m. To-morrow is the day of _corpus domini_; why it
should be preceded by such dismal ceremonies I know not; there is
nothing melancholy in the idea, but we shall be sure of a magnificent
procession.

So it was too, and wonderfully well attended: noblemen and ladies, with
tapers in their hands, and their trains borne by well-dressed pages, had
a fine effect. All still in black.

Black, but such as in esteem
Prince Memnon's sister might beseem;
With sable stole of cypress lawn,
O'er their decent shoulders drawn.

I never saw a spectacle so stately, so solemn a show in my life before,
and was much less tired of the long continued march, than were my Roman
Catholic companions.

Our inn is not a good one; the Pellegrino is engaged for the King of
Naples and his train: the place we are housed in, is full of bugs, and
every odious vermin: no wonder, surely, where such oven-like porticoes
catch and retain the heat as if constructed on set purpose so to do. The
Montagnola at night was something of relief, but contrary to every other
resort of company: the less it is frequented the gayer it appears; for
Nature there has been lavish of her bounties, which seem disregarded by
the Bolognese, who unluckily find out that there is a burying-ground
within view, though at no small distance really; and planting
themselves over against that, they stand or kneel for many minutes
together in whole rows, praying, as I understand, for the souls which
once animated the bodies of the people whom they believe to lie interred
there; all this too even at the hours dedicated to amusement.

Cardinal Buon Compagni, the legate, sent from Rome here, is gone home;
and the vice-legate officiated in his place, much to the consolation of
the inhabitants, who observed with little delight or gratitude his
endeavours to improve their trade, or his care to maintain their
privileges; while his natural disinclination to hypocritical manners, or
what we so emphatically call _cant_, gave them an aversion to his person
and dislike of his government, which he might have prevented by
formality of look, and very trifling compliances. But every thing helps
to prove, that if you would please people, it must be done _their_ way,
not your own.

Here are some charming manufactures in this town, and I fear it requires
much self-denial in an Englishwoman not to long at least for the fine
crapes, tiffanies, &c. which might here be bought I know not how