SECT. CXXXI. OF TURIN, THE CAPITAL OF PIEDMONT. TURIN is one of the most beautiful and most antient cities in Europe. Fable derives its origin from a pretended Phetontes, brother of the Egyptian god Osiris, who is said to have lived fifteen hundred years before the birth of Christ, and to have founded this place. Its large river we are told derives its name from his son Eridanus. The later Romans called it Padus, and it is now called the Po. According to these fables, the city's name, Turin, was given it in honour of the Egyptian god Apis ; whom the people worshipped under the symbol of a bull; as if the antient Egyptians could have spoken Greek: it would have seemed more probable had a Grecian origin been ascribed to the town, and its antient name Taurasia derived from the junction of the Dora with the Po, or from the waters of the latter. It was customary for the antients to compare a stream with two arms, or with high waves, to the horns of a bull. The accounts given by history are more worthy of attention; and from these we learn that Taurasia, which was then its name, was the chief city of the Ligurians, and the first which Hannibal took, after his passage over the alps. The fame of this wonderful man gives a greater splendour even to the people he conquered than any that fable could impart. Some centuries afterwards, under the reign of the Cesars, the Romans sent a colony to this place; and gave it the name of Augusta Taurinorum. The situation of Turin is uncommonly beautiful; and, as most travellers have remarked, very much resembles that of Dresden. The charming Po winds, along one part of the city, which is surrounded with hills and mountains, that afford numerous prospects; embellished with vineyards, groves, country seats, and gardens. Beyond the neighbouring heights and hills, the long range of Alps, cov ; ered with snow and fearful in grandeur, rise and superior, among these giants of the earth, the Viso and the Rochemelon, with their beaming summits, tower. These charming prospects are best enjoyed on the walls of the city; and it is a pity that this spasious walk is interrupted by the inclosed gardens of the roy al palace. We are astonished to see the Viso so near us; when we remember that the Po takes its rise in this mountain, and is already become so powerful a stream. The expectations I form of seeing this river empty itself into the Adriatic, when it shall have attained its full maturity, are great; its youthful stream being so promising. Immediately facing the gate, which takes its name from the Po, there is a bridge over the river, that neither corresponds with the beauty of the city nor the dignity of the stream. The Po street, which leads to this gate, is handsomely built. The plan of Turin is a noble one. The streets are in right lines, and the gates and the houses in a good style and taste: though the streets, in proportion to the heights of the houses, the Po street and the new streets excepted, are not sufficiently spacious. In the Po street, there are handsome and lofty arcades, on both sides of the way. The outside of the castle is not very promising: but the apartments are very magnificent. In a niche, at the entrance, there is an equestrian statue of Victor Amadeus the first the horse of marble, the duke of bronze. Amadeus is a noble figure: but I cannot say so much of his horse. The theatre of the Prince of Carignan is beautiful without pomp. The comic opera is performed here, during summer. Next to the castle is the large theatre, which is one of the handsomest in Italy. It is only open during carnival time; and I have not been able to form any good judgment of it, having only seen it by the light of a flambeau. The glimpse I had, however, gave me pleasure, by the noble style in which it is built. It is censured as not ac curately conveying the sounds; for, as it is said, only the spectators in the boxes can hear. The arsenal, which is still to be enlarged, is a fine and uncommonly capacious building, including five courts. The halls are supported by heavy pillars, similar to those of Gothic churches. Round each of these pillars a thousand muskets are ranged, in an ornamental manner. Pyramids are erected between them; on which horse pistols are piled, with great elegance. In the midst of these halls is one of a large size and circular form; the walls and pillars of which are ornamented with trophies of antient armour, ranged in military pomp. Before the door of this hall, the figures of old warriors stand, erect, in complete arThe arsenal contains arms for a hundred and twenty thousand men. The cylindrical ramrod, for artillery, is not yet in use: the ramrods here are all of iron. mour. name I and my wife, the first afternoon that was conveof a nient, went upon the Gorso. This is the charming public place, where, at this season of the year, every evening, from five to six, the nobility assemble: though they come rather to exhibit themselves and their equipage, than to converse and enjoy the beautiful prospect on the Po. Fashion is honoured here, in preference to Nature. Sluices are carried through the streets, to cleanse them, by means of a canal, which receives its water from the Dora. These sluices flow through drains into the Po; by which means the city is always clean. There are many large squares here, among which that of St. Charles is the most spacious and beautiful. The buildings are handsome, and it has extensive arcades on each side. We went to visit the Marquis of Caranzana, who is secretary of war, at his vineyard; from which we had a view of all Piedmont, properly se called, and a part of the country of Asti. At a little distance on a hill below us, we saw the royal castle of Mountecalieri, in the front of which two rivulets pour their waters into the Po. Here too we had a long prospect of the Po, whose windings have a delightful serpentine appear ance. The fertile plains seem like another paradise. Arable lands, vineyards, meadows, and pastures, with interchangeable fruit trees, cast their shades around, and look like so many pleasure groves. The Po meanders through the plains; till, at last, it loses itself among the distant poplars, as if to relieve the flatness which might else fatigue the eye and, at the farthest limits of the horizon, the proud Alps stand, linked with another chain of mountains that unite them to the Apennines. It was here that Hannibal showed his wearied army the rich European plains: or if it were not here, it might well have been here. I must not forget to tell you that, owing to the extreme heat of the present summer, the foliage is nearly as much faded as it is in the north of Germany, or even in Denmark, at the same season. STOLBERG. SECT. CXXXII. VISIT TO BATAVIA, AND BANTAM IN THE ISLAND OF PEP THE eye looks in the country here in vain for the common animals and vegetables, which it had been accustomed every day to meet in Europe. The vegetation of the country is likewise new. Even the parterres in the gardens are bordered, instead of boxwood, by the Arabian jessamine, of which the fragrant flowers adorn the pagodas of Hindostan. The Dutch, who are so fond of gardens in Holland, have transferred that taste where it can certainly be cultivated with more success, and indulge it to a great extent at their houses a little way from the city of Batavia; but still within that fenny district, concerning which an intelligent gentleman upon the spot used the strong expression, that the air was pestilential, and the water poisonous. Yet the country is every where so verdant, gay, and fertile; it is interspersed with such magnificent houses, gardens, avenues, canals, and drawbridges; and is so formed in every respect to please, could health be preserved in it, that a youth, coming just from sea, and enraptured with the beauty of every object he saw around him, but mindful of the danger there to life, could not help exclaiming, "What an excellent habitation it would be for immortals." The native Javanese derive one advantage, at least, from an atmosphere not subject to the vicissitudes of temperature experienced in the northern parts of Europe, where diseases of the teeth are chiefly prevalent; as they are here entirely exempt from such complaints. Their habit of living chiefly on vegetable food, and of abstaining from fermented liquors, no doubt contributes to this exemption. Yet such is the caprice of taste, that jet black is the favourite colour and standard of beauty, for the teeth amongst them, comparing to monkeys those who keep them of the natural colour. They accordingly take care to paint of the deepest black all their teeth, except the two middle ones, which they cover with gold leaf. Whenever the paint or gilding is worn off, they are as attentive to replace it on the proper teeth, as the belles of Europe are to purify and whiten theirs. The general reputation of the unhealthiness of Batavia for Europeans, deters most of those, who can reside at home with any comfort, from coming to it, notwithstanding the temptations of fortunes to be quickly amassed in it. From this circumstance it happens, that offices and professions are often necessarily entrusted to persons little qualified to fill them. One of the clergymen, and the principal physician of the place, were both said to have originally been barbers. In several houses of note throughout the settlement the table is spread in the morning at an early hour: besides tea, coffee, and chocolate, fish and flesh are served for breakfast; which is no sooner over, than Madeira, claret, gin, Dutch small beer, and English porter, are laid out in the portico before the door of the great hall, and pipes and tobacco presented to every guest, and a bright brass jar placed before him to receive the phlegm which the tobacco frequently draws |