"firmed in my resolution of shutting my "door against all the travelling English by "the impertinence of an anonymous scrib"bler, who said he might have known me, "but would not."

I interrupted him by telling him he need not have been so angry on that occasion,that it was an authoress who had been guilty of that remark. "I don't wonder," added I, "that a spinster should have avoided associating with so dangerous an acquaintance as you had the character of being at Venice."

that it speaks) are in the eight syllable measure, and occasionally display some pretty poetry; at all events, there is little in them to offend.

"We do not find any passage of sufficient beauty or originality to warrant extract."

Am. Critical Review, 1817.

"Well, I did not know that these 'Sketches "of Italy' were the production of a woman; "but whether it was a Mr., Mrs., or Miss, "the remark was equally uncalled for. To "be sure, the life I led at Venice was not "the most saintlike in the world.”

"Yes," said I, "if you were to be canonized, it must be as San Ciappelletto."

"Not so bad as that either," said he somewhat seriously.

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Venice," resumed he, "is a melancholy "place to reside in ;-to see a city die daily "as she does, is a sad contemplation. I

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sought to distract my mind from a sense of "her desolation, and my own solitude, by

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plunging into a vortex that was any thing

"but pleasure. When one gets into a mill

stream, it is difficult to swim against it, "and keep out of the wheels. The conse

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quences of being carried down by it would'

"furnish an excellent lesson for youth. You

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are too old to profit by it. But, who ever

"profited by the experience of others, or When you read my Memoirs,

"his own?

you

When

will learn the evils, moral and physical, "of true dissipation. I assure you my life " is very entertaining, and very instructive."

I said, "I suppose, when you left England, you were a Childe Harold, and at Venice a Don Giovanni, and Fletcher your Leporello." He laughed at the remark. I asked him, in what way his life would prove a good lesson? and he gave me several anecdotes of himself, which I have thrown into a sort of narrative.

"Almost all the friends of my youth are "dead; either shot in duels, ruined, or in "the galleys:" (mentioning the names of several.)

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Among those I lost in the early part "of my career, was Lord Falkland,—poor "fellow! our fathers' fathers were friends. "He lost his life for a joke, and one too he "did not make himself. The present race "is more steady than the last. They have "less constitution, and not so much money; 66 -that accounts for the change in their 66 morals.

"I am now tamed; but before I married, "shewed some of the blood of my ancestors. "It is ridiculous to say that we do not in"herit our passions, as well as the gout, or any other disorder.

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"I was not so young when my father died, "but that I perfectly remember him; and "had very early a horror of matrimony, from "the sight of domestic broils: this feeling

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came over me very strongly at my wed"ding. Something whispered me that I was "sealing my own death-warrant. I am a

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great believer in presentiments. Socrates' "dæmon was no fiction; Monk Lewis had "his monitor, and Napoleon many warnings. "At the last moment I would have retreated "if I could have done so. I called to mind 66 a friend of mine, who had married a young, "beautiful, and rich girl, and yet was mise"rable. He had strongly urged me against "putting my neck in the same yoke: and "to shew you how firmly I was resolved to "attend to his advice, I betted Hay fifty

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guineas to one that I should always re

"main single. Six years afterwards I sent