"
But whatever the material adversity of Arcadia, it still continues
to reward ascertained merit by grants of pasturage out of its ideal
domains. Indeed, it is but a few years since our own Longfellow, on a
visit to Rome, was waited upon by the secretary of the Arch-Flock,
and presented, after due ceremonies and the reading of a floral and
herbaceous sonnet, with a parchment bestowing upon him some very
magnificent possessions in that extraordinary dreamland. In telling me
of this he tried to recall his Arcadian name, but could only remember
that it was "Olympico something."
GIUSEPPE PARINI
I
In 1748 began for Italy a peace of nearly fifty years, when the Wars
of the Succession, with which the contesting strangers had ravaged
her soil, absolutely ceased. In Lombardy the Austrian rulers who had
succeeded the Spaniards did and suffered to be done many things for
the material improvement of a province which they were content to
hold, while leaving the administration mainly to the Lombards; the
Spanish Bourbon at Naples also did as little harm and as much good to
his realm as a Bourbon could; Pier Leopoldo of Tuscany, Don Filippo I.
of Parma, Francis III. of Modena, and the Popes Benedict XIV., Clement
XIV., and Pius VI. were all disposed to be paternally beneficent to
their peoples, who at least had repose under them, and in this period
gave such names to science as those of Galvani and Volta, to humanity
that of Beccaria, to letters those of Alfieri, Filicaja, Goldoni,
Parini, and many others.
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