ion and by acclamation, was conferred on the
society! Even more recently, at Florence, the _accademia_ called the
_Colombaria_, or the "Pigeon-house," proves with what levity the
Italians name a literary society. The founder was the Cavallero Pazzi,
a gentleman, who, like Morose, abhorring noise, chose for his study a
garret in his palazzo; it was, indeed, one of the old turrets which had
not yet fallen in: there he fixed his library, and there he assembled
the most ingenious Florentines to discuss obscure points, and to reveal
their own contributions in this secret retreat of silence and
philosophy. To get to this cabinet it was necessary to climb a very
steep and very narrow staircase, which occasioned some facetious wit to
observe, that these literati were so many pigeons who flew every evening
to their dovecot. The Cavallero Pazzi, to indulge this humour, invited
them to a dinner entirely composed of their little brothers, in all the
varieties of cookery; the members, after a hearty laugh, assumed the
title of the _Colombaria_, invented a device consisting of the top of a
turret, with several pigeons flying about it, bearing an epigraph from
Dante, _Quanto veder si puo_, by which they expressed their design not
to apply themselves to any single object. Such facts sufficiently prove
that some of the absurd or facetious denominations of these literary
societies originated in accidental circumstances or in mere pleasantry;
but this will not account for the origin of those mystifying titles we
have noticed; for when grave men call themselves dolts or lunatics,
unless they are really so, they must have some reason for laughing at
themselves.

To attempt to develope this curious but obscure singularity in literary
history, we must go further back among the first beginnings of these
institutions. How were they looked on by the governments in which they
first appeared? These academies might, perhaps, form a chapter in the
history of secret societies, one not yet written, but of which many
curious materials lie scattered in history. It is certain that such
literary societies, in their first origins, have always excited the
jealousy of governments, but more particularly in ecclesiastical Rome,
and the rival principalities of Italy. If two great nations, like those
of England and France, had their suspicions and fears roused by a select
assembly of philosophical men, and either put them down by force, or
closely watched them,