Well! the ladies, who never hardly dine at all, rise about seven in the
evening, when the gentlemen are just got ready to attend them; and sit
sipping their chocolate on a chair at the coffee-house door with great
tranquillity, chatting over the common topics of the times: nor do they
appear half so shy of each other as the Milanese ladies, who seldom
seem to have any pleasure in the soft converse of a female friend. But
though certainly no women can be more charming than these Venetian
dames, they have forgotten the old mythological fable, _that the
youngest of the Graces was married to Sleep._ By which it was intended
we should consider that state as necessary to the reparation not only of
beauty but of youth, and every power of pleasing.

There are men here however who, because they are not quite in the gay
world, keep themselves awake whole nights at study; and much has been
told me, of a collection of books belonging to a private scholar,
Pinelli, who goes very little out, as worthy attentive examination.

All literary topics are pleasingly discussed at Quirini's Casino, where
every thing may be learned by the conversation of the company, as Doctor
Johnson said of his literary Club; but more agreeably, because women are
always half the number of persons admitted here.

One evening our society was amused by the entrance of a foreign
nobleman, exactly what we should in London emphatically call a
_Character_,--learned, loud, and overbearing; though of a carriage that
impressed great esteem. I have not often listened to so well-furnished a
talker; nor one more capable of giving great information. He had seen
the Pyramids of Egypt, he told us; had climbed Mount Horeb, and visited
Damascus; but possessed the art of detaining our attention more on
himself, than on the things or places he harangued about; for