ar, only four really clear days since
they came to Italy.

[80] "My faith on that-point is decidedly shaken, which reminds me to
ask you whether you ever read Simond's Tour in Italy. It is a most
charming book, and eminently remarkable for its excellent sense, and
determination not to give in to conventional lies." In a later letter he
says: "None of the books are unaffected and true but Simond's, which
charms me more and more by its boldness, and its frank exhibition of
that rare and admirable quality which enables a man to form opinions for
himself without a miserable and slavish reference to the pretended
opinions of other people. His notices of the leading pictures enchant
me. They are so perfectly just and faithful, and so whimsically shrewd."
Rome, 9th of March, 1845.

[81] I send my heart up to thee, all my heart
In this my singing!
For the stars help me, and the sea bears part;
The very night is clinging
Closer to Venice' streets to leave one space
Above me, whence thy face
May light my joyous heart to thee its dwelling-place.

Written to express Maclise's subject in the Academy catalogue.

[82] "Their house is next to ours on the right, with vineyard between;
but the place is so oddly contrived that one has to go a full mile round
to get to their door."

[83] Not however, happily for them, in another important particular, for
on the eve of their return to England she declared her intention of
staying behind and marrying an Italian. "She will have to go to
Florence, I find" (12th of May 1845), "to be married in Lord Holland's
house: and even then is only married according to the English law:
having no legal rights from such a marriage, either in France or Italy.
The man hasn't a penny. If there were an opening for a nice clean
restaurant in Genoa--which I don't believe there is, for the Genoese
have a natural enjoyment of dirt, garlic, and oil--it would still be a
very hazardous venture; as the priests will certainly damage the man, if
they can, for marrying a Protestant woman. However, the utmost I can do
is to take care, if such a crisis should arrive, that she shall not want
the means of getting home to England. As my father would observe, she
has sown and must reap."

[84] He had carried with him, I may here mention, letters of
introduction to residents in all parts of Italy, of which I believe he
delivered hardly one. Writin