an
lady to be without her _cavaliere servente_, or lover, who spends much
of his time at her house, attends her to all public places, and appears
to live upon her smiles. The old maxim of the Provencal troubadours,
that matrimony ought to be no hindrance to such _liaisons_, seems to be
generally and practically believed in Italy.

In Genoa, there are marriage-brokers, who have pocketbooks filled with
the names of marriageable girls of different classes, with an account of
their fortunes, personal attractions, &c. When they succeed in
arranging connections, they have two or three per cent. commission on
the portion. The marriage-contract is often drawn up before the parties
have seen each other. If a man dislikes the appearances or manners of
his future partner, he may break off the match, on condition of paying
the brokerage and other expenses.

SPANISH WOMEN.

As the Spanish ladies are under a greater seclusion from general
society, than the sex is in other European countries, their desires of
an adequate degree of liberty are consequently more strong and urgent. A
free and open communication being denied them, they make it their
business to secure themselves a secret and hidden one. Hence it is that
Spain is the country of intrigue.

The Spanish women are little or nothing indebted to education. But
nature has liberally supplied them with a fund of wit and sprightliness,
which is certainly no small inducement to those, who have only transient
glimpses of their charms, to wish very earnestly for a removal of those
impediments, that obstruct their more frequent presence. This not being
attainable in a lawful way of customary intercourse, the natural
propensity of men to overcome difficulties of this kind, incites them to
leave no expedient untried to gain admittance to what perhaps was at
first only the object of their admiration, but which, by their being
refused an innocent gratification of that passion, becomes at last the
subject of a more serious one. Thus in Spain, as in all countries where
the sex is kept much out of sight, the thoughts of men are continually
employed in devising methods to break into their concealments.

There is in the Spaniards a native dignity; which, though the source of
many inconveniences, has nevertheless this salutary effect, that it sets
them above almost every species of meanness and infidelity. This quality
is not peculiar to the men; it diffuses itself, in a great measure,
am