J827.] 



Domestic and Foreign. 



197 



it home. You may conceive the discontent this 

 ordonnance could not fail to cause amongst the 

 lower classes ; one or two sbirri have been 

 stabbed in a late contest in a transteverian wine 

 shop. 



A woman announced to me, the other day, in 

 great agitation, that an order was about to be 

 published, commanding the different classes of 

 subjects, to wear particular dresses, by which 

 they might be distinguished. My informer la- 

 mented, therefore, at the prospect of being obliged 

 to cast aside all her present wardrobe, and con- 

 sidered how she should look when dressed in 

 yellow stockings and blue cap ; for it had been 

 settled what was to be the dress of each order. 

 The whole, however, turned out to be a fudge 

 a Roman laugh against themselves and their con- 

 dition. The promoter and encourager of these 

 dispositions that are lent to the Pope, is said to 

 be the Cardinal della Somaglia, the secretary of 

 state. He is reported to have had the intention 

 but to have been deterred from it by embassies 

 from the different towns of diminishing the public 

 expenditure, by abolishing the charge of lamp- 

 lighting; because, he is related to have said, in 

 his youth no streets were ever lighted at night, 

 and that, nevertheless, all went on just as well. 



I now hear that the committee for vaccination 

 has thus been lately suppressed as an innovation. 

 Talking lately with some Romans, the conver- 

 sation turned on Cardinal della Somaglia. Some- 

 body affecting to mistake the name, called him 

 Somarella a little ass Indeed I myself had had 

 with him a recent interview, from which I had 

 retired penetrated with due respect for his age 

 and station ; but the person to whom the other 

 was speaking, immediately caught up the pun, 

 repeating: II Cardinale della Somarella ! Oh, 

 questo mi piacet Oh, I like that ! 



When the French were in possession of Rome, 

 they cleared away the shabby buildings that en- 

 cumbered the ground around the beautiful column 

 of Trajan: and the earth being dug away as low 

 as the base of that column, twenty or thirty pil- 

 lars, broken off at a greater or less distance from 

 their pedestals, were exposed to view ; they are 

 all, however, without capitals. These mutilated 

 pillars, the remains of the Forum of Trajan, are 

 known to modern Roman wits by the appellation 

 of the Consistory. 



I was this morning stopped in the street by a 

 procession of children, two of whom carried a 

 cross, which the others followed singing a very 

 common amusement at Rome ; approaching the 

 wall to make room or them, I saw an edict per- 

 mitting the exportation of gunpowder, as the 

 manufacture of that article exceeded * bisogni 

 dello stato the wants of the state. How good ! 



We must find space for a few words on 

 the papyri manuscripts. The author visited 

 the apartment in Naples, whepe the process 

 of unrolling is carried on. 



The rolls, (says he), are completely burnt ; but 

 they are no more consumed than would be a sheet 

 of coarse writing paper by being lighted into a 

 flame, which, soon dying away of itself, would 

 leave what was written still legible on the un- 

 broken cinder. These rolls of papyri are only 

 written on one side, and that side is innermost. 

 On the outward and uninscribed side, a steady 

 hand, with a small paint-brush, attaches with glue, 



goldbeater's skin, and the piece of scorched pa- 

 pyrus, thus backed, is picked off from the roll 

 with a small pointed steel instrument. When a 

 sheet, twelve or fifteen inches long, is thus de- 

 tached, it is inframed behind glass, and carefully 

 copied as inscriptions are drawn. The few gaps 

 and words destroyed in the original manuscript 

 are then supplied by a jury of learned men. 



Notwithstanding the simplicity of the process, 

 which was carried, on before me, but three 

 volumes of the many rolls have been printed. A 

 society has the monopoly of these manuscripts ; 

 otherwise, I have been assured, private individuals 

 of Naples would, long since, have published them 

 all. 



The late administrator of this museum never 

 entered the building either before, or during, or 

 after his administration. (Vol. I. p. 207). 



The Revolt of the Bees ; 1827. This is 

 an eccentric kind of thing a political alle- 

 gory, painfully but blunderingly elaborated. 

 The Bees, it will be supposed, represent 

 society. Impelled by restless and ambitious 

 spirits, the said Bees, once upon a time, 

 changed, not only the form of their govern- 

 ment, but the very principles of society ; for 

 instead of all working, as before, for the 

 common good, each was now to pursue his 

 own to appropriate, that is, his gains, and 

 further his own interests to the full extent of 

 his abilities and opportunities. The speedy 

 consequence of this change, was the orders 

 of rich and poor. Hence arose quarrels and 

 disorders; and hence also arose laws and 

 lawyers. Masters and servants pulled dif- 

 ferent ways. Inequalities of property be- 

 came every day more conspicuous and perni- 

 cious ; and power augmented with augmenting 

 wealth. The right of legislation was all 

 with the rich, and they of course studied 

 their own advantage, and made laws to suit 

 their own purposes. Those who shrunk 

 from labour courted the patronage of the 

 great, and to secure it, exerted their abilities 

 in contributing to their pleasures and ad- 

 vocating their schemes. The interests of the 

 poor were forgotten, or rather were disre- 

 garded. The priests inculcated submission, 

 resignation passive obedience ; the econo- 

 mists, while professing to develope the in- 

 terests of the whole, laboured to point out 

 the most effective mode of expressing the 

 maximum of virtue from the bones and si- 

 news of the poor, and to make the great still 

 greater. By them the genius of mechanism 

 was invoked, and steam and machinery 

 quickly threw myriads helpless and dis- 

 contented upon the world. Starvation 

 covered the land, and the execrations of 

 misery echoed around it. The rich became 

 alarmed, and schemes of every kind, wicked 

 or wild, were caught at and promulgated ; 

 and gladly would they have expelled, or ex- 

 terminated, or annihilated the surplus popu- 

 lation. In the midst of this confusion of 

 expedients appeared a sage of a Bee, who 

 announced the existence of a society insti- 

 tuted upon co-operative principles, and 

 flourishing under the exercise of them 

 principles manifestly calculated to sweep 

 away the fatal evils introduced by the late 



