" But the best jest of
all would be, to see an ordinary fellow, a strolling player for example,
set seriously to make or repeat verses in our streets or squares
concerning his sweetheart's _cruelty_; when he would be in more danger
from that of the mob and the magistrates; who, if the first did not
throw dirt at him, and drive him home quickly, would come themselves,
and examine into his sanity, and if they found him not _statutably mad_,
commit him for a vagrant.
Different amusements, like different sorts of food, suit different
countries; and this is among the efforts of those who have learned to
refine their _pleasures_ without so refining their _ideas_ as to be able
no longer to hit on any pleasure subtle enough to escape their own power
of ridiculing it.
This city of Ferrara has produced some curious and opposite characters
in times past, however empty it may now be thought: one painter too, and
one singer, both super-eminent in their professions, have dropped their
own names, and are best known to fame by that of _Il_ and _La
Ferrarese_. Nor can I leave it without some reflections on the
extraordinary life of Renee de France, daughter of Louis XII surnamed
the Just, and Anne de Bretagne, his first wife.
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