bounded by the
Adriatic, which, like a thin line of blue, runs along the horizon. On
the south and west is the hill country of the Apennines, among whose
serrated peaks and cleft sides is many a lovely dell, rich in waters,
and vines, and olive trees. The distant country towards the
Mediterranean lay engulphed in a white mist. A violent electrical action
was going on in it, which, like a strong wind moving upon its surface,
raised it into billows, which appeared to sweep onward, tossing and
tumbling like the waves of ocean.

I had taken up my abode at the Il Pellegrino, one of the best
recommended hotels in Bologna,--not knowing that the Austrian officers
had made it their head-quarters, and that not a Bolognese would enter
it. At dinner-time I saw only the Austrian uniform around the table.
This was a matter of no great moment. Not so what followed. When I went
to bed, there commenced overhead a heavy shuffling of feet, and an
incessant going and coming, with slamming of doors, and jolting of
tables, which lasted all night long. A sad tragedy was enacting above
me. The political apprehensions are made over-night in the Italian
towns; and I little doubt that the soldiers were all night busily
engaged in bringing in prisoners, and sending them off to jail. The
persons so arrested are subjected to moral and physical tortures, which
speedily prostrate both mind and body, and sometimes terminate in death.
Loaded with chains, they are shut up in stinking holes, where they can
neither stand upright nor lie down at their length. The heat of the
weather and the foul air breed diseases of the skin, and cover them with
pustules. The food, too, is scanty, often consisting of only bread and
water. The Government strive to keep their cruel condition a secret from
their relatives, who, notwithstanding, are able at times to penetrate
the mystery that surrounds them, but only to have their feelings
lacerated by the thought of the dreadful sufferings undergone by those
who are the objects of their tenderest affection. And what agony can be
more dreadful than to know that a father, a husband, a son, is rotting
in a putrid cell, or being beaten to death by blows, while neither
relief nor sympathy from you can reach the sufferer? The case of a young
man of the name of Neri, formerly healthy and handsome, found its way to
the public prints. Broken down by blows, he was carried to the military
hospital in an almost dying condition, where an