These books,
however, not being contraband, were immediately returned to her, as was an
edition of Baffo, belonging to my other fellow traveller, returned to him.
Now this Baffo was a Venetian poet and his works are the most profligate
that ever were penned or imagined by mortal man. Martial and Petronius
Arbiter must hide their diminished heads before Baffo. The owner of this
book chose to read out loud, quite unsolicited, several _choice_ sonnets of
this poet for our edification during the journey; and this branch of
litterature seemed to be the only one with which he was acquainted.
When the examination was over I took leave of my fellow travellers, and
repaired to the _German Hotel_ in the _Via de' Condotti_, where I engaged
an apartment, and sat down to dinner at an excellent _table d'hote_ at five
o'clock. There was a profusion of everything, particularly of fish and
game. Mullets and wild boar are constant dishes at a Roman table. The
mullets at Rome are small but delicious, and this was a fish highly prized
by the ancient Romans. Game of all kinds is very cheap here, from the
abundance of it that is to be met with in wild uninhabited wastes of Latium
and in the Pontine marshes.
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