Anno. Domini. M. D. C. C. C...†

*Sic inscribendum me, ut opinor et opto, præmoriente;

sed aliter, jubente Deo, aliter inscribendum :

Qui. juxta. eam. sarcophago. uno.

Conditus. erit. quamprimum.

+ Here lies Eloisa E. St. Countess of Al, illustrious

The simplicity of this epitaph, and particularly of the note which accompanies it, appears to me very affecting.

For the present I have finished. I send you a heap of ruins-do what you like with them. In the description of the different objects, of which I have treated, I do not think that I have omitted any remarkable circumstance, unless it be that the Tiber is still the <" flavus Tiberinus." It is said that it acquires its muddy appearance from the rains which fall in the mountains, whence it descends. I have often, while contemplating this discoloured river in the

by her ancestry, the graces of her person, the elegance of her manners, and the incomparable candour of her mind; buried near Victor Alfieri aud in the same grave; (a) he preferred her during twenty-six years to every thing in the world; and though mortal, she was constantly honoured and revered by him as if she had been a divinity. She was born at Mons, lived... and died on .....

(a) To be thus inscribed, if I die first, as I believe and hope I shall; but if God ordain it otherwise, the inscription to be thus altered, after the mention of Alfieri.

Who will soon be inclosed in the same tomb with her.

serenest weather, represented to myself a life begun amidst storms. It is in vain that the remainder of its course is passed beneath a serener sky; the stream continues to be tainted with the waters of the tempest, which disturbed it at its

VISIT TO MOUNT VESUVIUS.*

On the 5th of January, 1 left Naples at seven o'clock in the morning, and proceeded to Portici. The sun had chased away the clouds of night, but the head of Vesuvius is always wrapt in mist. I began my journey up the mountain with a Cicerone, who provided two mules, one for me and one for himself.

The ascent was at first on a tolerably wide road, between two platations of vines, which

* The following observations were not intended for the public eye, as will easily be perceived from the particular character of the reflections which they contain. They were principally written in pencil as I ascended to the crater of the volcano. I have not chosen to correct any part of this short journal, that I might not in any degree interfere with the truth of the narrative; but for the reasons mentioned the reader is requested to peruse it with indulgence.

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were trained upon poplars. I soon began to feel the cold wintry air, but kept advancing, and at -length perceived, a little below the vapours of the middle region, the tops of some trees. They were the elms of the hermitage. The miserable habitations of the vine-dressers were now visible on both sides, amidst a rich abundance of Lachrymæ Christi. In other respects, I observed a parched soil, and naked vines intermixed with pine-trees in the form of an umbrella, some aloes in the hedge, innumerable rolling stones, and not a single bird.

On reaching the first level ground of the mountain, a naked plain lay stretched before me, and I had also in view the two summits of Vesuvius-on the left the Somma,

present mouth of the Volcano.

on the right the

were enveloped in pale clouds.

These two heads

I proceeded.

On one side the Somma falls in, and on the other, I began to distinguished the hollows made in the cone of the volcano, which I was about to climb. The lava of 1766 and 1769 covered the plain, which I was crossing. It is a frightful smoky desert, where the lava, cast out like dross from a