and full of commodious Villas. There are thirty
Parish Churches, and at San Lorenzo they show a large Dish made out of
One Emerald, which they say was given to King Solomon by the Queen of
Sheba. The Genoese are a cunning and industrious People, with a great
gusto for the Arts, but terrible Thieves. The Government a Republic,
headed by a Doge, that is chosen every two years from among the
Nobility, and must be a Genoese, at least Fifty years of age, and no
Byblow. He cannot so much as lie One Night out of the City, without
leave had from the Senate. When he is elected, they place a Crown of
Gold on his Head, and a Sceptre in his Hand. His Robes are of Crimson
Velvet, and he has the title of Serenity.

Here I did business with several Persons of Consideration; the Senators
B--c--i and Delia G----, the rich Banker L----, and Monsignore the
Archprelate X----. So by Cortona, where there is a strong Castle on a
Hill, to Pavia, an old decaying City on the River Tessin, which is so
rapid that Bishop Burnet says he ran down the Stream thirty miles in
three hours by the help of one Rower only. This may be, or t'other way;
but I own to placing very little faith in the veracity of these
Cat-in-Pan Revolution Bishops. Here (at Pavy) is a Brass Statue of
Marcus Antoninus on Horseback; though the Pavians will have it to be
Charles the Fifth, and others declare it to be Constantine the Great.

After two days here, waiting for Despatches from his Eminence, which
came at last in the False Bottom of a Jar of Narbonne Honey, and I
answering by a Billet discreetly buried in the recesses of a large
Bologna Sausage, I posted to Milan, through a fertile and delicious
country, which some call the Garden of Italy. A broad, clean place, with
spacious Streets; but the Wine and Maccaroni not half so good as at
Genoa. The Cathedral full of Relics, some of which run up as high as
Abraham. In the Ambrosian Library are a power of Books, and, what is
more curious, the Dried _Heads_ of several Learned Men--amongst others,
that of our Bishop Fisher, whom King Harry the Eighth put to death for
not acknowledging his Supremacy. About two miles from hence is a
Curiosity, in the shape of a Building, where, if you fire off a Pistol;
the Sound returns about Fifty times. 'Tis done, they told me, by two
Parallel Walls of a considerable length, which reverberate the Sound to
each other till the undulation is quite spent. The which, being so
informed, I was as wi