We arrived at Bologna just in time to get to the opera. Malibran in _La Gazza Ladra_ was enough to make one forget more than the fatigue of a day's travel. She sings as well as ever and plays much better, though she had been ill, and looked thin. In the prison scene, she was ghastlier even than the character required. There are few pleasures in Europe like such singing as hers, and the Italians, in their excellent operas, and the cheap rate at which they can be frequented, have a resource corresponding to everything else in their delightful country. Every comfort and luxury is better and cheaper in Italy than elsewhere, and it is a pity that he who can get his wine for three cents a bottle, his dinner and his place at the opera for ten, and has lodgings for anything he chooses to pay, can not find leisure, and does not think it worth the trouble, to look about for means to be free. It is vexatious to see nature lavishing such blessings on slaves. The next morning we visited a palace, which, as it is not mentioned in the guide-books of travel, I had not before seen--the _Lambaccari_. It was full of glorious pictures, most of them for sale. Among others we were captivated with a Magdalen of unrivalled sweetness by _Guido Carracci_. It has been bought since by Mr. Cabot, of Boston, who passed through Bologna the day after, and will be sent to America, I am happy to say, immediately. There were also six of "Charles the Second's beauties,"--portraits of the celebrated women of that gay monarch's court, by Sir Peter Lely--ripe, glowing English women, more voluptuous than chary-looking, but pictures of exquisite workmanship. There were nine or ten apartments to this splendid palace, all crowded with paintings by the first masters, and the surviving Lambaccari is said to be selling them one by one for bread. It is really melancholy to go through Italy, and see how her people are suffering, and her nobles starving under oppression. We crossed the Appenines in two of the finest days that ever shone, and descending through clouds and mist to the Tuscan frontier, entered the lovely valley of the Arno, sparkling in the sunshine, with all its palaces and spires, as beautiful as ever. I am at Florence once more, and parting from the delightful party with whom I have travelled for two months. I start for Rome to-morrow, in company with five artists. LETTER XLI. JOURNEY TO THE ETERNAL CITY--TWO ROADS TO ROME--SIENNA--THE PUBLIC SQUARE--AN ITALIAN FAIR--THE CATHEDRAL--THE LIBRARY--THE THREE GRECIAN GRACES--DANDY OFFICERS--PUBLIC PROMENADE--LANDSCAPE VIEW--LONG GLEN--A WATERFALL--A CULTIVATED VALLEY--THE TOWN OF AQUAPENDENTE--SAN LORENZO--PLINY'S FLOATING ISLANDS--MONTEFIASCONE-- VITERBO--PROCESSION OF FLOWER AND DANCING GIRLS TO THE VINTAGE--ASCENT OF THE MONTECIMINO--THE ROAD OF THIEVES--LAKE VICO--BACCANO--MOUNT SORACTE--DOME OF ST. PETER'S, ETC.