Our Young Gentlemen
Who Go To Rome Will Do Well To Be Upon Their Guard Against A Set
Of Sharpers,
(Some of them of our own country,) who deal in
pictures and antiques, and very often impose upon the uninformed
Stranger, by selling him trash, as the productions of the most
celebrated artists. The English are more than any other
foreigners exposed to this imposition. They are supposed to have
more money to throw away; and therefore a greater number of
snares are laid for them. This opinion of their superior wealth
they take a pride in confirming, by launching out into all manner
of unnecessary expence: but, what is still more dangerous, the
moment they set foot in Italy, they are seized with the ambition
of becoming connoisseurs in painting, musick, statuary, and
architecture; and the adventurers of this country do not fail to
flatter this weakness for their own advantage. I have seen in
different parts of Italy, a number of raw boys, whom Britain
seemed to have poured forth on purpose to bring her national
character into contempt, ignorant, petulant, rash, and
profligate, without any knowledge or experience of their own,
without any director to improve their understanding, or
superintend their conduct. One engages in play with an infamous
gamester, and is stripped perhaps in the very first partie:
another is pillaged by an antiquated cantatrice; a third is
bubbled by a knavish antiquarian; and a fourth is laid under
contribution by a dealer in pictures. Some turn fiddlers, and
pretend to compose: but all of them talk familiarly of the arts,
and return finished connoisseurs and coxcombs, to their own
country. The most remarkable phaenomenon of this kind, which I
have seen, is a boy of seventy-two, now actually travelling
through Italy, for improvement, under the auspices of another boy
of twenty-two. When you arrive at Rome, you receive cards from
all your country-folks in that city: they expect to have the
visit returned next day, when they give orders not to be at home;
and you never speak to one another in the sequel. This is a
refinement in hospitality and politeness, which the English have
invented by the strength of their own genius, without any
assistance either from France, Italy, or Lapland. No Englishman
above the degree of a painter or cicerone frequents any coffee-house
at Rome; and as there are no public diversions, except in
carnival-time, the only chance you have of seeing your
compatriots is either in visiting the curiosities, or at a
conversazione. The Italians are very scrupulous in admitting
foreigners, except those who are introduced as people of quality:
but if there happens to be any English lady of fashion at Rome,
she generally keeps an assembly, to which the British subjects
resort. In my next, I shall communicate, without ceremony or
affectation, what further remarks I have made at Rome, without
any pretence, however, to the character of a connoisseur, which,
without all doubt, would fit very aukwardly upon, - Dear Sir, Your
Friend and Servant.
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