The bad air of Rome and of the Campagna have I suspect been greatly exaggerated. In the latter, there seems to be a want of wholesome water: Rome is abundantly supplied, and this is perhaps partly the reason why the city is more wholesome than the country. Another source of disease is to be sought in the nature of the food eaten by the poor. When a man breakfasts on cucumbers, dines on melons, and sups on love-apples, what has he to support him? In the spring, they have, instead of these, purslain, artichokes, and lettuces. Fruit is dearer at Rome than at Bologna, but vegetables are good and plentiful. A lady, last night, was complaining that she could only get fifteen pauls for a cart load of lettuces, forty-five pauls being equal to a pound sterling. A mass of artichokes, consisting of twenty-six, cost this spring two bajocs. They are small, and being boiled till they are soft, are eaten whole. Love-apples have sometimes been sold as low as twelve pounds for a bajoc. Wheaten bread at the same time bears about two thirds of the price it does in England. Polenta is cheaper, but the temptation is great to fill the belly with a food, which if less wholesome, is more savoury, as well as at a lower price. LETTER XLIII. NAPLES. _Rome, 28th September, 1817._ I DO not know if you are tired of Rome, but I know that I am not. Rome is the paradise of artists; it is full of their objects and their recollections; but what most contributes to make the residence in Italy in general, and of Rome in particular, so interesting to us, is the universal sympathy which is accorded to the objects of our pursuit. From the prince to the peasant, the most educated to the most ignorant, all seem to find pleasure in the productions of the fine arts; and it is this sympathy which more than any one thing makes life pass agreeably; the want of it is always distressing. Why have heretics been burnt, but because they wanted sympathy with the people? Or at least the people believing that to be the case, has had no sympathy with them. What is it but the supposed want of sympathy which makes the populace so hostile to bakers and corndealers? It imagines them to rejoice in that dearness of provisions which is a cause of suffering to the poor, and it therefore considers them with aversion. But I have got to moralizing, when I should be giving an account of my journey here. The first steps are to get a passport, and a certificate of health; no questions are asked on demanding the latter, and all you have to do is to pay a few bajocs. It seems that there has been some suspicion of a contagious disease at Naples, and the Roman government has consequently required a certificate of health from all persons coming from Naples. By way of reprisal, the Neapolitan government now requires a similar certificate with all those coming from Rome.