It is a relief to begin the new year 1820 with recording an exception made to the general custom above. George was presented by his father to King Ferdinand, and all the _nobili Inglesi_ were invited to join in the festivities with which it was customary to usher in the new year. For the rest, the evenings and early part of the mornings are spent in a continual whirl of amusement, and it would require a page to number up the balls and dances he figured in. He visits also the Carthusian and Camaldolese monasteries, but makes no comments. He goes two or three times to see Vesuvius and the crater and the lava, of which he gives a very nice description; after this he is allowed, by special favour, to be at the Royal chase: this puts him in great humour, for, besides the sport it afforded in the way of getting shots at such choice game as wild boars, it gave him an opportunity of seeing the "King and all his court, to which nothing can be similar." Towards the end of January, Lord and Lady Spencer determined on returning to England, and offered to leave George to travel through the sights of Southern Italy. He perceives, in a few days, the tokens of an inclination in his {67} parents to have his company, and goes straightway to the Honourable Augustus Barrington, who was to be his fellow-traveller, and breaks off the plan they had formed. It was only after very pressing instances from his father and mother that he could be persuaded to take up the first plan anew. A portion of his autobiography will throw some light upon many things we have only just touched upon, and, therefore, it is better to quote it here, though it might come in more opportunely at the conclusion of his first tour abroad. "It is extraordinary, indeed, that I should have remained a whole year on the Continent and never once have seriously taken into consideration the subject of the Catholic religion. Such was the case; and I returned to England, as far as I can remember, without one doubt having crossed my mind whether this was the true religion or not. ...