These Italians, Tom, are very like the Irish. There is the same blending of mirth and melancholy in the national temperament, the same imaginative cast of thought, the same hopefulness, and the same indolence. In justice to our own people, I must say that they are the better of the two. Paddy has strong attachments, and is unquestionably courageous; neither of these qualities are conspicuous here. It would be ungenerous and unjust to pronounce upon the _naturel_ of a people who for centuries have been subjected to every species of misrule, whose moral training has been also either neglected or corrupted, and whose only lessons have been those of craft and deception. It would be worse than rash to assume that a people so treated were unfitted for a freedom they never enjoyed, or un suited to a liberty they never even heard of. Still, I may be permitted to doubt that Constitutional Government will ever find its home in the hearts of a Southern nation. The family, Tom,--the fireside, the domestic habits of a Northern people, are the normal schools for self-government. It is in the reciprocities of a household men learn to apportion their share of the burdens of life, and to work for the common weal. The fellow who with a handful of chestnuts can provision himself for a whole day, and who can pass the night under the shade of a fig-tree, acknowledges no such responsibilities. All-sufficing to himself, he recognizes no claims upon him for exertion in behalf of others; and as to the duties of citizenship, he would repudiate them as an intolerable burden. Take ray word for it, Parliamentary Institutions will only flourish where you have coal-fires and carpets, and Elective Governments have a close affinity to easy-chairs and hearth-rugs! You are curious to learn "how far familiarity with works of high art may have contributed to influence the national character of Italy." I don't like to dogmatize on such a subject, but so far as my own narrow experience goes, I am far from attributing any high degree of culture to this source. I even doubt whether objects of beauty suggest a high degree of enjoyment, except to intellects already cultivated. I suspect that your men of Glasgow or Manchester, who never saw anything more artistic than a power-loom and a spinning-jenny, would stand favorable comparison with him who daily passes beside the "Dying Gladiator" or the Farnese Hercules. Of course I do not extend this opinion to the educated classes, amongst whom there is a very high range of acquirement and cultivation. They bring, moreover, to the knowledge of any subject a peculiar subtlety of perception, a certain Machiavellian ingenuity, such as I have never noticed elsewhere. A great deal of the national distrustful-ness and suspicion has its root in this very habit, and makes me often resigned to Northern dulness for the sake of Northern reliance and good faith.