I lost no time in carrying my homage to that son of the Muses, so nobly consoled by his brothers: as a rich ambassador, I had subscribed towards his mausoleum in Rome; as a poor pilgrim in exile's train, I went to kneel in his prison at Ferrara. I know that fairly well-founded doubts are raised as to the identity of the spots; but, like all true believers, I set history at defiance: that crypt, whatever men may say, is the very place in which the _pazzo per amore_ lived for seven whole years; one had necessarily to pass through those cloisters; one came to that gaol where the daylight stole in through the iron bars of an air-hole, where the low-hanging vault that freezes your head drips saltpetrous water on a damp soil that petrifies your feet. On the walls, outside the prison and all around the grating, one reads the names of the worshippers of the god: the statue of Memnon, quivering with harmony under the touch of dawn, was covered with the declarations of the several witnesses of the prodigy. I did not daub my _ex-voto_; I hid myself in the crowd, whose secret prayers must, by reason of their very humility, be more acceptable to Heaven. The buildings in which Tasso's prison is enclosed to-day belong to a hospital open to every infirmity; they have been placed under the protection of the Saints: _Sancto Torquato sacrum._ At some distance from the blest cell is a dilapidated yard; in the middle of that yard, the porter cultivates a garden-plot surrounded by a hedge of mallows: the pale-green palissade was loaded with large and beautiful flowers. I gathered one of those roses, the colour of royal mourning, that seemed to me to be growing at the foot of a Calvary. Genius is a Christ: denied, persecuted, scourged, crowned with thorns, crucified by men and for men, it dies leaving them the light and rises again to be worshipped. FERRARA, 18 _September_ 1833. I went out on the morning of the 18th and, on returning to the Three Crowns, found the street blocked with people; the neighbours were gaping at the windows. An escort of one hundred men of the Austrian and Papal troops occupied the inn. The corps of officers of the garrison, the magistrates of the town, the generals, the Pro-legate were awaiting Madame, whose coming had been announced by a courier wearing the French arms. The stair-case and drawing-rooms were decorated with flowers. Never was finer reception arranged for an exile. When the carriages came in sight, the drums beat a salute, the music of the regiments burst forth, the soldiers presented arms. Madame, in the midst of the throng, was put to it to descend from her calash, when it drew up in front of the hotel; I had hastened up; she recognised me among the crowd. She held out her hand to me across the established authorities and the beggars who flung themselves upon her, and said: "'My son is your King;' do help me to pass through."