“Dined.  Tried on a new coat.  Letter to Murray, with corrections of Bacon’s Apophthegms and an epigram—­the latter not for publication.  At eight went to Teresa, Countess G. At nine and a half came in Il Conte P. and Count P.G.  Talked of a certain proclamation lately issued.  Count R.G. had been with * * (the * *), to sound him about the arrests.  He, * *, is a trimmer, and deals, at present, his cards with both hands.  If he don’t mind, they’ll be full. * * pretends (I doubt him—­they don’t,—­we shall see) that there is no such order, and seems staggered by the immense exertions of the Neapolitans, and the fierce spirit of the Liberals here.  The truth is, that * * cares for little but his place (which is a good one), and wishes to play pretty with both parties.  He has changed his mind thirty times these last three moons, to my knowledge, for he corresponds with me.  But he is not a bloody fellow—­only an avaricious one.

“It seems that, just at this moment (as Lydia Languish says), there will be no elopement after all.  I wish that I had known as much last night—­or, rather, this morning—­I should have gone to bed two hours earlier.  And yet I ought not to complain; for, though it is a sirocco, and heavy rain, I have not yawned for these two days.

“Came home—­read History of Greece—­before dinner had read Walter Scott’s Rob Roy.  Wrote address to the letter in answer to Alessio del Pinto, who has thanked me for helping his brother (the late Commandant, murdered here last month) in his last moments.  Have told him I only did a duty of humanity—­as is true.  The brother lives at Rome.

“Mended the fire with some ‘sgobole’ (a Romagnuole word), and gave the falcon some water.  Drank some Seltzer-water.  Mem.—­received to-day a print, or etching, of the story of Ugolino, by an Italian painter—­different, of course, from Sir Joshua Reynolds’s, and I think (as far as recollection goes) no worse, for Reynolds’s is not good in history.  Tore a button in my new coat.

“I wonder what figure these Italians will make in a regular row.  I sometimes think that, like the Irishman’s gun (somebody had sold him a crooked one), they will only do for ‘shooting round a corner;’ at least, this sort of shooting has been the late tenor of their exploits.  And yet, there are materials in this people, and a noble energy, if well directed.  But who is to direct them?  No matter.  Out of such times heroes spring.  Difficulties are the hotbeds of high spirits, and Freedom the mother of the few virtues incident to human nature.

“Tuesday, January 9. 1821.

“Rose—­the day fine.  Ordered the horses; but Lega (my secretary, an Italianism for steward or chief servant) coming to tell me that the painter had finished the work in fresco, for the room he has been employed on lately, I went to see it before I set out.  The painter has not copied badly the prints from Titian, &c. considering all things.