*20] 
rooms, in each of which there was 
a servant in waiting. Above a do- 
zen gentlemen, well dressed and 
polite, after the fashion of Italy, 
with six other ladies, formed this 
agreeable party. Coffee and Sor- 
bettis being served, cards were in- 
troduced ; and, in quality of stran- 
gers, we had the honour of losing 
a few sequins at Ombre with the 
mistress of the house. The other 
ladies present took up, each of then, 
two gentlemen; for Ombre is the 
universal game, because, in Italian 
assemblies, the number of’ men 
commonly triples that of women: 
the latter, when unmarried, seldom 
going abroad; and when married, 
being ambitious of appearing to re- 
ceive company every evening at 
home. During the intervals of 
. play, we endeavoured to turn the 
conversation on the history and pre- 
sent state of St. Marino, but found 
this subject to be too grave for the 
company. In this little state, as 
well as in other parts of Italy, the 
social amusements of life, consisting 
chiefly in what are called Conversa- 
ztoni, have widely deviated from 
the Symposia of the Greeks, and the 
Convivia of the Romans. Instead 
of philosophic dialogues and epi- 
deiktic orations; and instead of 
those animatcd rehearsals of appro- 
ved works of history and poetry, 
which formed the entertainment and 
delight of antiquity, the modern 
Italian Conversaziones exhibit a very 
different scene: a scene, in which 
play is the business ; gallantry the 
amusement ; and of which avarice, 
vanity, and mere sensual pleasure, 
form the sole connecting principle 
and chief ultimate end. Such insi- 
pid and such mercenary assemblies 
are sometimes enlivencd by the 
ANNUAL REGISTER, 1795. 
we had passed through two outer jokes of the buffoon; the Improvi-- 
satore sometimes displays in them 
the powers of his memory rather 
than the elegance of his fancy ; and 
every entertainment in Italy, whe- 
ther gay or serious, is always season-, 
ed with music; but chiefly that 
soft voluptuous music which was ba- 
nished by Lycurgus, proscribed by 
Plato, and prohibited by other le- 
gislators, under severe penalties, 
as unfriendly to virtue and destruc- 
tive of manhood, The great amuse- 
ments of life are commonly nothing 
more than images of its necessary 
occupations ; and where the latter, 
therefore, are different, so also must 
be the former. Is it because the 
occupations of the ancients were 
less softened than those of the mo- 
derns, that women are found to 
have acted among different nations 
such difierent parts in society ? and 
thatthe centrast is so striking be- 
tween the wife of a citizen of St. 
Marino, surmunded with ber card- 
tables, her music, and her admirers, 
and the Roman Lucretia nocte scra 
deditam lane inte: lucubrantes. ancila 
lus, (Tit. liv. i. 47.) or the more 
copious description: of female mo- 
desty and industry yven by Ischo-~ 
machus in Xenophoms Treatise on 
domestic Economy ?, In modern 
Italy this contrast of myners dis-_ 
plays its greatest: force. Though 
less beautiful and less accoaplished 
than the English and Fren, the 
Italian women expect superhr at- 
tention, and exact greater assiyj- 
ties. To be well with the ladeg 
is the highest ambition of the met. 
Upon this principle their manners 
are formed ; by this their behaviour 
is regulated ; and the art of con- 
versation, in its utmost sprighliness 
and highest perfection, is reduced 
te that playful wantonness, which, 
touching 
a 
