Due secoli con

Atti della Giornata di Studio, Pisa 18 ottobre 2018

a cura di DOMITILLA CAMPANILE DIRETTORE (CHIEF EDITOR): Cesare Letta ([email protected])

VICEDIRETTORI (ASSISTANT EDITORS): Marisa Bonamici, Saverio Sani, Mauro Tulli

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Due secoli con Ivanhoe : atti della Giornata di studio, Pisa 18 ottobre 2018 / a cura di Domitilla Campanile. - Pisa : Pisa University press, 2019. - (Nuova biblioteca di studi classici e orientali ; 2)

823.7 (WD) I. Campanile, Maria Domitilla 1. Scott, Walter - Ivanhoe - Congressi - 2018

CIP a cura del Sistema bibliotecario dell’Università di Pisa © Copyright 2019 by Pisa University Press srl Società con socio unico Università di Pisa Capitale Sociale Euro 20.000,00 i.v. - Partita IVA 02047370503 Sede legale: Lungarno Pacinotti 43/44 - 56126, Pisa Tel. + 39 050 2212056 Fax + 39 050 2212945 e-mail: [email protected] - www.pisauniversitypress.it

ISBN: 978-88-3339-271-4

L’editore resta a disposizione degli aventi diritti con i quali non è stato possibile comunicare per omissioni o richieste di soggetti o enti che possano vantare dimostrati diritti sulle immagini riprodotte nel volume. SOMMARIO

Domitilla Campanile Prefazione 5

Domitilla Campanile Introduzione 7

Roberta Ferrari «Amidst the Dust of Antiquity»: Scott, Ivanhoe e il racconto della storia 17 Emanuella Scarano Tumulti e rivoluzioni nel romanzo storico italiano 45 Tommaso di Carpegna Falconieri Ivanhoe, un cavaliere in redingote: sul mito della cavalleria nell’Ottocento 65 Chiara Tommasi Aspetti esoterici e ideali massonici nelle vicissitudini di Ivanhoe 85 Alfonso Maurizio Iacono Il romanzo storico tra ieri e oggi 103 Luigi Spina Rileggendo Ivanhoe per una giornata di studi (ovvero dalle parole agli Atti) 115 Guido Paduano e l’opera: La donna del lago 127 Chiara Savettieri Delacroix e i dipinti ispirati ad Ivanhoe: dall’illustrazione alla tragedia 143 Marco Battaglia Lo sfruttamento ideologico delle antichità germaniche in Ivanhoe 161 Manfred Giampietro L’Ivanhoe di Miklós Rózsa: appunti su una “drammaturgia sinfonica” 191 Domitilla Campanile Ivanhoe al cinema e in televisione 203 Giuseppe Pucci Ivanhoe reloaded 219 Cesare Letta Postfazione 233

Indice dei nomi e dei luoghi notevoli 237 Domitilla Campanile

INTRODUZIONE

Introdurre un volume dedicato a Ivanhoe a duecento anni dalla pub- blicazione è un compito lieve; un romanzo continuamente ristampato, tradotto e trasposto in tutte le forme visive e sonore disponibili nelle varie epoche si è già conquistato un’attenzione particolare. Ivanhoe, in ogni caso, meriterebbe da parte degli studiosi il riguardo dovuto a un’opera che, insieme ad altre di Sir Walter Scott, ha creato il genere letterario noto come romanzo storico. Forse, però, non è così diffici- le comprendere come ‒ salvo alcune eccezioni ‒ il romanzo scottiano abbia suscitato, in realtà, un interesse accademico tenue; non di rado, infatti, capita che la grande popolarità di un testo possa rappresentare un ostacolo più che un invito alla ricerca. Sarebbe fuori luogo, però, insistere su questo fenomeno per intro- durre un volume dedicato a Ivanhoe; piuttosto che biasimare quanto non è stato fatto, è più gradevole notare come le tendenze intransigenti stiano diventando meno accentuate e che sempre più spesso un numero sempre più ampio di studiosi si stia impegnando in ricerche considerate in passato non degne di esplorazione. Credo che il miglior favore che si possa fare ai lettori sia ora cedere la parola all’Autore. Non si può introdurre meglio un volume su Ivanhoe, né si possono trovare risposte migliori a tutte le varie obiezioni suscitate dal romanzo storico di quelle fornite nella Dedicatory Epistle che Laurence Templeton, alter ego di Sir Walter Scott, indirizza proprio in Ivanhoe all’immaginario pedante Rev. Dr. Dryasdust. Se il Rev. Dryasdust è im- maginario, non sono immaginarie le critiche respinte da Scott con impa- reggiabile ironia e assoluto dominio della materia. Il cognome del noioso antiquario, Rev. Dryasdust, lascia già pregustare il resto. 8 DUE SECOLI CON IVANHOE DEDICATORY EPISTLE TO

THE REV. DR DRYASDUST, F.A.S. logy in your eyes, yet I would not willingly stand conviction in those of Residing in the Castle-Gate, York. the public of so grave a crime, as my Much esteemed and dear Sir, fears lead me to anticipate my being It is scarcely necessary to men- charged with. tion the various and concurring rea- I must therefore remind you, that sons which induce me to place your when we first talked over together name at the head of the following that class of productions, in one of work. Yet the chief of these reasons which the private and family affai- may perhaps be refuted by the imper- rs of your learned northern friend, fections of the performance. Could Mr Oldbuck of Monkbarns, were so I have hoped to render it worthy of unjustifiably exposed to the public, your patronage, the public would at some discussion occurred between once have seen the propriety of in- us concerning the cause of the po- scribing a work designed to illustrate pularity these works have attained in the domestic antiquities of England, this idle age, which, whatever other and particularly of our Saxon forefa- merit they possess, must be admit- thers, to the learned author of the Es- ted to be hastily written, and in vio- says upon the Horn of King Ulphus, lation of every rule assigned to the and on the Lands bestowed by him epopeia. It seemed then to be your upon the patrimony of St Peter. I am opinion, that the charm lay entirely conscious, however, that the slight, in the art with which the unknown unsatisfactory, and trivial manner, author had availed himself, like a se- in which the result of my antiqua- cond M’Pherson, of the antiquarian rian researches has been recorded in stores which lay scattered around the following pages, takes the work him, supplying his own indolence from under that class which bears or poverty of invention, by the inci- the proud motto, “Detur digniori”. dents which had actually taken place On the contrary, I fear I shall incur in his country at no distant period, the censure of presumption in pla- by introducing real characters, and cing the venerable name of Dr Jonas scarcely suppressing real names. It Dryasdust at the head of a publica- was not above sixty or seventy years, tion, which the more grave antiquary you observed, since the whole north will perhaps class with the idle no- of was under a state of go- vels and romances of the day. I am vernment nearly as simple and as pa- anxious to vindicate myself from triarchal as those of our good allies such a charge; for although I might the Mohawks and Iroquois. Admit- trust to your friendship for an apo- ting that the author cannot himself INTRODUZIONE 9 be supposed to have witnessed tho- sess in the same proportion superior se times, he must have lived, you softness and beauty; and upon the observed, among persons who had whole, we feel ourselves entitled to acted and suffered in them; and even exclaim with the patriotic Syrian— within these thirty years, such an in- “Are not Pharphar and Abana, rivers finite change has taken place in the of Damascus, better than all the rivers manners of Scotland, that men look of Israel?” back upon the habits of society pro- Your objections to such an at- per to their immediate ancestors, as tempt, my dear Doctor, were, you we do on those of the reign of Queen may remember, two-fold. You in- Anne, or even the period of the Re- sisted upon the advantages which volution. Having thus materials of the Scotsman possessed, from the every kind lying strewed around very recent existence of that state him, there was little, you observed, of society in which his scene was to embarrass the author, but the dif- to be laid. Many now alive, you re- ficulty of choice. It was no wonder, marked, well remembered persons therefore, that, having begun to work who had not only seen the celebra- a mine so plentiful, he should have ted Roy M’Gregor, but had feasted, derived from his works fully more and even fought with him. All those credit and profit than the facility of minute circumstances belonging to his labours merited. private life and domestic character, Admitting (as I could not deny) the all that gives verisimilitude to a nar- general truth of these conclusions, I rative, and individuality to the per- cannot but think it strange that no at- sons introduced, is still known and tempt has been made to excite an in- remembered in Scotland; whereas terest for the traditions and manners in England, civilisation has been of Old England, similiar to that which so long complete, that our ideas of has been obtained in behalf of those our ancestors are only to be gleaned of our poorer and less celebrated nei- from musty records and chronicles, ghbours. The Kendal green, though the authors of which seem perver- its date is more ancient, ought surely sely to have conspired to suppress to be as dear to our feelings, as the in their narratives all interesting variegated tartans of the north. The details, in order to find room for flo- name of Robin Hood, if duly conju- wers of monkish eloquence, or trite red with, should raise a spirit as soon reflections upon morals. To match as that of ; and the patriots of an English and a Scottish author in England deserve no less their renown the rival task of embodying and revi- in our modern circles, than the Bru- ving the traditions of their respecti- ces and Wallaces of Caledonia. If the ve countries, would be, you alleged, scenery of the south be less romantic in the highest degree unequal and and sublime than that of the northern unjust. The Scottish magician, you mountains, it must be allowed to pos- said, was, like Lucan’s witch, at li- 10 DUE SECOLI CON IVANHOE berty to walk over the recent field of seen those remote districts at all, battle, and to select for the subject of or he has wandered through those resuscitation by his sorceries, a body desolate regions in the course of a whose limbs had recently quivered summer tour, eating bad dinners, sle- with existence, and whose throat had eping on truckle beds, stalking from but just uttered the last note of ago- desolation to desolation, and ful- ny. Such a subject even the powerful ly prepared to believe the strangest Erictho was compelled to select, as things that could be told him of a alone capable of being reanimated people, wild and extravagant enough even by “her” potent magic— to be attached to scenery so extraor- ——gelidas leto scrutata medullas, dinary. But the same worthy person, Pulmonis rigidi stantes sine vulnere fibras when placed in his own snug parlour, Invenit, et vocem defuncto in corpore quaerit. and surrounded by all the comforts The English author, on the other of an Englishman’s fireside, is not hand, without supposing him less of half so much disposed to believe that a conjuror than the Northern War- his own ancestors led a very diffe- lock, can, you observed, only have rent life from himself; that the shat- the liberty of selecting his subject tered tower, which now forms a vista amidst the dust of antiquity, whe- from his window, once held a baron re nothing was to be found but dry, who would have hung him up at his sapless, mouldering, and disjointed own door without any form of trial; bones, such as those which filled that the hinds, by whom his little the valley of Jehoshaphat. You ex- pet-farm is managed, a few centuri- pressed, besides, your apprehension, es ago would have been his slaves; that the unpatriotic prejudices of my and that the complete influence of countrymen would not allow fair feudal tyranny once extended over play to such a work as that of which the neighbouring village, where the I endeavoured to demonstrate the attorney is now a man of more im- probable success. And this, you said, portance than the lord of the manor. was not entirely owing to the more While I own the force of these general prejudice in favour of that objections, I must confess, at the which is foreign, but that it rested same time, that they do not appear partly upon improbabilities, arising to me to be altogether insurmounta- out of the circumstances in which the ble. The scantiness of materials is in- English reader is placed. If you de- deed a formidable difficulty; but no scribe to him a set of wild manners, one knows better than Dr Dryasdust, and a state of primitive society exi- that to those deeply read in antiqui- sting in the Highlands of Scotland, ty, hints concerning the private life he is much disposed to acquiesce in of our ancestors lie scattered through the truth of what is asserted. And re- the pages of our various historians, ason good. If he be of the ordinary bearing, indeed, a slender proportion class of readers, he has either never to the other matters of which they INTRODUZIONE 11 treat, but still, when collected toge- our friend Mr Oldbuck. Yet Horace ther, sufficient to throw considera- Walpole wrote a goblin tale which ble light upon the “vie prive” of our has thrilled through many a bosom; forefathers; indeed, I am convinced, and George Ellis could transfer all that however I myself may fail in the playful fascination of a humour, the ensuing attempt, yet, with more as delightful as it was uncommon, labour in collecting, or more skill in into his Abridgement of the Ancient using, the materials within his reach, Metrical Romances. So that, howe- illustrated as they have been by the ver I may have occasion to rue my labours of Dr Henry, of the late Mr present audacity, I have at least the Strutt, and, above all, of Mr Sharon most respectable precedents in my Turner, an abler hand would have favour. been successful; and therefore I pro- Still the severer antiquary may test, beforehand, against any argu- think, that, by thus intermingling ment which may be founded on the fiction with truth, I am polluting failure of the present experiment. the well of history with modern in- On the other hand, I have alre- ventions, and impressing upon the ady said, that if any thing like a rising generation false ideas of the true picture of old English manners age which I describe. I cannot but in could be drawn, I would trust to the some sense admit the force of this re- good-nature and good sense of my asoning, which I yet hope to traverse countrymen for insuring its favoura- by the following considerations. ble reception. It is true, that I neither can, nor do Having thus replied, to the best of pretend, to the observation of com- my power, to the first class of your plete accuracy, even in matters of objections, or at least having shown outward costume, much less in the my resolution to overleap the bar- more important points of language riers which your prudence has rai- and manners. But the same motive sed, I will be brief in noticing that which prevents my writing the dia- which is more peculiar to myself. logue of the piece in Anglo-Saxon It seems to be your opinion, that or in Norman-French, and which the very office of an antiquary, em- prohibits my sending forth to the ployed in grave, and, as the vulgar public this essay printed with the will sometimes allege, in toilsome types of Caxton or Wynken de Wor- and minute research, must be con- de, prevents my attempting to con- sidered as incapacitating him from fine myself within the limits of the successfully compounding a tale of period in which my story is laid. It this sort. But permit me to say, my is necessary, for exciting interest of dear Doctor, that this objection is any kind, that the subject assumed rather formal than substantial. It is should be, as it were, translated into true, that such slight compositions the manners, as well as the language, might not suit the severer genius of of the age we live in. No fascination 12 DUE SECOLI CON IVANHOE has ever been attached to Oriental appears to me, that extensive neutral literature, equal to that produced by ground, the large proportion, that is, Mr Galland’s first translation of the of manners and sentiments which are Arabian Tales; in which, retaining common to us and to our ancestors, on the one hand the splendour of Ea- having been handed down unaltered stern costume, and on the other the from them to us, or which, arising wildness of Eastern fiction, he - mi out of the principles of our common xed these with just so much ordinary nature, must have existed alike in ei- feeling and expression, as rendered ther state of society. In this manner, them interesting and intelligible, a man of talent, and of great antiqua- while he abridged the long-winded rian erudition, limited the populari- narratives, curtailed the monotonous ty of his work, by excluding from it reflections, and rejected the endless every thing which was not sufficien- repetitions of the Arabian original. tly obsolete to be altogether forgot- The tales, therefore, though less pu- ten and unintelligible. rely Oriental than in their first con- The license which I would here coction, were eminently better fitted vindicate, is so necessary to the exe- for the European market, and obtai- cution of my plan, that I will crave ned an unrivalled degree of public your patience while I illustrate my favour, which they certainly would argument a little farther. never have gained had not the man- He who first opens Chaucer, or ners and style been in some degree any other ancient poet, is so much familiarized to the feelings and ha- struck with the obsolete spelling, bits of the western reader. multiplied consonants, and anti- In point of justice, therefore, to quated appearance of the language, the multitudes who will, I trust, de- that he is apt to lay the work down vour this book with avidity, I have so in despair, as encrusted too deep far explained our ancient manners in with the rust of antiquity, to permit modern language, and so far detai- his judging of its merits or tasting led the characters and sentiments of its beauties. But if some intelligent my persons, that the modern reader and accomplished friend points out will not find himself, I should hope, to him, that the difficulties by which much trammelled by the repulsive he is startled are more in appearan- dryness of mere antiquity. In this, ce than reality, if, by reading aloud I respectfully contend, I have in no to him, or by reducing the ordinary respect exceeded the fair license due words to the modern orthography, he to the author of a fictitious compo- satisfies his proselyte that only about sition. The late ingenious Mr Strutt, one-tenth part of the words emplo- in his romance of Queen-Hoo- yed are in fact obsolete, the novice Hall, 5 acted upon another principle; may be easily persuaded to approach and in distinguishing between what the “well of English undefiled,” with was ancient and modern, forgot, as it the certainty that a slender degree of INTRODUZIONE 13 patience will enable him to to enjoy the peculiar state of society, must both the humour and the pathos with still, upon the whole, bear a strong which old Geoffrey delighted the age resemblance to each other. Our an- of Cressy and of Poictiers. cestors were not more distinct from To pursue this a little farther. If us, surely, than Jews are from Chri- our neophyte, strong in the new-born stians; they had “eyes, hands, or- love of antiquity, were to undertake gans, dimensions, senses, affections, to imitate what he had learnt to ad- passions;” were “fed with the same mire, it must be allowed he would food, hurt with the same weapons, act very injudiciously, if he were to subject to the same diseases, war- select from the Glossary the obsolete med and cooled by the same winter words which it contains, and employ and summer,” as ourselves. The te- those exclusively of all phrases and nor, therefore, of their affections and vocables retained in modern days. feelings, must have borne the same This was the error of the unfortunate general proportion to our own. Chatterton. In order to give his lan- It follows, therefore, that of the guage the appearance of antiquity, materials which an author has to he rejected every word that was mo- use in a romance, or fictitious com- dern, and produced a dialect entirely position, such as I have ventured different from any that had ever been to attempt, he will find that a -gre spoken in Great Britain. He who at proportion, both of language and would imitate an ancient language manners, is as proper to the present with success, must attend rather to time as to those in which he has laid its grammatical character, turn of ex- his time of action. The freedom of pression, and mode of arrangement, choice which this allows him, is than labour to collect extraordinary therefore much greater, and the dif- and antiquated terms, which, as I ficulty of his task much more dimi- have already averred, do not in an- nished, than at first appears. To take cient authors approach the number an illustration from a sister art, the of words still in use, though perhaps antiquarian details may be said to somewhat altered in sense and spel- represent the peculiar features of a ling, in the proportion of one to ten. landscape under delineation of the What I have applied to language, pencil. His feudal tower must arise is still more justly applicable to sen- in due majesty; the figures which he timents and manners. The passions, introduces must have the costume the sources from which these must and character of their age; the piece spring in all their modifications, are must represent the peculiar features generally the same in all ranks and of the scene which he has chosen conditions, all countries and ages; for his subject, with all its appro- and it follows, as a matter of course, priate elevation of rock, or precipi- that the opinions, habits of thinking, tate descent of cataract. His general and actions, however influenced by colouring, too, must be copied from 14 DUE SECOLI CON IVANHOE

Nature: The sky must be clouded ples of art were better understood. or serene, according to the climate, His language must not be exclusi- and the general tints must be those vely obsolete and unintelligible; but which prevail in a natural landsca- he should admit, if possible, no word pe. So far the painter is bound down or turn of phraseology betraying by the rules of his art, to a precise an origin directly modern. It is one imitation of the features of Nature; thing to make use of the language but it is not required that he should and sentiments which are common descend to copy all her more minute to ourselves and our forefathers, and features, or represent with absolute it is another to invest them with the exactness the very herbs, flowers, sentiments and dialect exclusively and trees, with which the spot is proper to their descendants. decorated. These, as well as all the This, my dear friend, I have found more minute points of light and sha- the most difficult part of my task; dow, are attributes proper to scenery and, to speak frankly, I hardly expect in general, natural to each situation, to satisfy your less partial judgment, and subject to the artist’s disposal, and more extensive knowledge of as his taste or pleasure may dictate. such subjects, since I have hardly It is true, that this license is con- been able to please my own. fined in either case within legitimate I am conscious that I shall be bounds. The painter must introduce found still more faulty in the tone of no ornament inconsistent with the keeping and costume, by those who climate or country of his landscape; may be disposed rigidly to examine he must not plant cypress trees upon my Tale, with reference to the man- Inch-Merrin, or Scottish firs among ners of the exact period in which my the ruins of Persepolis; and the au- actors flourished: It may be, that I thor lies under a corresponding re- have introduced little which can po- straint. However far he may venture sitively be termed modern; but, on in a more full detail of passions and the other hand, it is extremely pro- feelings, than is to be found in the an- bable that I may have confused the cient compositions which he imita- manners of two or three centuries, tes, he must introduce nothing incon- and introduced, during the reign of sistent with the manners of the age; Richard the First, circumstances ap- his knights, squires, grooms, and ye- propriated to a period either consi- omen, may be more fully drawn than derably earlier, or a good deal later in the hard, dry delineations of an than that era. It is my comfort, that ancient illuminated manuscript, but errors of this kind will escape the ge- the character and costume of the age neral class of readers, and that I may must remain inviolate; they must be share in the ill-deserved applause of the same figures, drawn by a better those architects, who, in their mo- pencil, or, to speak more modestly, dern Gothic, do not hesitate to intro- executed in an age when the princi- duce, without rule or method, orna- INTRODUZIONE 15 ments proper to different styles and promised to designate it by some to different periods of the art. Those emphatic mode of printing, as {The whose extensive researches have gi- Wardour Manuscript}; giving it, the- ven them the means of judging my reby, an individuality as important as backslidings with more severity, will the Bannatyne MS., the Auchinleck probably be lenient in proportion to MS., and any other monument of the their knowledge of the difficulty of patience of a Gothic scrivener. I have my task. My honest and neglected sent, for your private consideration, friend, Ingulphus, has furnished a list of the contents of this curious me with many a valuable hint; but piece, which I shall perhaps subjoin, the light afforded by the Monk of with your approbation, to the third Croydon, and Geoffrey de Vinsauff, volume of my Tale, in case the prin- is dimmed by such a conglomeration ter’s devil should continue impatient of uninteresting and unintelligible for copy, when the whole of my nar- matter, that we gladly fly for relief rative has been imposed. to the delightful pages of the gallant Adieu, my dear friend; I have said Froissart, although he flourished at enough to explain, if not to vindica- a period so much more remote from te, the attempt which I have made, the date of my history. If, therefore, and which, in spite of your doubts, my dear friend, you have generosity and my own incapacity, I am still enough to pardon the presumptuous willing to believe has not been alto- attempt, to frame for myself a min- gether made in vain. strel coronet, partly out of the pearls I hope you are now well recove- of pure antiquity, and partly from the red from your spring fit of the gout, Bristol stones and paste, with which and shall be happy if the advice of I have endeavoured to imitate them, your learned physician should re- I am convinced your opinion of the commend a tour to these parts. Seve- difficulty of the task will reconcile ral curiosities have been lately dug you to the imperfect manner of its up near the wall, as well as at the an- execution. cient station of Habitancum. Talking Of my materials I have but little of the latter, I suppose you have long to say. They may be chiefly found since heard the news, that a sulky in the singular Anglo-Norman MS., churlish boor has destroyed the an- which Sir Arthur Wardour preserves cient statue, or rather bas-relief, po- with such jealous care in the third pularly called Robin of Redesdale. It drawer of his oaken cabinet, scarcely seems Robin’s fame attracted more allowing any one to touch it, and visitants than was consistent with the being himself not able to read one growth of the heather, upon a moor syllable of its contents. I should ne- worth a shilling an acre. Reverend ver have got his consent, on my visit as you write yourself, be revengeful to Scotland, to read in those precious for once, and pray with me that he pages for so many hours, had I not may be visited with such a fit of the 16 DUE SECOLI CON IVANHOE stone, as if he had all the fragments The last news which I hear from of poor Robin in that region of his Edinburgh is, that the gentleman viscera where the disease holds its who fills the situation of Secretary to seat. Tell this not in Gath, lest the the Society of Antiquaries of Scot- Scots rejoice that they have at length land22, is the best amateur draftsman found a parallel instance among their in that kingdom, and that much is ex- neighbours, to that barbarous deed pected from his skill and zeal in de- which demolished Arthur’s Oven. lineating those specimens of national But there is no end to lamentation, antiquity, which are either moulde- when we betake ourselves to such ring under the slow touch of time, subjects. My respectful compliments or swept away by modern taste, with attend Miss Dryasdust; I endeavou- the same besom of destruction which red to match the spectacles agreeable John Knox used at the Reformation. to her commission, during my late Once more adieu; “vale tandem, non journey to London, and hope she has immemor mei”. Believe me to be, received them safe, and found them satisfactory. I send this by the blind Reverend, and very dear Sir, carrier, so that probably it may be Your most faithful humble Servant. some time upon its journey1. Laurence Templeton. Toppingwold, near Egremont, Cumberland, Nov. 17, 1817. 1 This anticipation proved but too true, as my learned correspondent did not receive my letter until a twelve- month after it was written. I mention this circumstance, that a gentleman atta- ched to the cause of learning, who now holds the principal control of the post- office, may consider whether by some mitigation of the present enormous ra- tes, some favour might not be shown to the correspondents of the principal Literary and Antiquarian Societies. I understand, indeed, that this experiment was once tried, but that the mail-coach having broke down under the weight of packages addressed to members of the Society of Antiquaries, it was relinqui- shed as a hazardous experiment. Surely, however it would be possible to build these vehicles in a form more substan- tial, stronger in the perch, and broader in the wheels, so as to support the weight 2 Mr Skene of Rubislaw is here inti- of Antiquarian learning; when, if they mated, to whose taste and skill the author should be found to travel more slowly, is indebted for a series of etchings, exhi- they would be not the less agreeable to biting the various localities alluded to in quiet travellers like myself.—L. T.] these novels. Finito di stampare nel mese di Novembre 2019 da Digital Team srl – Fano (PU) per conto di Pisa University Press