Page:The Works of J. W. von Goethe, Volume 12.djvu/205

 have passed the two nights on deck, wrapped up in my cloak. It was only toward morning that I felt it getting cold. I am now actually in latitude forty-five, and yet go on repeating my old song,—I would gladly leave all to the inhabitants of the land, if only, after the fashion of Dido, I could enclose enough of the heavens to surround our dwellings with. It would then be quite another state of existence. The voyage in this glorious weather has been most delightful, the views and prospects simple, but agreeable. The Po, with its fertilising stream, flows here through wide plains. Nothing, however, is to be seen but its banks covered with trees or bushes: you catch no distant view. On this river, as on the Adige, are silly water-works, which are as rude and ill-constructed as those on the Saal.

, Oct. 16, 1786.

At night.

Although I only arrived here early this morning (by seven o'clock, German time), I am thinking of setting off again to-morrow morning. For the first time since I left home, a feeling of dissatisfaction has fallen upon me in this great and beautiful, but flat and depopulated city. These streets, now so desolate, were, however, once kept in animation by a brilliant court. Here dwelt Ariosto discontented, and Tasso unhappy; and so we fancy we gain edification by visiting such scenes. Ariosto's monument contains much marble, ill arranged: for Tasso's prison they show a wood-house or coal-house, where, most assuredly, he never was kept. Moreover, the people pretend to know scarcely anything you may ask about. But at last, for "something to drink" they manage to remember. All this brings to my mind Luther's ink-spots, which the housekeeper freshens up from time to time. Most travellers, however, are little better than our Handwerksburschen, or strolling journeymen, and content themselves with such