I dined the next day at Massa. I had a letter to a descendant of the Greek Emperor Paleologus, his name is Paleologo. He is a single man; to avoid a _tête-à-tête_ with a perfect stranger, the visit to whom was whimsical in itself, I admitted my maid _en tiers_. I was in high spirits and very jolly. I went in a _chaise-à-porteurs_ into the quarries at Carrara. They produce the finest marble after that found at Paros. My royal Greek was very careful of me. He escorted me through all difficulties, torrents, chasms, precipices, etc. Upon the whole I expect he took me for an _aventurière_; indeed, he well might, though my suite rather imposed upon him, for I went in my own chaise, my maid with me, and on the seat my cook and a footman, and André was on horseback. I am sure he thought there was something _mysterious_, at least, about me. I went from Massa to Pisa, where to my surprise I found Lords Wycombe and Holland, and my _farouche_ companion; they had not found a favourable wind to cross to the Isle of Elba, and were on their return to Florence. I walked about Pisa in the morning. It is a beautiful town, and the quay has perhaps the advantage of Florence in beauty. The Campo Santo, the Campanile, and the church are very beautiful. The leaning tower is still a problem among the curious, whether its deviation from the perpendicular was accidental or intentional. Monsieur de la Condamine measured it with a plumb line, and found that when let down from the top it touched the ground at the distance of thirteen feet from the bottom of the tower. [Sidenote: VALLOMBROSA] Lord Wycombe read us a sonnet he had just composed; it was very ingeniously written. I went to the famous Vallombrosa, a Benedictine convent, about sixteen miles from Florence. The road for the last six miles is through a thick forest of chestnut; the ascent is steep. The monastery is placed on a verdant lawn round which the mountains form an amphitheatre; the darkest pines surround the whole building, and hanging woods of that tree only decorate the steep sides of the hills. No woman is admitted within the convent walls; I dined at the Mill House close to it. After dinner the _Padre Abate_ and many of the monks came out and joined us. He is a lively, middle-aged man, with apparently little love of devotion and a strong love of pleasure.