This however must be regarded as a fancy price, as single copies are not an article on demand; they can only be obtained, by the way, at the office of the Gazette in the Via della Stamperia, and this office is closed from noon, I think, to sunset.
Suppose, for the sake of argument, there was an English newspaper at Rome.

Let us consider what would be its summary of contents, this day on which I write.

Putting aside foreign topics altogether, what might one naturally suppose would be the Roman news?
There is the revolution in the Romagna; if private reports are not altogether false, there have been disturbances in the Marches; there is the question of the Congress, the rumoured departure of the French troops, the state of the adjoining kingdoms, the movements of the Pontifical army, and the promised Papal reforms.

Add to all this, there is the recent mysterious attempt at murder in the Minerva hotel, about which all kinds of strange rumours are in circulation.

Suppose too, which heaven forbid, that I was a Roman citizen, and had no means of catching sight of foreign newspapers, which is extremely probable, or understood no foreign language, which is more probable still; what in this case should I learn from my sole source of information, my _Giornale di Roma_, about my own city and my own country, on this 19th of January, in the year of grace 1860?
The first fact brought before my eager gaze on taking up the paper, would be that yesterday was the feast of St Peter's chair.