At the end of the sixteenth century Italy is well under way on a new stretch of history, which lasted until the nineteenth century. Except Venice, always individual, and the Papacy, freshly revivified, Italy has lost all moral force, and become wholly effeminate. In twenty-five years three hundred and twenty-six volumes of sonnets were published. Her political life has become what one may call grand-ducal; her religion formal, superstitious; her literature affected, stilted; her architecture Baroque; her painting and sculpture steeped in mannerism and exaggeration. Nevertheless, Italy is Italy, and has her own charm, her own individuality, her own coquetry. As formerly she lured Barbarian nations, so now she lures individual Barbarians, and becomes the roaming-ground of travellers. She seems less a real country than a theatre, where rococo dukes, cavaliers, and ladies curl their hair and powder their cheeks. For two centuries this artificial existence continued. Its history is not to be found in the solemn volumes of Cesare Cantu, Carlo Botta, or other Italian historians, but in the journals of German, French, and English travellers: for during these centuries Italy was not a country in either a political or a sentimental sense; it was a place of recreation for gentlemen on the grand tour, pious folk bound Romeward, virtuosi seeking classical remains, and elderly statesmen hoping to cure the gout. The several petty states were so many artificial gardens, where the peasants wore pretty costumes, the dukes sang prize songs, the duchesses trilled _tra la la_ in rival endeavour, and the ecclesiastics trolled out the chorus. It was the Italian opera bouffe on the most charming stage in the world. The best summary of the history of the coming century will be a series of extracts from the diary of a keen-witted French gentleman, travelling for pleasure, Michel de Montaigne, who, in the company of some friends, spent several months in Italy (1580-81). They crossed the Alps over the Brenner Pass and went by way of Trent. Montaigne's diary is sometimes written in the second and sometimes in the third person. He describes many of the principal cities.