The work to which I allude is a little dramatical composition, the Bambocciata, or puppet-show, by Martelli, entitled _The Sneezing of Hercules_. Goldoni, in his _Memoirs_, has given us the following account of the manner in which he brought it out on the stage:
"Count Lantieri was very well satisfied with my father, for he was greatly recovered, and almost completely cured: his kindness was also extended to me, and to procure amusement for me he caused a puppet-show, which was almost abandoned, and which was very rich in figures and decorations, to be refitted.
"I profited by this, and amused the company by giving them a piece of a great man, expressly composed for wooden comedians. This was the _Sneezing of Hercules_, by Peter James Martelli, a Bolognese.
"The imagination of the author sent Hercules into the country of the pigmies. Those poor little creatures, frightened at the aspect of an animated mountain with legs and arms, ran and concealed themselves in holes. One day as Hercules had stretched himself out in the open field, and was sleeping tranquilly, the timid inhabitants issued out of their retreats, and, armed with prickles and rushes, mounted on the monstrous man, and covered him from head to foot, like flies when they fall on a piece of rotten meat. Hercules waked, and felt something in his nose, which made him sneeze; on which, his enemies tumbled down in all directions. This ends the piece.
"There is a plan, a progression, an intrigue, a catastrophe, and winding up; the style is good and well-supported; the thoughts and sentiments are all proportionate to the size of the personages. The verses even are short, and everything indicates pigmies.
"A gigantic puppet was requisite for Hercules; everything was well executed. The entertainment was productive of much pleasure; and I could lay a bet, that I am the only person who ever thought of executing the Bambocciata of Martelli."--_Memoirs of Goldoni_, translated by John Black, 2 vols., duod. vol. i. chap. 6.
It is certainly not necessary to point out here in what respects the adventures of Hercules, the _animated mountain_, and those of Quinbus Flestrin, the _man mountain_, differ from, or coincide with, each other, as the only question I wish to raise is, whether a careful analysis of Martelli's puppet-show ought, or ought not, to have been placed among the notes on _Gulliver's Travels_.