and well-fixed bases. But as
earthquakes and subterranean fires here are scarcely a wonder, one need
not marvel much at seeing the ground retreat just _here_. It is nearer
our hand, and quite as well worth our while to enquire, why the tower at
_Bridgnorth_ in Shropshire leans exactly in the same direction, and is
full as much out of the perpendicular as this at Pisa.

The brazen gates here, carved by John of Bologna, at least begun by him,
are a wonderful work; and the marbles in the baptistery beat those of
Florence for value and for variety. A good lapidary might find perpetual
amusement in adjusting the claims of superiority to these precious
columns of jasper, granite, alabaster, &c. The different animals which
support the font being equally admirable for their composition as for
their workmanship.

The Campo Santo is an extraordinary place, and, for aught I know,
unparalleled for its power over the mind in exciting serious
contemplations upon the body's decay, and suggesting consolatory
thoughts concerning the soul's immortality. Here in three days, owing to
quick-lime mixed among the earth, vanishes every vestige, every trace of
the human being carried thither seventy hours before, and here round the
walls Giotto and Cimabue have exhausted their invention to impress the
passers-by with deep and pensive melancholy.

The four stages of man's short life, infancy, childhood, maturity, and
decrepit age, not ill represented by one of the ancient artists, shew
the sad but not slow progress we make to this dark abode; while the last
judgment, hell, and paradise inform us what events of the utmost
consequence are to follow our journey. All this a modern traveller finds
out to be _vastly ridiculous!_ though Doctor Smollet _(whose book I
think he has read)_ confesses, that the spacious Corridor round the
Campo Santo di Pisa would make the noblest walk in the world perhaps for
a contemplative philosopher.

The tomb of Algarotti produces softer ideas when one looks at the
sepulchre of a man who, having deserved and obtained such solid and
extensive praise, modestly contented himself with desiring that his
epitaph might be so worded, as to record, upon a simple but lasting
monument, that he had the honour of being disciple to the immortal
_Newton_.

The battle of the bridge here at Pisa drew a great many spectators this
year, as it has not been performed for a considerable time before: the
waiters at our inn here give a