ouches of real
pathos, and some stanzas of natural and beautiful description: and
thus it is with Rossini; his best operas contain some melodies among
the finest ever composed, and even in his worst, the ear is every now
and then roused and enchanted by a few bars of graceful and beautiful
melody, to be in the next moment again bewildered in the maze of
unmeaning notes, and the clash of overpowering accompaniments.

_Lucca, April 23._--Lucca disappoints me in every respect: it was
once, when a republic, one of the most flourishing, rich, and populous
cities in Italy; it is now consigned over to the Ex-queen of Etruria;
and its fate will be perhaps the same as that of Venice, Pisa, and
Sienna, which, when they lost their independence, lost also their
public spirit, their public virtue, and their prosperity.

It is impossible to conceive any thing more rich and beautiful, than
the country between Florence and Lucca, though it can boast little of
the elevated picturesque, and is destitute of poetical associations.
The road lay through valleys, with the Apennines (which are here
softened down into gently sunny hills) on each side. Every spot of
ground is in the highest state of cultivation; the boundaries between
the small fields of wheat or lupines, were rows of olives or
mulberries, with an interminable treillage of vines flung from tree to
tree. In England we should be obliged to cut them all down for fear of
depriving the crops of heat and sunshine, but here they have no such
fears. The style of husbandry is exquisitely neat, and in general
performed by manual labour. The only plough I saw would have excited
the amusement and amazement of an English farmer: I should think it
was exactly similar to the ploughs of Virgil's time: it was drawn by
an ox and an ass yoked together, and guided by a woman. The whole
country looked as if it had been laid out by skilful gardeners, and
the hills in many parts were cut into terraces, that not one available
inch of soil might be lost. The products of this luxuriant country are
corn, silk, wine, and principally oil: potteries abound, the making of
jars and flasks being an immense and necessary branch of trade.

The city of Lucca has an appearance in itself of stately solemn
dulness, and bears no trace of the smiling prosperity of the adjacent
country: the shops are poor and empty, there are no signs of business,
and the streets swarm with beggars. The interior of the Duomo is a
fin