Chapter CXXI: Letter 391: To Mr. Murray

"Ravenna, 8bre 12 deg., 1820.

"By land and sea carriage a considerable quantity of books have
arrived; and I am obliged and grateful: but 'medio de fonte
leporum, surgit amari aliquid,' &c. &c.; which, being interpreted,
means,

"I'm thankful for your books, dear Murray;
But why not send Scott's Monast_ery_?

the only book in four _living_ volumes I would give a baioccolo to
see--'bating the rest of the same author, and an occasional
Edinburgh and Quarterly, as brief chroniclers of the times. Instead
of this, here are Johnny Keats's * * poetry, and three novels by
God knows whom, except that there is Peg * * *'s name to one of
them--a spinster whom I thought we had sent back to her spinning.
Crayon is very good; Hogg's Tales rough, but RACY, and welcome.

"Books of travels are expensive, and I don't want them, having
travelled already; besides, they lie. Thank the author of 'The
Profligate' for his (or her) present. Pray send me _no more_ poetry
but what is rare and decidedly good. There is such a trash of Keats
and the like upon my tables that I am ashamed to look at them. I
say nothing against your parsons, your S * *s and your C * *s--it
is all very fine--but pray dispense me from the pleasure. Instead
of poetry, if you will favour me with a few soda-powders, I shall
be delighted: but all prose ('bating _travels_ and novels NOT by
Scott) is welcome, especially Scott's Tales of my Landlord, and so
on.

"In the notes to Marino Faliero, it may be as well to say that
'_Benintende_' was not really of _the Ten_, but merely _Grand
Chancellor_, a separate office (although important): it was an
arbitrary alteration of mine. The Doges too were all _buried_ in
St. _Mark's before_ Faliero. It is singular that when his
predecessor, Andrea Dandolo, died, _the Ten_ made a law that _all_
the _future Doges_ should be _buried with their families, in their
own churches,--one would think by a kind of presentiment_. So that
all that is said of his _ancestral Doges_, as buried at St. John's
and Paul's, is altered from the fact, _they being in St. Mark's.
Make a note_ of this, and put _Editor_ as the subscription to it.

"As I make such pretensions to accuracy, I should not like to be
_twitted_ even with such trifles on that score. Of the play they
may say what they please, but not so of my costume and _dram.
pers._ they having been real existences.

"I omitted Foscolo in my list of living _Venetian worthies, in the
notes_, considering him as an _Italian_ in general, and not a mere
provincial like the rest; and as an Italian I have spoken of him in
the preface to Canto 4th of Childe Harold.

"The French translation of us!!! _oime! oime!_--the German; but I
don't understand the latter and his long dissertation at the end
about the Fausts. Excuse haste. Of politics it is not safe to
speak, but nothing is decided as yet.

"I am in a very fierce humour at not having Scott's Monastery. You
are _too liberal_ in quantity, and somewhat careless of the
quality, of your missives. All the _Quarterlies_ (four in number) I
had had before from you, and _two_ of the Edinburgh; but no matter;
we shall have new ones by and by. No more Keats, I entreat:--flay
him alive; if some of you don't, I must skin him myself. There is
no bearing the drivelling idiotism of the manikin.

"I don't feel inclined to care further about 'Don Juan.' What do
you think a very pretty Italian lady said to me the other day? She
had read it in the French, and paid me some compliments, with due
DRAWBACKS, upon it. I answered that what she said was true, but
that I suspected it would live longer than Childe Harold. '_Ah
but_' (said she). '_I would rather have the fame of Childe Harold
for three years than an_ IMMORTALITY _of Don Juan!_' The truth is
that _it is_ TOO TRUE, and the women hate many things which strip
off the tinsel of _sentiment_; and they are right, as it would rob
them of their weapons. I never knew a woman who did not hate _De
Grammont's Memoirs_ for the same reason: even Lady * * used to
abuse them.

"Rose's work I never received. It was seized at Venice. Such is the
liberality of the Huns, with their two hundred thousand men, that
they dare not let such a volume as his circulate."

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