“Talked of various modes of warfare—­of the Hungarian and Highland modes of broad-sword exercise, in both whereof I was once a moderate ’master of fence.’  Settled that the R. will break out on the 7th or 8th of March, in which appointment I should trust, had it not been settled that it was to have broken out in October, 1820.  But those Bolognese shirked the Romagnuoles.

“‘It is all one to Ranger.’  One must not be particular, but take rebellion when it lies in the way.  Come home—­read the ‘Ten Thousand’ again, and will go to bed.

“Mem.—­Ordered Fletcher (at four o’clock this afternoon) to copy out seven or eight apophthegms of Bacon, in which I have detected such blunders as a school-boy might detect rather than commit.  Such are the sages!  What must they be, when such as I can stumble on their mistakes or misstatements?  I will go to bed, for I find that I grow cynical.

“January 6. 1821.

“Mist—­thaw—­slop—­rain.  No stirring out on horseback.  Read Spence’s Anecdotes.  Pope a fine fellow—­always thought him so.  Corrected blunders in nine apophthegms of Bacon—­all historical—­and read Mitford’s Greece.  Wrote an epigram.  Turned to a passage in Guinguene—­ditto in Lord Holland’s Lope de Vega.  Wrote a note on Don Juan.

“At eight went out to visit.  Heard a little music—­like music.  Talked with Count Pietro G. of the Italian comedian Vestris, who is now at Rome—­have seen him often act in Venice—­a good actor—­very.  Somewhat of a mannerist; but excellent in broad comedy, as well as in the sentimental pathetic.  He has made me frequently laugh and cry, neither of which is now a very easy matter—­at least, for a player to produce in me.

“Thought of the state of women under the ancient Greeks—­convenient enough.  Present state a remnant of the barbarism of the chivalry and feudal ages—­artificial and unnatural.  They ought to mind home—­and be well fed and clothed—­but not mixed in society.  Well educated, too, in religion—­but to read neither poetry nor politics—­nothing but books of piety and cookery.  Music—­drawing—­dancing—­also a little gardening and ploughing now and then.  I have seen them mending the roads in Epirus with good success.  Why not, as well as hay-making and milking?

“Came home, and read Mitford again, and played with my mastiff—­gave him his supper.  Made another reading to the epigram, but the turn the same.  To-night at the theatre, there being a prince on his throne in the last scene of the comedy,—­the audience laughed, and asked him for a Constitution.  This shows the state of the public mind here, as well as the assassinations.  It won’t do.  There must be an universal republic,—­and there ought to be.

“The crow is lame of a leg—­wonder how it happened—­some fool trod upon his toe, I suppose.  The falcon pretty brisk—­the cats large and noisy—­the monkeys I have not looked to since the cold weather, as they suffer by being brought up.  Horses must be gay—­get a ride as soon as weather serves.  Deuced muggy still—­an Italian winter is a sad thing, but all the other seasons are charming.