Italy Author:William Beckford Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: LETTER HI. The Prince of Orange's cabinet of paintings.—Temptation of St. Anthony, by Breughel.—Exquisite pictures by Berghem aijd Wouvermans.—Mean garrets st... more »ored with inestimable productions of the Indies.—Enamelled flasks of oriental essences.—Vision of the wardrobe of Hecuba.—Disenchantment.—Cabinet of natural history.—A day dream.—A delicious morsel.—Dinner at Sir Joseph Yorke's.—Two honourable boobies.—The Great Wood.—Parterres of the Gref- fier Fagel.—Air poisoned by the sluggish canals.—Fishy locality of Dutch ban- quetting rooms.—Derivation of the inhabitants of Holland.—Origin and use of enormous galligaskins.—Escape from damp alleys and lazy waters. 30th June, 1780. I Dedicated the morning to the Prince of Orange's cabinet of paintings and curiosities, both natural and artificial. Amongst the pictures which amused me the most is a temptation of the holy hermit St. Anthony, by Hell-fire Breughel, who has shown himself right worthy of the title; for a more diabolical variety of imps never entered the human imagination. Breughel has made his saint take refuge in a ditch filled with harpies and creeping things innumerable, whose malice, one should think, would have lost Job himself the reputation of patience. Castles of steel and fiery turrets glare on every side, whence issue a band of junior devils. These seem highly entertained with pinking poor Anthony, and whispering, I warrant ye, filthy tales in his ear. Nothing can be more rueful than the patient's countenance; more forlorn than his beard; more piteous than his eye, forming a strong contrast to the pert winks and insidious glances of his persecutors; some of whom, I need not mention, are evidently of the female kind. But really I am quite ashamed of having detained you in such, bad company so long; and ha...« less