Venice.

What a singular and dull place is Venice! One is astonished on entering it; and you can have no conception of its appearance. A great city in the midst of the sea, all its walls bathed in water, and canals instead of streets! Nothing truly is more extraordinary. In most of the streets, particularly in that where we lodge, there is no passage between the houses and the canal; consequently no foot passengers, no cries in the streets, not the least noise, for the Gondoliers make none; so that you might fancy yourself in a desart, or in the cavern of the Dutchess. If you look out of the window, you see nothing pass but Gondolo's covered with black cloth, which look like coffins; and you have nothing under your eye but dirty water; and old Gothick houses, blackened by time, present you with a most woeful and disagreeable prospect. Add to this, if you go out of the town to amuse yourself, you are not sure of getting back again; for it is very possible the weather may prevent you. This happened to us, who were obliged to sleep in an horrible inn at Fussina, a small league from Venice, because the bad weather prevented our getting further. This city, nevertheless, is well worth a stranger's curiosity. It has not its fellow in the world, and its affords some very fine buildings, and some excellent pictures.

I am obliged, my dear friend, to own to you another new work relative to education. It is upon Mythology; or Poetic History; which I have endeavoured to render more agreeable, and, above all, more decent than those already published. – Adelaide had only a general idea of fabulous history; and as for the understanding the pictures and antient monuments, of which Italy is full, it is necessary to know it as perfectly as the Roman history, I have composed this work for her use.