soil. The grander features of the landscape, however, are fortunately
beyond the power of man to injure; the lofty mountain-summits, bare
precipices cleft with chasms, and pinnacles of rock piercing the sky,
betokening, far more than any thing I have seen elsewhere, a breaking up
of the crust of the globe in some early period of its existence. I am told
that in May and June the country is much more beautiful than at present,
and that owing to a drought it now appears under a particular
disadvantage.

The Academy of the Fine Arts has had its exhibition since I arrived. In
its rooms, which were gratuitously open to the public, I found a large
crowd of gazers at the pictures and statues. Many had come to look at some
work ordered by an acquaintance; others made the place a morning lounge.
In the collection were some landscapes by Morghen, the son of the
celebrated engraver, very fresh and clear; a few pieces sent by Bezzoli,
one of the most eminent Italian painters of his time; a statue of Galileo,
not without merit, by Costoli, for there is always a Galileo or two, I
believe, at every exhibition of the kind in Florence; portraits good, bad,
and indifferent, in great abundance, and many square feet of canvas
spoiled by attempts at historical painting.

Let me remark, by the way, that a work of art is a sacred thing in the
eyes of Italians of all classes, never to be defaced, never to be
touched, a thing to be looked at merely. A statue may stand for ages in a
public square, within the reach of any one who passes, and with no
sentinel to guard it, and yet it shall not only be safe from mutilation,
but the surface of the marble shall never be scratched, or even
irreverently scored with a lead pencil. So general is this reverence for
art, that the most perfect confidence is reposed in it. I remember that in
Paris, as I was looking at a colossal plaster cast of Napoleon at the