCKHART,—­I have written with such regularity that ...  I will not recur to this painful subject.  I hope also I have found you both persuaded that the best thing you can do, both of you, is to come out here, where you would find an inestimable source of amusement, many pleasant people, and living in very peaceful and easy society.  I wrote you a full account of my own matters, but I have now more complete [information].  I am ashamed, for the first time in my life, of the two novels, but since the pensive public have taken them, there is no more to be said but to eat my pudding and to hold my tongue.  Another thing of great interest requires to be specially mentioned.  You may remember a work in which our dear and accomplished friend Lady Louisa condescended to take an oar, and which she has handled most admirably.  It is a supposed set of extracts relative to James VI. from a collection in James VI.’s time, the costume (?) admirably preserved, and, like the fashionable wigs, more natural than one’s own hair.  This, with the Lives of the Novelists and some other fragments of my wreck, went ashore in Constable’s, and were sold off to the highest bidder, viz., to Cadell, for himself and me.  I wrote one or two fragments in the same style, which I wish should, according to original intention, appear without a name, and were they fairly lightly let off there is no fear of their