TRIESTE, July thirtieth, 1806.--In Venice there had just been published a new translation of the _Génie du Christianisme_. This Venice, unless I am mistaken, would please you as little as it pleases me. It is a city against nature; one cannot take a step without being obliged to get into a boat, or else one is driven to go round by narrow passages more like corridors than streets! The Square of St. Mark alone is by its general effect worthy of its reputation. The architecture of Venice, which is almost altogether Palladio’s, is too capricious and too varied; it is as if two or three palaces were built one upon the other. And the famous gondolas, all black, look like boats that carry coffins; I took the first one I saw for a corpse on the way to burial. The sky is not our sky beyond the Apennines. Rome and Naples, my dear friend, and a bit of Florence, there you have all Italy. There is, however, one remarkable thing in Venice, and that is the number of convents built on the islands and reefs round the city, just as other maritime cities are surrounded with forts which defend them; the effect of these religious monuments seen at night over a calm sea is picturesque and touching. There are a few pictures left by Paolo Veronese, Titian.... Giustina was filled with indignation on reading these lines, which were signed by an author whose sentimentalism had found an echo in her heart. A lady who admired Foscolo’s _Jacopo Ortis_ would naturally be pleased with the _Génie du Christianisme_. The attack on her beloved native city seemed all the more unkind for that, and she hastened to reply in a long letter written in French, which she published in Pisa in the _Giornale dei Letterati_. She answered Chateaubriand categorically, concluding with the following words:-- I know that you have promised to return here; come then, but come in a mood less sad, in a spirit less weary, with feelings less cold.... I do not flatter myself that you will exclaim with that Neapolitan poet that Venice was built by the gods, but I hope at least that you will find here something more interesting than the convents on the islands and the translation of your works. Giustina had been in her grave eighteen years when Chateaubriand returned to Venice, with a spirit indeed less weary, and allowed himself to grow enthusiastic, and wrote a beautiful description of the city in his _Mémoires d’Outre Tombe_.