strained, unnatural whine too common among preachers of all churches and all countries, praised himself for having induced her to enter on a path which would lead her fettered steps “from palm to palm, from triumph to triumph,” Poor thing! she looked as if the domestic olives and poppies were all she wanted; and lacking these, tares and wormwood must be her portion.  She was then taken behind a grating, her hair cut, and her clothes exchanged for the nun’s vestments; the black-robed sisters who worked upon her looking like crows or ravens at their ominous feasts.  All the while, the music played, first sweet and thoughtful, then triumphant strains.  The effect on my mind was revolting and painful to the last degree.  Were monastic seclusion always voluntary, and could it be ended whenever the mind required a change back from seclusion to common life, I should have nothing to say against it; there are positions of the mind which it suits exactly, and even characters that might choose it all through life; certainly, to the broken-hearted it presents a shelter that Protestant communities do not provide.  But where it is enforced or repented of, no hell could be worse; nor can a more terrible responsibility be incurred than by him who has persuaded a novice that the snares of the world are less dangerous than the demons of solitude.

Festivities in Italy have been of great importance, since, for a century or two back, the thought, the feeling, the genius of the people have had more chance to expand, to express themselves, there than anywhere else.  Now, if the march of reform goes forward, this will not be so; there will be also speeches made freely on public occasions, without having the life pressed out of them by the censorship.  Now we hover betwixt the old and the new; when the many reasons for the new prevail, I hope what is poetical in the old will not be lost.  The ceremonies of New Year are before me; but as I shall have to send this letter on New-Year’s day, I cannot describe them.  The Romans begin now to talk of the mad gayeties of Carnival, and the Opera is open.  They have begun with “Attila,” as, indeed, there is little hope of hearing in Italy other music than Verdi’s.  Great applause waited on the following words:—­

“EZIO (THE ROMAN LEADER).

  “E gittata la mia sorte,
    Pronto sono ad ogni guerra,
  S’ io cardo, cadre da forte,
    E il mio nome restera.

  “Non vedro l’amata terra
    Svener lenta e farri a brano,
  Sopra l’ultimo Romano
    Tutta Italia piangera.”

“My lot is fixed, and I stand ready for every conflict.  If I must fall, I shall fall as a brave man, and my fame will survive.  I shall not see my beloved country fall to pieces and slowly perish, and over the last Roman all Italy will weep.”

And at lines of which the following is a translation:—­