er than let him into heaven, while _he_ has the keys
thereof.

"I must go and ride, though rather feverish and chilly. It is the
ague season; but the agues do me rather good than harm. The feel
after the _fit_ is as if one had got rid of one's body for good and
all.

"The gods go with you!--Address to Pisa.

"Ever yours.

"P.S. Since I came back I feel better, though I stayed out too late
for this malaria season, under the thin crescent of a very young
moon, and got off my horse to walk in an avenue with a Signora for
an hour. I thought of you and

'When at eve thou rovest
By the star thou lovest.'

But it was not in a romantic mood, as I should have been once; and
yet it was a _new_ woman, (that is, new to me,) and, of course,
expected to be made love to. But I merely made a few common-place
speeches. I feel, as your poor friend Curran said, before his
death, 'a mountain of lead upon my heart,' which I believe to be
constitutional, and that nothing will remove it but the same
remedy."

* * * * *

LETTER 461. TO MR. MOORE.

"October 6. 1821.

"By this post I have sent my nightmare to balance the incubus of *
* *'s impudent anticipation of the Apotheosis of George the Third.
I should like you to take a look over it, as I think there are two
or three things in it which might please 'our puir hill folk.'

"By the last two or three posts I have written to you at length. My
_ague_ bows to me every two or three days, but we are not as yet
upon intimate speaking terms. I have an intermittent generally
every two years, when the climate is favourable (as it is here),
but it does me no harm. What I find worse, and cannot get rid of,
is the growing depression of my spirits, without sufficient cause.
I ride--I am not intemperate in eating or drinking--and my general
health is as usual, except a slight ague, which rather does good
than not. It must be constitutional; for I know nothing more than
usual to depress me to that degree.

"How do _you_ manage? I think you told me, at Venice, that your
spirits did not keep up without a little claret. I _can_ drink, and
bear a good deal of wine (as you may recollect in England); but it
don't exhilarate--it makes me savage and suspicious, and even