[Illustration: (_Juliet's Tomb._)]
Lord Byron, in a postscript to one of his letters from Verona, dated
Nov. 7, 1816, says, "I have been over Verona. Of the truth of Juliet's
story, they seem tenacious to a degree, insisting on the fact--giving
a date (1303), and showing a tomb. It is a plain, open, and partly
decayed sarcophagus, with withered leaves in it, in a wild and
desolate conventual garden--once a cemetery, now ruined to the very
graves. The situation struck me as very appropriate to the legend,
being blighted as their love. I have brought away a few pieces of the
granite, to give to my daughter and my nieces."[5]
[5] Moore's Life of Byron, vol. ii. 4to. p. 50.
Mrs. Maria Callcott writes, in 1829:--"The tomb now shown as that of
Juliet, is an ancient sarcophagus of red granite: it has suffered from
the fire which burnt down the church, where it was originally
placed."[6]
[6] See a sketch accompanying an Engraving of Verona, in vol.
xiv. of the _Mirror_, p. 321.
Lastly, the accomplished authoress of _Characteristics of Women_ adds
her testimony, and illustrates the fondness with which the relics of
Juliet are cherished, by noting that she met in Italy a gentleman, who
being then "_dans le genre romantique_," wore a fragment of Juliet's
tomb set in a ring.[7]
[7] See p. 118 of the present volume.
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MONASTERIES.
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