the westward the backbone of the Graian mountain-range, which runs parallel to the famed Cornici road. Middle and southern Italy were then but clusters of islands, analogous to and adjoining the present rock-bound shores of Sicily, Sardinia, Corsica, Malta, &c.

Influenced by volcanic inward forces, and the constant deposit and surface accumulation of débris from out an aqueous void, the first principle of matter has ever been gradually developing itself into continental form; volcanic upheavings and depressions, leaving dry land where once was water, and (sometimes of necessity) water where hitherto had been dry land; but all the complex forces of nature, her heat and volcanic action, leading to the suppression of the watery element upon her surface, and the substitution, particle for particle, of terra-firma in its stead. As civilisation advances, we find her most forward promoters instinctively anticipating in every quarter of the globe, by scientific means, what nature is ever imperceptibly but surely accomplishing.

The artificial drainage of bays and lagoons, yet in their transition state (neither altogether sea, nor yet land), is but an aiding of nature to throw off more quickly the superabundance of her first element, and thus make room for the increase of souls upon her surface.

The low-lying Campagna, situate midway between the Alps and the Apennines (known familiarly as the Válle, or fen district of Venetia), is drained by the sluggish Po, which lazily meanders through the fruitful vine-garden of Northern Italy, and disgorges its turbid waters at its hydra-headed junction with the sea. In surmising the date of the earliest existing population inhabiting this district, we are carried back two thousand years B.C., and obtain approximate data for assuming the Pelasgic race to have been the first colonisers of Northern Italy, and the founders of Adria, which was probably built, like Venice, upon sandbanks or islands, and was then a port at the mouth of the Po.

We are accustomed to regard the Roman as the founder of Italy's civilisation, but his greatest achievements in constructive architecture were anticipated by the Egypto-Assyrian craftsmen, and it would be more proper to speak of the Latin as a clever adapter of the results of a previous civilisation to his own more particular wants, than as a projector of original ideas in the realms of manipulative art, or more positive science.

We wish to draw the reader's attention to the fact that innumerable relics are constantly being discovered which have proved equally durable in all their apparent fragility-with the walls of many Roman cities. These relics of pre-Roman civilisation, although most interesting to the philosopher and the antiquary, belong to the

mythological pre-historic period, and are necessarily more vague in their story, and less interesting to the casual observer, than the towering massiveness of Roman masonry, or the graceful statuary chiselled by the hand of genius.

The civilisation of the Assyrian race has left its impress on the land it inhabited: the traditions of numerous Eastern nations have survived the dark ages of pre-historic and mediæval gloom, and are now readable by aid of that "dim religious light" which illuminates the sacred history of all time. The Egyptian hieroglyphics portray human life in its varied phases as it "lived and moved and had its being" in the twenty thousand inhabited cities which Herodotus informs us existed three thousand years ago in the land of the sacred Nile; we have no historic lore relating to Italy's earliest civilisation, no stately monuments of her greatness carved with the traditional symbols of what she was in pre-Roman days, but we have the remnants of pottery of Pelasgic and Etruscan manufacture, which are dug up in considerable quantities in the vicinity of Adria; and each of these tiny fragments, beautiful and complete in its every figure, tells its own story-tells of the habits and customs of the people of those days —enables, as it were, the thoughtful examiner to rehabilitate the silent spirit of the tomb, to reclothe its occupant with the attributes of thought, of taste, of power, which constituted its individuality during the short span of its mundane existence four thousand years ago. We are surprised at the originality of design, the multiplicity of subject-matter for study contained in the numerous articles of earthenware. Bowls ornamented with exquisite groupings from nature the athlete, the water-carrier, the husbandman, the graceful nymph, the sturdy artisan, repeat themselves in every form. The mule is portrayed as the beast of burden; the horse, caparisoned and haughty, with stately tread carries the mailed warrior to the battle-field, or with more agile gracefulness (bearing the hunter in the chase) pursues the nimble fawn or the antlered deer. We may well wonder at the beautiful proportions of the horse, the anatomy so carefully studied and preserved, the lines of beauty so faithfully and exquisitely rendered by a few strokes of the engraver's tool.

Numerous and elegant as are the articles adapted solely for domestic purposes, there are others which were evidently designed for religious use, and have the appearance of greater artistic skill, and contain larger groupings of symbolic figures; such, for example, as the priest with flowing beard presiding at the sacrificial altar; processions of animals, apparently for the purpose of such sacrifices, &c. In all we find an amount of symmetrical ornamentation rivalling the pictorial art of the Greek.

It is noticeable that the Pelasgic relics are found in an entirely different alluvial strata from that in which the Etruscan are buried, and three feet below it; whilst the latter again lie six feet under the black bog deposit from which the Roman vases and the innumerable relics of the historic period have been excavated. The existence of these three distinct deposits has given rise to the supposition that Adria has been swept away three distinct times by the bursting of the pre-existing banks of the Po, and refounded by the succeeding race on the ruins of the past. We are thus enabled to distinguish the handiwork of the Pelasgian from that of his successor, and we find him excelling in his method of burning in the colours, which time has proved to have been more enduring than the method employed by the Etruscan potter. At the same time we must give the palm to the Etruscan workman, for he was undoubtedly the more accomplished potter, he having used a finer composition for hardening his clay. One remarkable peculiarity is observable in the composition of the Pelasgian designer to which neither the Etruscan nor the Greek or Roman can lay claim, viz., that no one idea, no single figure, curve, or primary principle of ornamentation is reproduced in a duplicate form: each separate ewer or bowl displays an inexhaustible originality of design. Here we will also note the fact, which may or may not be new to those who have studied the subject, that the Etruscan seems generally to have completed his work of ornamentation before the glaze was burnt in, whilst the Pelasgian has evidently, in many cases, put the finishing touches to his after that process had been perfected.

It is only during the last few years that the excavations near the bed of the Po have been commenced (at the supposed site of the ancient city, two miles from the present one, and at various other points). As yet no traces have been discovered of architectural foundations, so that we can form no certain conclusion as to the antiquity of the first "oltra-Po" city of Adria. We may presume that if any such architectural traces should be found, they will correspond with similar Etruscan ruins already discovered in other portions of central Italy; indeed it is confidently anticipated by the enterprising scholar who is conducting the research, that such will shortly be discovered.

Adria the modern-no more a seaport is now the centre of a vast level, intersected by the meandering Brenta, the fast-flowing Adige, and the listless, turbid Po. Large tracts still remain morass, the haunt of the wild fowl, the home of the eel cultivator. Long, straight Roman roads, poplared on either hand, with undeviating regularity; deep sunken fosses full of surface-water of an inky darkness; even the very wildness of the tout ensemble has an air

of novelty, a dash of romantic association, which more than counteracts the monotony of the scene. One can wander for hours together, mile after mile, and not see the vestige of human habitation; everywhere silence, on the earth and in the sky,-broken only by the distant caw-caw of the raven, by the sudden rise of a heron or a stork with heavy indecisive flutter, as if his aerial apparatus were rusty and out of joint.

A long residence in Northern Italy-years spent in social intercourse with the contadini, have familiarised the writer with phases of social life, and with the national peculiarities of a shy and suspicious people, too long accustomed to espionage and treachery to allow willingly to a foreigner the privilege of entrée within the sanctum of the domestic circle.

The crushing, soul-degrading efforts of despotism have distorted honest patriotism into a rash risking of body and soul in blind antagonism to the powers that be. Citizen hatred of priest and monk has ceased to combat the anomalies with which Romanism has clogged and fettered the early Catholic Church; now religion herself is brought into contempt, the sneer of the scoffer is substituted for the protest of the reformer. The "contadini” (or small landed proprietors), on the other hand, remain in statu quo. Political agitation and the latitudinarianism of social and religious discontent have not yet uprooted their fidelity to the Church of Rome. The country inhabitants scattered over the fair compagna still regard the rural priest as their spiritual superior; whilst reverencing him only in proportion to the honesty, sincerity, and consistency of his life and example The "Párroco," the "Archiprete," has perhaps more influence for good or for evil over the mass of the Italian population than the clergyman of any other European country; and far be it from us to under-estimate that influence, or to insinuate that it is not for good. Fully to analyse it, we must separate the elements of which it is composed. We must bear in mind that the Jesuit, the Capuchin, the Dominican friar, and the other orders of padri and monachi, do not necessarily come into direct contact with the people at large. The clergy proper consist of the Monsignori (archbishops, bishops, and canons) and the Don-reverendos (parochial and vicarial) in their various grades, and they alone can be called the pastors of the people. That many of these are earnest, pious men not even their enemies will deny; but their usefulness is counteracted by the negative effect of that dogmatism and dependence on ceremonial ritualism which is forced upon them by the canons of their Church, bringing down the highest intellect to the level of the veriest ignoramus whom episcopal hands have ordained, and rendering the most zealous virtually powerless.

As in France, so in Italy, it is the citizen who alone is the political agitator; the contadino is essentially conservative; contented with the religion of his forefathers, he has learnt to accommodate himself to foreign political rule, and uses the very name of Cittadino as synonymous with socialist and revolutionnaire.

It may be interesting to the reader to describe the occupation of the country population inhabiting the válle lands of Southern Venetia during the winter months, when the tillage of the soil, the culture of the vine, the production of rice and maize, and the rearing of silkworms no longer claim their undivided attention. Then the whole district becomes the rendezvous of sportsmen; wild ducks and geese congregate by hundreds of thousands, and the yield to the proprietors of vast districts of morass is considerable.

A water-tight decoy-pit sunk in the midst of an area of several acres of lagoon, hides away half-a-dozen of the sportsmen, who there await the signal, when a simultaneous discharge carries death and destruction among the feathery crowd which ususpectingly comes within their range. Each sportsman is entitled to a certain proportion of the game, but the greater part is sold for the benefit of the proprietor of the morass; thus the sporting value is no doubt great, but not to be compared with the produce of the lagoon. It is the eel-fisheries of the Romagna and the Venetian marshes to which the people principally turn their winter attention; these are conducted on a very extensive scale, and supply the demand during Lent of all good Catholics in Spain, Southern France, Austria, Dalmatia, and Italy itself.

It is a remarkable fact, and one probably of more than passing interest, that until within the last few years of quasi Italian unity, the principal eel and fresh-water fisheries were either the absolute property of the Pope, or had to pay tribute to the Holy See. revenue derived therefrom is said to have been enormous.

Its

We do not know the date of the prohibition of flesh, or rather the substitution of fish in its stead, on the Friday and Saturday and during the forty days of Lent, but it looks as though such a substitution of fish for flesh was not wholly disinterested on the part of the first sovereign Pontiff who originated this system, and we may surmise that the date of the practical development of the Papal monopoly over the fishy tribe coincides with that at or about which the first articles relative to fasts and Lent observances were proclaimed by il Papa of centuries gone by.

At the present day, although landed proprietors well know the advantages resulting from artificial drainage, and are reclaiming vast tracts year by year, yet, partly from want of capital, partly from the absence of speculative energy in the Italian character, and perhaps still