dangerous, the
moment they set foot in Italy, they are seized with the ambition of
becoming connoisseurs in painting, musick, statuary, and architecture;
and the adventurers of this country do not fail to flatter this
weakness for their own advantage. I have seen in different parts of
Italy, a number of raw boys, whom Britain seemed to have poured forth
on purpose to bring her national character into contempt, ignorant,
petulant, rash, and profligate, without any knowledge or experience of
their own, without any director to improve their understanding, or
superintend their conduct. One engages in play with an infamous
gamester, and is stripped perhaps in the very first partie: another is
pillaged by an antiquated cantatrice; a third is bubbled by a knavish
antiquarian; and a fourth is laid under contribution by a dealer in
pictures. Some turn fiddlers, and pretend to compose: but all of them
talk familiarly of the arts, and return finished connoisseurs and
coxcombs, to their own country. The most remarkable phaenomenon of this
kind, which I have seen, is a boy of seventy-two, now actually
travelling through Italy, for improvement, under the auspices of
another boy of twenty-two. When you arrive at Rome, you receive cards
from all your country-folks in that city: they expect to have the visit
returned next day, when they give orders not to be at home; and you
never speak to one another in the sequel. This is a refinement in
hospitality and politeness, which the English have invented by the
strength of their own genius, without any assistance either from
France, Italy, or Lapland. No Englishman above the degree of a painter
or cicerone frequents any coffee-house at Rome; and as there are no
public diversions, except in carnival-time, the only chance you have of
seeing your compatriots is either in visiting the curiosities, or at a
conversazione. The Italians are very scrupulous in admitting
foreigners, except those who are introduced as people of quality: but
if there happens to be any English lady of fashion at Rome, she
generally keeps an assembly, to which the British subjects resort. In
my next, I shall communicate, without ceremony or affectation, what
further remarks I have made at Rome, without any pretence, however, to
the character of a connoisseur, which, without all doubt, would fit
very aukwardly upon,--Dear Sir, Your Friend and Servant.

LETTER XXX

NICE, February 28, 1765.

DEAR SIR,--Nothing can be