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DEPOSITED BY THE
LINONIAN AND BROTHERS LIBRARY

LIFE ON THE LAGOONS

LIFE ON
THE LAGOONS

HORATI(J°Vf' BROWN
AUTHOR OF 'Venice: an historical sketch of the republic'

SECOND EDITION, REVISED

Wii^ 3({Iu0nation0

MACMILLAN AND CO.
1894

{fPhe rights of translation ami of refroduction are reserved.')

TO
MY GONDOLIER
ANTONIO SALIN
MY CONSTANT COMPANION
IN VENICE AND
VENETIA

PREFACE
In preparing this new edition of Life on the
Lagoons, I have re-written the chapter upon the
structure of the Venetian estuary, and have
added a very brief history of those who made it
their home. I trust that this condensed account
of the Venetian Republic may prove useful to
those who visit the City in the Lagoons. I have
also included some description of the restorations
which have recently been carried out at the Ducal
Palace, based upon information furnished to me
by the architect in charge of the works. The
addition of illustrations to the book will, it is
hoped, prove acceptable. Those chapters in the
first edition which referred chiefly to the main
land of Venetia have been omitted, with a view
to concentrating the work upon the city of
Venice; they may, perhaps, be utilised, some
day, in a companion book upon the cities,
villages, and castles of the Veneto.
HORATIO F. BROWN.
Ca' Torresella, Venice,
February 1894.

CONTENTS

The Lagoons : their Nature and their History, . . i

The Gondola, . ....

. 60

The Traghetti, 

. . . 85

A Gondolier's Bank, .

. 113

Floods in the City,

120

The Casa dbgli Spiriti,

I2S

Sant' Elena, ...

130

Osele, ....

. . . 136

Sails and Sailmaking,

• 147

A Vision of La Sensa,

. 160

Processions, 

. 166

San Nicolo del Lido 

¦ 175

The Doves of Saint Mark,

181

The Ducal Palace, 

18s

All Souls' Day, .

¦ 194

The Madonna della Salute,

. 200

Home Life, . . ...

. 206

Popular Beliefs, 

. 229

Popular Poetry, .

. 240

A Regatta and its Sequel,

. 264

' Ml Chiama il Mare,' ....

. 282

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
The Lion of St. Mark, . ... Frontispiece
On the Lagoon,  Page 9
Venetian Fishing-boat,  25
The Statue of Colleoni  . . 50
A Gondola of 1480  69
Early Forms of the Gondola,  75
A Modern Gondola,  81
Traghetto of Santa Maria Zobenigo, .... 97
Venetian Osele,  137
A Bragozzo  153
Chiozzotti,  159
A Bragozzo off the Gardens,  169
Plan of the Ducal Palace,  193
Well and Courtyard,  205
Alla Speranza,  221
Gossip at the Well,  224
The Murazzi,  227
A Champion Oarsman  273
Wine-making,  277
Forze d'Ercole,  278
Bathing, . .  292

THE LAGOONS
THEIR NATURE AND THEIR HISTORY
I
The Lagoon of \''enice is a sheet of water covering a
surface estimated at i6o square geographical miles.
Speaking roughly, its form is that of a crescent moon :
the convex side represents the shore of the lagoon
towards the mainland ; the concave side is formed by
a number of long, narrow sandbanks called Lidi,
which divide the lagoon from the open Adriatic.
This sheet of water is at its widest just where the
city of Venice is placed ; though even there it is not
more than seven miles across.
But this large body of water is neither a marshy
swamp, nor a tidal lake, nor the open sea ; it is a
place peculiar in every way. There are three chief
factors in the formation of this basin, and it is by
fixing our attention upon these that we shall best
succeed in understanding how the lagoons were
created. These three factors are the sea, the Lidi,
and the rivers.
I have placed the Lidi in the middle, because they
come there in nature — between the sea and the
A

2 The Lagoons
rivers ; and because they are the most important
factor, governing, as we shall see, the whole nature of
the lagoons.
With the Lidi, then, we will begin. Towards the
Adriatic run these long, narrow islands, never more
than half a mile wide, formed of sea-sand on the one
side and lagoon-mud upon the other. There has
been much speculation as to the way in which these
islands were formed. It is possible that at one time
they belonged to the mainland, and were the real
coast-line in that direction ; but the land behind
them being at a low level, hardly distinguishable
from that of the sea, may have been flooded by the
united action of the sea sweeping landward, and of
the rivers — the Brenta, Sile, and Piave — sweeping
seaward from the Alps and the eastern plain of Italy ;
and thus the Lidi, while they continued to be the
limit of the sea, ceased to be the real coast-line of the
mainland, but behind them lay this area of water
which we call the lagoon. Or it may be that the
Lidi are nothing else than the bar built by the rivers
across their own mouths. These long ridges of sand
were slowly piled up between the salt water and the
fresh, between the rivers and the sea, as a monument
of their eternal struggle whose issue was never
decided. As they raised their heads above the water-
level, they offered a resting-place for wind-blown seeds
that blossomed into grass and flowers and manifold
vegetation. They presented a sandy rampart to the

Their Nature and their History 3
Adriatic, and kept it out, so that it could no longer
break on the very shore of the mainland ; but at the
same time they dammed back the rivers, whose waters
found a difficult and tortuous passage to the sea, and
therefore submerged the delta at their mouths and
made the lagoon.
Whichever view be the correct one, the Lidi came
into being between the sea and the lagoon, and form
the feature of highest importance in the character of
the water surface upon which the city of Venice lies.
Their great function is that of protection to the
capital, and to her inhabitants, from two enemies —
a stormy sea and a hostile force.
The Lidi form one of the most admirable natural
defences against an attack which it is possible to
imagine — and in this way. The long line of sandy
islands is not uninterruptedly continuous ; it is broken
at five points, forming outlets to the sea and inlets
to the lagoon : these breaks are generally known as
Porti or ports. It is obvious that an enemy, in the
days before cannon of any range were known, wish
ing to reach the city, must first reach the Lidi, and
then pass through them with his boats ; otherwise he
would find himself in view of the city, it is true, but
still separated from it by the stretch of the internal
lagoons. The enemy, therefore, must seek out the
position of one or other of these five ports, and then
steer for it, before he could hope to enter the lagoon.
But nature has protected each of these ports upon

4 The Lagoons
the sea side in a singular fashion ; and if the enemy,
using his common-sense, steered straight for a port, he
would soon find himself stranded upon a sandbank
some distance out at sea ; for the deep main channel,
by which the waters flow in and out of each port, does
not proceed seaward in a straight line, but in every case
trends southward, having on one side of it the sea-shore
of the Lido and on the other a wide bank of sand
covered always with water, but so shallow that any
day at low tide, if a little breeze be blowing, you
may see the white line of breakers on its farther
edge. The cause of this phenomenon, which has given
to Venice a second and invisible Hne of defence after
the obvious rampart of the Lidi, is, that in the Adriatic 
there is a permanent current which, starting from the
Mediterranean, flows up the eastern coast by Dalmatia
and Istria, round by the head of the gulf, and returns
by the western coast to the Mediterranean again.
This steady-flowing current, in its ceaseless sweep
past the porti of the Venetian lagoons, meets the
waters that flow in and out of these porti. In the one
case it drives the inflowing tide close to the Lido
shore, and makes a channel ; in the other case it
draws the outflowing tide with it, deflecting it south
ward, and this also deepens the channel and confirms
the previous operation. The channel is kept open by
this daily ebb and flow, and thus becomes habitual
to these waters.

Their Nature and their History 5
But there is another, a graver and more constant,
danger against vvhich the Lidi serve as a protection
to Venice and the Venetians. A hostile fleet off the
Lido was a comparatively rare occurrence ; but a
stormy sea might spring up at any moment : yet it
is only the narrow strip of sandy dune we call Lidi
that protects the city from the angry Adriatic. If the
scirocco should chance to blow, you will hear borne
high up in the air the boom of the waves breaking
on the Lido shore ; should that frail sandbank once
give way, the impetuous seas would come rolling in
upon the city, sweeping its palaces and churches
down to a watery destruction, such as the imagination
of Tintoret has pictured on his canvas at S. Maria
deir Orto. And, listening to this thunderous attack
of the sea, we know what the old Venetians must
have felt before the Republic undertook to build
these bulwarks of defence, the murazzi or sea-walls,
along the Lido at its weakest points. For this strip
of sand is never more than half a mile wide, and in
.some places, near Pelestrina for example, it is not a
hundred paces that separate the sea from the lagoon.
The danger that the Adriatic might make incursion
into the lagoon was always so serious, that from
the earliest times the question of palisades occupied
the attention of the Government. There is little
doubt that the Lidi were originally covered with that
most beautiful of pines, Pinus pinea, or stone pine,
which used to form the glory of the Ravenna forest.

6 The Lagoons
With the gradual felling and consumption of these
sea-shore forests the danger to the Lidi increased,
and the Government were obliged to take the matter
in hand. But the earliest protection which 'they
devised for the Lidi was not those great walls of
hewn stone which run now from Pelestrina down
towards Chioggia, but a much simpler and more
primitive bulwark, yet one which is in use to this day.
If you wish to see what the old defences of the Lido
were like, make your gondolier stop on the way to
S. Elizabetta, at what was once the beautiful Island
of S. Elena, and there you will be able to study the
device of palisade and rubbish by which the old
Venetians used to prevent the sea from eating its
way through the ramparts of the Lido.
The Lidi, as I have said, are the chief factor in
the formation of the lagoons, and their function was,
and is, more especially protection. The sea is the
next important factor, and its function is pre-emi
nently that of vivifying. Without the diurnal move
ment of the sea, the lagoons would become an oozy
mass of pestilential mud. Originally the sea was by
no means the sole supply of water in the lagoons.
The rivers Brenta, Sile, Piave, and other smaller
streams used to discharge their waters into the
Venetian estuary. But the mingling of salt and fresh
water rendered the air of Venice malarious, and the
earthy deposit brought down by the rivers threatened
some day to choke up the basin, so the Govern-

Their Nature and their History 7
ment turned its attention to the expulsion of the
rivers from the lagoon. This was no easy task ; for
those rivers, starting from their 'high mountain
cradles' among the Dolomite Alps, and having but
a short course from birth to sea, acquire in their de
scent an impetuosity that in flood-time is irresistible.
The Government, however, by dint of patience and a
great expenditure, succeeded in their object. The
Piave was diverted to a new mouth, the Sile was
forced to follow the old bed of the Piave, and the
Brenta was carried along the borders of the lagoon
to the sea at Brondolo ; only a very small portion
of its waters now find their way into the lagoon at
Fusina. It is the sea which is the great alimentary of the
lagoon, and twice a day its waters come pouring in
upon the lagoon surface, sweeping round the walls
of the city and through its narrow canals, performing
their ' task of pure ablution,' and at their outgoing
carrying with them all the refuse of the town.
But this ebb and flow of the sea in the estuary is
not a simple operation — it is a complex of various
similar, but perfectly distinct, operations ; and it is
this complexity which imparts to the lagoon much
of its extraordinary character as a natural pheno
menon. To understand the nature of the ebb and flow in
the lagoon, we must return for a moment to the Lidi.
Those long strips of land are broken at five points.

8 The Lagoons
These breaks are known as— (i.) The Porto of Tre
Porti ; (2.) the Porto of S. Erasmo ; (3.) the Porto of
Lido ; (4.) the Porto of Malamocco ; and (5.) the Porto
of Chioggia. The Lido Porto is that which conducts
to Venice, and by it, under the Republic, the war-
galleys used to reach and leave the city. In order,
therefore, to deepen the channel by increasing the
current and the scour, the Government closed the
Port of S. Erasmo, compelling most of its waters to
pass through the Lido Port, and very little water
enters or leaves the lagoon by S. Erasmo — a quantity,
in fact, that we may neglect ; and in considering the
internal economy of the estuary, we have to deal only
with the four ports of Tre Porti, Lido, Malamocco,
and Chioggia.
We shall best appreciate the nature of the ebb
and flow of the tide in the lagoons by following the
movement of the water as it sweeps in by one of
these four ports.
The surface of the lagoon is not a stable surface.
At high-tide it is water, at low-tide it is to a very
large extent mudbank ; but these mudbanks are
cut in all directions by innumerable channels, some
large and deep, kept open artificially by means of
dredging, some narrow and shallow, which eventually
lose themselves among the innermost recesses of the
lagoon. These channels are the natural courses
which the water has formed for itself in its outgoings
and incomings.

ON THE LAGOON

Their Nature and their History i i
If we follow the sea now as it enters by the Lido
port, we find it sweeping in with impetuous force and
speed through that narrow opening, having all the
swelling of the Atlantic, the Mediterranean, and the
Adriatic at its back. It spreads rapidly at first
through the innumerable channels in the mudbanks,
filling them till they brim over and flood the whole
surface of the lagoon, and it looks no longer like a
vast muddy field, but seems rather to be some great
lake with a fairy city buoyed up on its breast. The
tide flows on past Venice and Murano to Campalto,
to Mestre, to Fusina, all of them upon the mainland ;
and the farther it draws away from the sea and its port
of entry, the more it loses its speed and the slower it
flows. But some of its waters do not flow straight
for the mainland ; they are diverted by channels to
right and left. The waters to the left flow on towards
Malamocco, till in a line near the Island of S. Spirito
they meet the tide which all this time has been
coming in at the Malamocco port, just as the tide
which we are following has been coming in at the
Lido port. These two inflowing tides meet, and, as
they have each of them lost much of their primary
force, they easily neutralise one another, and come
nearly to a standstill ; then each of them deposits
the burden of sand and mud which has hitherto been
swept along with it suspended in its current, and so
at this point of juncture a little mound or watershed
is gradually built up, which, although it is of no

12 The Lagoons
appreciable height, is still sufficient to compel the
waters to return by the way they came when they
receive their summons to the sea once more. The
same thing has been happening contemporaneously
on the right-hand side of the Lido port, at the
Island of the Santi, near Burano, where the tide
that came in by the Lido meets and neutralises the
tide that flowed by Tre Porti. And so again at the
Ca dei Furlani, near Pelestrina, the Malamocco tide
meets and neutralises the Chioggia tide. These
points of juncture are called spartiacque, or water
sheds ; and the result of this curious action of the tide,
which I have been endeavouring to explain, is this,
that the Lagoon of Venice, apparently all one, is
really divided into four sub-lagoons, with three lines
of separation — three watersheds at the Santi, at
S. Spirito, and at the Ca dei Furlani respectively.
Each of these subsections is a water system complete
in itself, with its watersheds, its small streams, and
its main rivers, which lead and reconduct the tide
from and to the sea.
I mentioned the fact that the incoming tide loses
much of its speed in its passage from the ports to the
farther recesses of the lagoon, and this diminution of
force has gradually produced another division of the
lagoon surface into what are technically called the
Laguna viva and the Laguna morta, the Live and
the Dead Lagoon.
The Live Lagoon is that part of the lagoon

Their Nature and their History 13
where the force of the tide is most actixc, where the
difference between high and low tide is distinctly
marked by the disappearance and the reappearance
of the mudbanks.
The Dead Lagoon is that section of the lagoon
which is nearest to the mainland, where the water
hardly feels the life and the \'ivifying influence of the
tide. It lies in semi-stagnant pools between the little
islands, which are tufted with sea-grass, or tamarisk
and pale sea-lavender, that spreads over the surface
of the doubtful land a shimmering veil of blue in
summer when the plant comes into flower, or a
mantle of rich purple in autumn when the sea-
lavender dies down.
Such is the action of the sea upon the lagoon.
While the Lidi take the largest share in the formation
of this basin, it is the sea which imparts to it the
special internal characteristics which it displays — its
double division into subsections and into Dead and
Live Lagoon.
As the tide rises and falls in the estuary, the mud
banks are alternately covered and laid bare. But
even when the tide is full it is not possible for boats
to traverse the surface of the lagoon in all directions,
for in many places the water is not more than three
inches above the muddy bottom. It is therefore abso
lutely necessary for boats to keep to the courses of the
deeper channels by which the sea flows in and out of
the lagoon. The surface of the lagoon is traversed

14 The Lagoons
by five main waterways ; all of them centre in Venice.
The line of these channels .is defined hy pali or posts
driven into thennud along their margins.
The pali form not only an important feature in
the Venetian landscape, but they are absolutely
essential to the navigation of the lagoons. Without
them even a native would be almost sure to miss his
way and to find himself stranded on a mudbank,
where he would have to wait till released by the
rising tide. The impassability of the lagoon surface
has frequently proved one of the most valuable
defences of the city from the days when the Frankish
chivalry under Charlemagne's son were led to their
destruction by the old woman of Malamocco, rex
consilii as she is called, who told them that Venice,
which lay in sight, could easily be reached across the
six miles of shoals and mudbanks and intricate wind
ing channels. And were it not for ihe pali, of which
there are upwards of 20,000, the same fate would cer
tainly overtake many a modern voyager upon these
waters. Their beauty, their fascination, their infinite
variety ; the glory of autumn sunsets ; the tremulous
white light on a summer dawn ; the vast arch of
heaven spread over the lagoon ; the perpetual change
and shimmer of colour on the water surface ; the
stationary, immovable Alps with their mantle of im
maculate snow, — with these and with much more the
reader may become intimately acquainted for himself,
should he embrace a life on the lagoons.

Their Nature and their History 15
II
Such are the chief ph)sical features of the
lagoons, and hardly less remarkable than the lagoons
themselves is the history of the way in which the
Venetians settled there and constructed one of the
most famous and most beautiful cities that the world
has ever seen.
The colonisation of the Venetian estuary is
usually dated from the year 452, the period of the
Hunnish invasion under Attila, when the scourge of
God, as he was named by his terror-stricken op
ponents, sacked the rich Roman cities of Aquileia,
Concordia, Opitergium, and Padua. In one sense
the date is correct. The Hunnish invasion certainly
gave an enormous increase to the lagoon population,
and called the attention of the mainlanders to the
admirable asylum which the estuary offered in times
of danger. When Alcuin, the great scholar from
Yorkshire, was teaching Charlemagne's son and heir,
Pepin, he drew up for his pupil's use a curious
catechism of questions and answers. Among others
this occurs : ' Quid est mare ? ' ' What is the sea ? '
' Refugium in periculis.' ' A refuge in time of danger.'
Surely a strange answer, and one which can hardly
be reckoned as true except in the particular case of
the Venetian lagoons. For the mainlanders were
caught between the devil of Attila and the deep sea
of the Adriatic, and had they not found the lagoons

1 6 The Lagoons
ready at hand to offer them an asylum and to prove
a refugium in periculis, it must have fared hard with
them. But this date of 452 is not to be taken as the date
of the very earliest occupation of the lagoon. Long
before Attila and his Huns swept down upon Italy,
we know that there was a sparse population occupy
ing the estuary, engaged in fishing and in the salt
trade. Cassiodorus, the secretary of the Gothic
King Theodoric the Great, has left us a picture of
this people, hardy, independent, toughened by their
life on the salt water ; their means of living the
fish of the lagoons; their- source of wealth the salt
which they extracted from its waters ; their houses
wattled cabins built upon piles driven into the mud ;
their means of locomotion light boats which were
tied to the door-post like horses on mainland. ' Thus
you live in your sea-birds' home,' he exclaims, ' rich
and poor under equal laws ; a common food supports
you ; house is like unto house ; ahd envy, that curse
of all the world, hath no place there.' No doubt this
early population of the lagoons, already intimately
associated with its dwelling-place, modified by it and
adapted to it, helped to form the basis upon which
the later strata of population, the result of the Hun
nish invasion, could rest ; and in all probability some
of the characteristics of this early population, its
independence and its hardihood, passed into the
composition of the full-grown Venetian race. But

Their Nature and their History 17
beyond the brief words of Cassiodorus we know
little about these early lagoon-dwellers. It is really
with the Hunnish invasion that the history of Venice
begins its first period of growth.
The population which flocked from the mainland to
seek refuge in the estuary of \'^enice came from many
different cities — from Aquileia, from Concordia, from
Padua ; and though the inhabitants of all these, no
doubt, bore the external stamp which Rome never
failed to impose, yet, equally doubtless, they brought
with them their own particular customs, their mutual
hates and rivalries. While living on the mainland
these animosities had wider space in which to play,
and were therefore less dangerous, less explosive.
But in the lagoons, under stress of suffering, and
owing to confinement and juxtaposition, they became
intensified, exaggerated, and perilous. There was a
double problem before the growing Venetian popula
tion which required to be solved before Venice and
the Venetians could, with any justice, be considered a
place and a people. First, the various and largely
hostile populations who had taken refuge in the
lagoon had to be reconciled to each other ; and
secondly, they had to be reconciled to their new
home, to be identified with it and made ohe with it.
The lagoon achieved both reconciliations : the
isolation of its waters, their strangeness, gradually
created the feeling of unity, of family connection,
among the diverse and hostile components of the
B

1 8 The Lagoons
population, till a fusion took place between the
original and the immigrant inhabitants, and between
the people and their home, and Venice and the
Venetians emerge upon the history of the world as
an individual and full-grown race.
But this reconciliation and identification were not
accomplished at once. They cost many years of
struggle and of danger. The unification of Venice is
the history of a series of compromises, an historical
example of the great law of selection and survival.
I have pointed out how natural it was that the
mutual jealousies which existed between the cities
of the mainland before Attila's invasion should
be continued and intensified between those lagoon
villages which the inhabitants of each mainland city
occupied after their flight from their ancient homes.
The first organic constitutional movement in the
lagoon took place about 466, when the twelve prin
cipal townships drew together in a sort of federation ;
each island-town being governed by its own chief
or tribune, and an assembly of the tribunes being
summoned to decide matters affecting the general
welfare of the whole corporate body.
But this first indication of organised vitality
instantly brought to light the inherent danger which
threatened the existence of the lagoon communities —
I mean those ancient jealousies to which I have
referred. Each township wished to become the chief
city of the lagoons ; and each tribune desired to be

Their Nature and their History 19
leader of the lagoon-dwellers, or at least primus
inter pares at the tribunitian assembly. And the heat
of this jealousy between two of the principal town
ships, Heraclea and Malamocco, seemed to jeopardise
the very life of the Confederation. Then the first
compromise took place. It was the only solution
which oflered itself. The individual rivals waived
their claim, and the Confederation created a personal
head of the State, and concentrated the functions of
the Government in his hand, when they chose their
first Doge, Luccio Paolo Aenafesto, in the year 697.
But the danger which the creation of a Doge was
intended to dispel was by no means completely
overcome. The jealousy of Malamocco and Heraclea
resided deeply engrained in the breast of each of
their citizens ; but it was certain that, whoever might
be Doge, he would follow the traditional policy of his
township. The creation of a Doge only intensified
the internal discord which it was designed to allay.
The rivalry between Heraclea and Malamocco
became more and more violent, until it ended in the
slaughter of Doge Orso and the abolition of the
Dogeship by the whole party who were opposed to
Heraclea. The violence which brought about the murder of
Orso led to the second great compromise. A new
Doge was elected. He was a noble of Heraclea, it is
true, but he reigned no longer at Heraclea ; the seat
of the Government was removed to Malamocco, and

20 The Lagoons
thus an important step was taken towards the unifica
tion of the two leading townships and the annihilation
of their ancient rivalry in the growing idea of the
Venetian State.
Much still remained to be done ere that consum
mation should be reached ; for though Malamocco
had now become the seat of the Government, Hera-
clean nobles reigned, and the fact of their residence
in a hostile city simply served to accentuate the
antagonism, until the hatred against them was
brought to a point. The Heraclean dynasty was
overthrown, and the first Malamoccan Doge reigned
in Malamocco. Thus a further step towards the
unification of the State was effected by the gradual
suppression of Heraclea, which had threatened at one
time to prove an insuperable obstacle to that process.
For Heraclea was not powerful enough to absorb the
whole authority in the lagoon, and yet too powerful
to permit any other township to do so.
And now we come to the last stage in the long
operation which achieved the amalgamation of the
lagoon townships and produced the State which we
know as Venice : the epoch which saw the birth of
modern Venice, the close of the first period in Venetian
history, the period occupied in the consolidation of
the various hostile and diverse populations which
were flung upon the lagoon by Attila's invasion.
The pressure which effected this final union of the
lagoon townships came from outside. Charlemagne

Their Nature and their History 21
was lord of the Franks and real master of the West-
em world. Both Charlemagne and the Pope had
definite objects of policy in view, and each agreed to
assist the other in the attainment of their respective
desires. Charlemagne longed to be crowned Roman
Emperor, and to take the place once held by the
descendants of Augustus ; the Pope wished to become
a temporal prince and to possess a State in Italy.
They both appeared to have achieved their object
when Charlemagne led back the exiled Pope to
Rome, was there crowned by him as Emperor, and
there presented to the Pope the temporal sovereignty
over Parma, Reggio, Mantua, Istria, Venetia. But
the larger part of this donation was an empty gift.
Charlemagne had no real title which would have
justified him in making a present of the lagoons to any
one, and the lagoon-dwellers absolutely refused to sub
mit, or to recognise the Emperor in any way. Pepin,
Charlemagne's son, undertook to reduce the lagoons
to obedience, and this brings us to the events which
led to the creation of the city of Rialto, the nucleus
of what we now call Venice.
Pepin's idea in his attack on the Venetian estuary
was to operate from the south-west corner. He took
and sacked Brondolo, Chioggia, Pelestrina, and finally
threatened Malamocco, the seat of the Government.
The Venetians found themselves compelled to select
some other place as an asylum for the old, the infirm,
the women, and the children.

2 2 The Lagoons
The spot they chose was that small group of
islands at the very core of the lagoons, called Rialto,
equally distant from the mainland and from the Lido
shore. Pepin made one desperate and disastrous
effort to reach the asylum of Rialto. But the shifty
mudbanks and the intricate channels baffled every
effort. His boats ran aground, his men sunk in the
mud, and were harassed and cut to pieces by the
Venetians in their light and shallow vessels ; Pepin
was forced to retire from his enterprise under a defeat
to which the physical nature of the lagoons no less
than the valour of the Venetians had contributed.
Thus Rialto, the modern city of Venice, became
the capital of the estuary. Malamocco was aban
doned, and the seat of the Government was removed
to those islands which had proved themselves the
true asylum of the Venetians in their time of trouble.
The choice of Rialto as the capital was determined
by a double compromise, one political and one
physical. In the political sphere, Rialto represented
the outcome of the long struggle between Malamocco
and Heraclea, which ended in the destruction of the
one and the abandonment of the other. It signified
the absorption and fusion of two hostile currents in
policy, which had for several centuries torn and
weakened the lagoon-dwellers. It proclaimed the
consolidation and unification of the Venetians as a
nation, individual, coherent, ready to play their part
along with other nations in the history of the world.

Their Nature and their History ::3
In the ph)-sical sphere, Rialto represented the
deliberate choice between the danger of the main
land demonstrated by Attila's invasion, and the
danger of the Lido shore as demonstrated by Pepin's
attack. Rialto, by the service of asylum which it
had rendered to the Venetians, indicated itself to
them as their true capital. Its position, equally
distant from the sea and the mainland, designated it
as the true centre and heart of the lagoons. The
lagoons and the lagoon-dwellers together had saved
the State, and henceforth they were united in bonds
which nothing could sever.
The State which was thus created enjoyed an
existence of nearly one thousand years. The history
of that long life will be most easily grasped if we
mark it off" into its three natural periods, and consider
each of these in tum.
The first period covers the years from 8io to
1 310, and is chiefly occupied with the consolidation
of the new community. It is during this period that
the Venetian Republic was developed, emerged, and
took its place among the States of Italy. The
problem for Venice was twofold : external and
internal. Externally the young State was called
upon to fight for its existence, and in the course of
that struggle for life it grew, extended its borders,
and fitted itself to take over the commercial supre
macy in the Mediterranean. Internally, when the
Crusaders broke up the Empire of the East, the State

24 The Lagoons
was forced to develop its own constitution. The
external and the internal processes were nearly
contemporaneous, and at the conclusion of both the
Venetian Republic appears as that extraordinary
oligarchy which fascinated constitutional statesmen
and historians by its solidity, as that close guild of
merchant princes who enjoyed the monopoly of
Eastern trade for the next two centuries, and whose
wealth was a source of envy to the poorer States of
Europe. During this early period of growth the
State of Venice had the good fortune to be left very
much alone. The capital of the Eastern Empire,
upon which Venice was nominally dependent, lay far
off", and its rulers were not always strong ; while on
the nearer mainland of Italy the Goth, Lombard, and
Frankish sovereigns were too deeply occupied with
the task of maintaining their own existence to pay
much attention to the Venetian estuary, which ap
peared to be so unfruitful and so unimportant. But
Venice was not left free from the attacks or the
threats of other foes. The Saracens in the south of
the Adriatic, the Sclav pirates of the Istrian and
Dalmatian coast, and, later on, the Normans of Sicily,
kept the lagoon-dwellers 'fully occupied and in the
constant practice of naval warfare, till the glorious
campaigns of Doge Pietro Orseolo II. led to the
subjugation of Dalmatia in the year looo, and laid
the foundation of Venetian supremacy in the Adriatic.
The Doge of Venice assumed the title of Duke of

VENETIAN FISHING-BOAT

Their Nature and their History 27
Dalmatia, and the State commemorated the day on
which Orseolo set sail by a solemn ceremony of
supplication, which was subsequently developed into
the famous and magnificent function of the Sposalizio
del Mar.
The victory over the Dalmatian pirates set the
seal to a long course of commercial development, and
brought Venice prominently under the notice of the
Western Emperor, Otho III., and arrested the atten
tion of the mler of the East, thus preparing the way
for the next important step in the development of
the State — the choice of Venice as the point of de
parture for the Crusades.
When the Council of Clermont determined on the
rescue of the Holy Sepulchre, three States of Italy
were ready to compete for the profit of transporting
the Cmsaders to the East. Venice was not only the
most powerful, but the most eastern of the three ;
the choice fell on her. The Republic embarked on
the Crusades in a purely commercial spirit ; and the
various expeditions opened to the Venetians the
islands and coast of the Levant. The Venetian
fleet plundered Corfu, Chios, Lesbos, Rhodes, and
established colonies at Acre and at Tyre. By these
operations of the year 1123 the growing Republic
achieved a second movement of expansion no less
important than that which had signalised the reign of
Orseolo II. But the first Crusade had one highly
dangerous influence on the course of Venetian history ;

2 8 The Lagoons
for while it developed Venetian commerce in the
Levant, it also brought the Republic into hostile
relations towards the Eastern Empire through the
Venetian possession of Tyre, which the Emperors
could not fail to feel as derogatory to their dignity.
Although Venetian history, during the earlier
centuries of her life, is chiefly concerned with the
Adriatic and the Levant, yet the lagoons were too
near the Italian mainland to be able to remain absol
utely unaffected by all that was taking place there.
When the powerful Emperors of the house of Hohen-
staufen descended upon the peninsula, intending to
make their shadowy crown of Italy a solid fact, the
Venetian Republic could not refuse to throw in her
lot with her neighbouring communities, each one of
which, like herself, was absorbed in an effort to
maintain its own independence. She joined the
combination of North Italian townships to oppose
Frederick Barbarossa, and declared for Pope Alex
ander HI. as against the Imperial nominee. Pope
Victor IV. Frederick attacked the Republic and
seized Caverzere, on the banks of the Adige, in 1158.
The Venetians applied for help to their nominal
overlord, the Emperor of the East. But Manuel
could not forget that Venetians held Tyre ; aid was
refused, and the Republic was forced to declare her
self a member of the Lombard League. All vigorous
participation in the wars of the League was rendered
impossible, however, by events which took place in

Their Nature and their History 29
Constantinople. There the animosity of the Em
peror had been gradually increasing, and not without
cause. Venice had occupied Tyre, Venetian sailors
on board their ships" had ridiculed the Emperor by
dressing a negro in Imperial robes. Venetian mer
chants were absorbing the trade of the capital, and
the Venetian colony was disturbing its streets with
scenes of riot and bloodshed. In March 1171 a
concerted attack was made on the Venetians in the
Empire ; their property was confiscated, many were
slain, most were imprisoned. At Venice arose an
irrepressible cry for war ; and thus the Republic
found itself embarked upon hostilities with its
nominal suzerain, the Emperor of the East, and
forced into a naval campaign against the whole
power of the Empire. The Venetian fleet set sail
with much pomp. But the results of the war were
ruinous and disastrous : plundering expeditions led
to delay ; the good season was lost ; the armament
wintered at Chios, where dirt and debauchery,
rather than poisoned wells, brought on the plague.
The flower of Venice fell ; the whole Giustiniani
family except one young monk, who was not with
the fleet, and who subsequently replanted his race,
perished in the harbour of Chios. The crews muti
nied and sailed for Venice ; the disaster could not
have been more complete. The Doge paid the
penalty with his life.
The position of Venice was most serious. She was

30 The Lagoons
apparently bankrupt, for the State had suspended
payment after the failure at Chios ; surrounded by
enemies ; without allies ; still a member of the Lom
bard League, and at war with Barbarossa ; completely
crushed by the diplomacy of her bitter enemy, the
Emperor Manuel : yet at this very moment the Re
public was about to rise from the bed of her mis
fortunes, and for the first time in her history to take a
place in the affairs of the whole world. Two great
Doges, Ziani and Dandolo, were destined to exalt the
Republic to a pinnacle which she had never reached
before — Ziani in the politics of the Western Empire,
and Dandolo in the East.
The war with the Emperor Manuel, which had
distracted Venice from her co-operation in the
Lombard League, and prevented her from taking
any share in the battle of Legnano, proved, in spite
of its immediate ruinous results, a fortunate episode
for the Republic. The issue of the great fight at
Legnano rendered Frederick Barbarossa desirous of
coming to terms with Pope Alexander. But a place
of meeting which should be safe and acceptable to
both parties was not easily found. The accidental
neutrality of Venice, the fact that she was essentially
different from all other Italian cities, being in many
respects not an Italian town at all, indicated the
capital of the lagoons as most suitable for the confer
ence between the spiritual and the temporal heads of
Western Europe. In ii 77 the Congress of Venice

Their Nature and their History 31
took place. The Pope left Ferrara in May, and
reached San Nicolo del Lido on the lOth ; the Em
peror did not arrive at Chioggia till July. From
Chioggia he was conducted to San Nicolo, and
thence he was accompanied by the Doge, the Patri
arch, the bishops and nobles, across the lagoon to
the Piazzetta ; passing up that open space, he
came in front of the Basilica, where, upon a lofty
throne, the Pope awaited him. A magnificent cere
monial, satisfactory to the Pope and humiliating to
the Emperor, occupied two days, and was followed
by the ratification of a six years' truce. The Re
public received from her exalted guests the confirma
tion of her many ancient privileges. But her chief
gain had been one of parade. She appeared to
Europe as the host of Emperor and Pope, the friend
and ally of both alike ; and it is not surprising that
the State should have commemorated so enjoyable an
experience by the institution of the famous ceremony
known as the Sposalizio del Mar, when the Doge
upon Ascension Day of each year passed, in solemn
procession, to the Lido port, and there, dropping a
ring into the sea, declared in the words Despon-
samus te. Mare, that Venice and the sea were for
ever one.
But the triumph achieved by Ziani was as nothing
compared to the glory which Dandolo's Dogeship
bestowed upon the Republic. Throughout the whole
of the fourth Crusade, Dandolo and the Venetians

32 The Lagoons
were the chief actors and by far the most impor
tant people in Europe at that moment. The same
reasons which induced the Council of Clermont
to select Venice as the point of departure for the
first Crusade governed the choice of the Council of
Soissons in 1200. Dandolo and Venice accepted
the task of transport, and contracted to furnish ships
for a certain number of knights, men, and horses, at a
fixed sum. The Crusaders failed to keep their share
of the contract ; by the stipulated date the iTien were
not ready, the money not forthcoming : the Venetians
then agreed to set sail on condition that the crusading
fleet should stop on its way to reduce the city of
Zara to its allegiance to Venice. The Crusaders,
much against their will, accepted these terms when
they found that Venice refused to let them move
from their camp on the Lido upon any other condi
tions. By October 1202 everything was ready, and
the crusading armament departed. It was now
virtually a Venetian fleet, embarked upon Venetian
enterprises. Zara was reduced in spite of opposition
from all the Crusaders. And, having been once
diverted from its holy purpose, a second diversion
in the private interests of its three leaders, Philip of
Swabia, Boniface of Monferrat, and the Venetians,
was all the more easily effected. This second di
version was directed to no lesser object than the
destruction of the Eastern Empire and its partition
among the crusading pirates. Philip wished to

Their Nature and their History 33
thwart the Pope, who was supporting his rival for
the Imperial crown, Otho of Brunswick. Boniface
wished to recover the kingdom of Salonica, to which
he thought he had a claim. Dandolo secured for
Venice the hire of the fleet for another year, a large
subsidy, and the probability of e.xtended factories
and commerce in the East An ostensible plea was
put forward in the desire to restore young Alexius
Comnene to the throne, from which he and his father
Isaac had been driven by Alexius the Elder.
The fleet sailed through the Dardanelles and
anchored opposite the Imperial City. Constantinople
was attacked, and, in spite of its reputation as impreg
nable, was, after fierce fighting, captured, thanks to
the personal valour of Dandolo and the prowess of
his Venetian sailors, who were the first to plant the
Lion of St. Mark on the battlements of the con
quered capital. Dandolo, though he had taken the
largest share in the siege of Constantinople, did not
present himself as a candidate for the Imperial crown,
to which the Crusaders proceeded to elect Baldwin
of Flanders. But the Doge secured for his native
city the most extensive development of her posses
sions in the Levant, and rights which enabled her to
assume the title of ' Lord of a quarter and of half a
quarter of the Roman Empire.' By the treaty of
partition, and by subsequent treaties, the Venetians
acquired the Cyclades, the Sporades, Crete, the mari
time cities of Thessaly, and the islands off the
c

34 The Lagoons
Dalmatian coast. She established an unbroken line
of communication from Venice to Constantinople.
She received a large share of the plunder, and many
of her principal families must date the foundation of
their greatness from the fourth Crusade. The basis
of Venetian supremacy in the Levant was laid.
After the fourth Crusade it is a new Venice with
which we have to deal — a Venice of merchant-princes
who held 'the gorgeous East in fee,' who began to
adorn their native city and to render it in outward
appearance what it was about to become in fact, the
commercial capital of the Mediterranean.
But, in spite of all these obvious advantages, the
action of the Venetians in the fourth Crusade was a
crime. It brought its punishment later on ; for by
the destruction of the Greek Empire the way was
prepared for the subsequent occupation of Constan
tinople by the Turks, and all the disastrous wars
thereby entailed upon the Republic.
The year 1204, the reign of Dandolo, the fall of
Constantinople, may be taken as closing the first
period of Venetian history in its external aspect.
The internal history, the growth of the Venetian
aristocracy, is' carried one hundred and six years
further to the date 13 10, at which epoch we may
consider the Republic of Venice as fully developed.
A consideration of prime importance in the in
ternal history of Venice is the isolation and indepen
dence which were secured to her by her geographical

Their Nature and their History 35
position. We have seen how the Venetians, with
the help of the lagoons, had been able to repel the
attacks of Pepin, son of Charlemagne, and of Frede
rick Barbcirossa ; how neither Goth, Hun, Lombard,
nor Frank had ever succeeded in subduing the
estuary. The Venetians were therefore enabled to
pursue, undisturbed by a foreign master, the line of
development which their own nature indicated for
them. No feudal system, arbitrarily dividing the
State into classes, was ever imposed upon the growing
Republic ; and so, in spite of all internal ferments, the
State remained homogeneous, thanks to this essential
union, and was able to achieve that solid constitution
which endured to the close of the last centur>'. The
constitutional history of Venice, from the settlement
at Rialto in 810 to the final consolidation of the
aristocracy in 13 10, is the history of minute changes
gradually working towards one inevitable result, the
creation of an oligarchy. The details of that process
need not detain us here. It will be sufficient to
indicate the two great lines upon which the consti
tutional history of the State was advancing. It
was possible that a powerful Doge might introduce
the dynastic principle, and reduce the State to a
monarchy, ruled by a single lord. But the Venetians
over and over again had shown their resolve to be
free : they had declared that their ancestors had not
sought the lagoon to live under a master ; had they
desired to be slaves, there were many better places

36 The Lagoons
where they might have settled. And, animated by
this love of freedom, the Venetians repressed the
effort of any Doge to raise his family to the position
of a ruling house ; under the impulse of this spirit
the Venetian constitution eventually produced that
series of restrictions which gradually robbed the
Doges of any real authority in the State, and left
them as merely ornamental figure-heads — 'Doge in
the Piazza, prisoner in the Palace,' as the proverb
runs. But, on the other hand, while severely re
pressing any advance in the direction of a monarchy,
the Venetians were increasing in population, in
power, in importance ; grave questions came to be
submitted to their decision, and the machinery of
popular democratic government, the machinery of
mass meetings and promiscuous speeches, soon dis
played its inherent unfitness for the conduct of
foreign affairs. This inability was made especially
clear by the disastrous war with the Emperor Manuel,
and the subsequent annihilation of the Venetian fleet
in 1 171. The first great constitutional changes took
shape in the creation of a deliberative assembly.
The inhabitants of each of the six divisions of the
city chose two members for each district, who in
their turn each nominated forty members from
their respective quarters, thus creating a body of
480 citizens who held office for one year, but who
at the close of the year themselves appointed two
electors to act for each district in nominating the

Their Nature and their History 37
new Council for the succeeding year. Here, then,
we find the germ of the Maggior Consiglio, the Great
Council, the basis of the Venetian oligarchical con
stitution. It had its origin in the necessity for
limiting the deliberative body in a rapidly growing
State. In its source it was democratic, the result
primarily of an election by the whole population as
represented by their twelve deputies ; but it con
tained the germ of an oligarchy in the provision
whereby the assembly itself named the subsequent
twelve electors. These reforms of 1172 display the
very essence of the Venetian constitution. The
deliberative assembly is started on its career ; its
members become a class in the State with a double
object in view — the suppression of the Doge in any
attempt which he might make to develop into a
-governing head. In this, the new aristocracy, created
by the establishment of a deliberative council, was
. merely carrying on the policy of the democracy which
it was now called upon to represent, and was there
fore able to rely on the support of that democracy as
against the dynastic tendencies of any Doge. But,
on the other hand, the new aristocracy, intending to
become master in the State, developed a policy which
was hostile to the people, and, though carefully
veiled, eventually succeeded in excluding them from
all share in the government of their city.
The policy initiated in 1172 was continued
throughout the next century. The fall of Con-

38 The Lagoons
stantinople, and the sudden influx of wealth conse
quent thereon, all went to strengthen the growing
aristocracy, into whose hands it chiefly fell, and
served to mark it off" more and more as a caste,
as a class apart. A seal was set to this movement,
and the Venetian aristocracy became, in name no
less than in fact, an oligarchy, by the great con
stitutional measure of 1 296, known as the Serrata del
Maggior Consiglio, or closing of the Great Council,
— a provision by which a seat in the deliberative
assembly of the State, the Great Council, was
limited to those who had sat in that assembly
during the last four years. As the Great Council
was the basis of the whole constitution, as all officers
were elected in it, as all other departments of the
governmental machinery were supplied from it, ex
clusion "'from the Great Council meant political death
for a Venetian citizen. Minor provisions rendered
access to the charmed circle more and more difficult,-
and the Venetian oligarchy in all its rigidity was
completed. The animosity aroused by this violent
act displayed itself in the only serious internal
revolution which ever disturbed the harmony of
home politics in Venice. In 13 10, some of the ex
cluded citizens, headed by members of the Tiepolo
and Querini families, endeavoured to overthrow the
government of Pietro Gradenigo, the Doge under
whose guidance the Serrata had been carried out.
A battle took place in the Piazza. Tiepolo was

Their Nature and their History 39
defeated, Querini killed. The conspiracy ended in
a complete collapse, leaving the oligarchy victorious.
To ensure their victory, the triumphant party created
the Council of Ten, a committee of public safety at
first, called into existence on account of the slow
ness and publicity of the ordinary machinery of
State. The Ten, by its activity, its absolute secrecy
and unlimited powers, soon absorbed to itself the
conduct of all the most delicate and important affairs
of the city. In 1335 it was declared permanent, and
became the chief instrument of the oligarchy in main
taining its unique and isolated position in the Republic
which it had created for itself in the Serrata of 1296.
Here, then, at this period closes the history of
the Venetian constitution; as it was left after 13 10,
so it remained till the fall of the Republic, with but
one slight addition, the creation of the Council of
Three Inquisitors of State, a Commission of the Ten
appointed in 1539, chiefly with a view to discovering
the machinations and the briberies of Spain.
The Serrata del Maggior Consiglio and the con
spiracy of Tiepolo may be said to conclude the
first period of Venetian history, both external and
internal. It left Venice a full-grown State, with
large possessions in the Levant, governed from the
capital in the lagoons ; with a vast and ever-grow
ing commerce ; possessed of a constitution which, if
compared with the structure of other Italian States,
was as iron to a reed. But this strength and solidity

40 The Lagoons
concealed a latent danger. For when her Italian
neighbouring princes fell, one by one, it was inevit
able that Venice, the only permanent power in the
north-east of the peninsula, should occupy their
territory, and thereby create that land empire which
roused the jealousy of Europe and the alarm of Italy,
and ultimately contributed to her ruin by evoking
the League of Cambray. It is this career of full-
grown Venice, expanding and becoming famous,
yet walking surely to destruction, which occupies
the whole of the second great period of Venetian
history from 1 310 to 15 10.
It was certain that the State, which had reached
its full maturity by the year 13 10, would not be able
to stand still — that it would be compelled to advance,
to expand, at whatever risk of opposition and defeat.
This second period of Venetian history may, roughly
speaking, be said to be concerned with Venetian
struggles and development by sea, and with Venetian
expansion and ambitions by land.
Venice had been the largest gainer by the sack
of Constantinople and the partition of the Eastern
Empire ; but she was not the sole competitor for
the traffic of the Levant. Amalfi, Pisa, and Genoa
had each at different times rivalled the Venetian
Republic in Constantinople ; but Amalfi had died
out, Pisa was crippled by Genoa, and so during this
period of her sea struggles it is with Genoa chiefly
that Venice is brought into contact.

Their Nature and their History 41
The last phase of the long conflict between the
two maritime republics — a struggle which Petrarch
deplored as fratricidal — broke out over the question
of the fur trade in tlie Crimea, where both Venetians
arid Genoese held factories. Venetian ships were
seized at Kaff"a on the Black Sea ; representations
at Genoa failed to secure reparation ; war was de
clared (1350). The scene of the campaign was the
Levant. The war opened with a series of un
important operations ; but when the great Venetian
admiral, Nicolo Pisani, took the command, the scene
changed. Pisani was matched by another admiral
of almost equal fame, Paganino Doria of Genoa.
The Genoese at the verj^ outbreak of hostilities seized
and held the island of Negropont. But the scene
of the campaign was soon removed to the waters
of the Bosphorus. There, under the walls of Pera,
Pisani and Doria joined issue. It was late in the
afternoon when the attack was given from the
Venetian side, and night came on before the battle
ceased. But Genoese and Venetians fought by the
flames of their now burning ships ; the gale which
fanned the fires threw the fleets into very great con
fusion, and at last the Venetians recognised a defeat.
But the battle of the Bosphorus was hardly a de
cisive engagement. The loss on both sides was too
equally balanced. And while both commanders were
watching each other, the Venetian allies, the Catalans,
sailed to attack the Genoese possessions in Sardinia.

42 The Lagoons
This brought out Antonio Grimaldi with a second
Genoese fleet. His orders were to throw himself
between the Catalans and Venetians and to prevent
a junction. But he was too late. The operation
had been already carried out. Pisani left the Levant
and joined the Catalans in the waters of Cagliari.
There, in the month of August, the Genoese and
Venetians once more measured arms. This time
Pisani was victorious. He was a fine seaman, and loved
abundant sea-room ; in the Bosphorus he had been
cramped ; off Cagliari he was master of an open
sea. He drew out, followed by the Genoese ; then,
suddenly wheeling round, he ran his ships along
side of one another and lashed them together into
one solid front, leaving ten galleys free to skirmish
and to draw the enemy on towards his impregnable
formation. The battle lasted for many hours ; but first
on one and then on another of the Genoese ships the
ensign of Saint Mark began to fly. The Genoese lost
heart. They threw themselves into the sea, or hid in
their holds. Antonio Grimaldi fled towards Genoa.
The Venetians were victorious, but Pisani's victory
had cost him too dear to allow him to follow it up at
once. Genoa placed herself under the strong protec
tion of the Viscontis of Milan, and Venice was balked
of her desire to crush her rival. War soon broke out
once more. Paganino Doria sailed from Genoa,
Nicolo Pisani from Venice, with orders to intercept
Doria and to protect the mouth of the Adriatic. But

Their Nature and their History 43
Doria gave Pisani the slip, and, before the Venetians
so much as knew that he was in their waters, news
arrived that Parenzo and Istria were virtually in
Genoese hands. The alarm was intense ; the Genoese
were hourly expected off" the Lido mouth, which was
closed by an iron chain. But the danger passed by.
The arrival of the Emperor Charles III. induced the
belligerents to sign a hollow truce, which no sooner
expired than these two deadly foes flew at each other
again. This time war was confined to the Levant,
where Nicolo Pisani and his more famous nephew,
Vettor, went in search of the redoubtable Paganino.
They failed to find him, and returned to winter
quarters at Portolongo, opposite the island of
Sapienza. The guard at the mouth of the narrow
channel in which the Venetians lay was carelessly
kept Paganino's nephew, Luciano Doria, on one of
his reconnoitring cmises, became aware of this. He
induced his uncle to order an attack. On November
4th a surprise was carried out ; the Genoese sailed up
to Portolongo, found it unprepared, and every single
ship of the Republic fell into their hands.
And, as though the minous blow of Sapienza were
not sufficient, it was followed by an alarming episode
inside Venice. In 1354 the Council of Ten received
warning of a plot to murder the members of the domi
nant aristocracy. The whole information was vague, but
in the course of their investigations the Ten suddenly
discovered that the Doge, Marino Faliero, was a party

44 The Lagoons
to the scheme. The discovery was made on April 14th,
and the massacre was designed for the 15th ; on that
day ten of the conspirators were hung in a row from
the windows ofthe Ducal Palace ; on the 17th, Marino
Faliero was deposed from his dignity, deprived of his
Ducal cap, and executed at the top of the stairs
leading down to the courtyard of the Palace.
The defeat of Sapienza, the conspiracy of Faliero,
and the exhaustion of a long war, all induced Venice
to accept the terms of a peace with Genoa, proposed
by Visconti ; and during the respite thus obtained
she set to work to repair her fleet and to arm herself
for her final struggle with her rival. That republic
was fully occupied and exhausted by internal dis
sensions ; and, while she could do nothing to check
Venetian recovery, her hatred increased steadily, till
it found vent in the insult offered to the Venetian
consul at the coronation of Pierre Lusignan, king of
Cyprus, at Famagosta. The Genoese consul claimed
precedence of the Venetian. This was refused him
by the court officials. At the wedding banquet he
expressed his disgust by throwing bread at the
Venetian, Malipiero. A free fight ensued, and some
of the Genoese were thrown out of the window. On
the top of this affair at Famagosta came the outbreak
of war, which was brought about when the Venetians
occupied the island of Tenedos, so near to the mouth
of the Dardanelles that the Genoese considered the
possession of it by Venice an act of overt hostility.

Their Nature and their History 45
Venice prepared for the campaign with alacrity.
Two great naval leaders took the sea : Carlo Zeno,
the impetuous, was sent to Negropont ; Vettor Pisani,
the able tactician and strategist, received the supreme
command. He sailed for Genoese waters in 1378,
defeated the Genoese fleet in a stormy sea and a
deluge of rain off" Cape Antium, and, after a further
cruise, he returned to the Adriatic, where, in spite of
his protest, he was ordered into winter quarters at
Pola in Istria. In May of the following year he was
still there, his ships in need of repair, his men in need
of rest ; on the 7th of that month Luciano Doria
suddenly appeared off" Pola harbour. Pisani could
not restrain his Council of War ; he was outvoted
and forced to give the signal for attack. In spite of
his own heroic conduct, which met with applause
from his very foes, the admiral was utterly defeated ;
only six galleys out of all his fleet found shelter in
the harbour of Parenzo.
It would seem that only one fact saved Venice
from falling into the hands of the Genoese after the
battle of Pola. Luciano Doria had been killed in the
engagement ; and while his successor, Pietro Doria,
was on his way to assume the command, Venice had
time to recover from her panic. She had time, also,
to commit an act of gross injustice, which may be
explained, though hardly palliated, by her panic : she
disgraced Pisani and imprisoned him for six months.
When the Genoese admiral arrived, he sailed along

46 The Lagoons
the shores of the Lido towards Chioggia, where
he intended to establish himself and to blockade
Venice until she surrendered. Doria attacked the
Venetian garrison in Chioggia, and after a severe
struggle he captured the town, drew his fleet within
the lagoon, and took up his quarters in the conquered
township. In Venice the alarm was extreme. The
Government was for appointing Taddeo Giustiniani
to the supreme command ; but a wave of popular
feeling compelled them to release Vettor Pisani from
prison and to intrust the fortunes of their country to
his hands. The popular instinct was fully justified.
From the moment that Vettor Pisani assumed the
direction of the operations the whole aspect of the
war was changed. By boldly sinking ships at all the
sea entrances into the lagoon, and by placing his own
fleet outside in the open sea, he effectually shut in
the Genoese, who, instead of blockading Venice, now
found themselves blockaded in Chioggia. But the
strain upon the Venetians was severe ; the position of
their fleet on the open sea, the severe winter weather —
for it was the month of December — the continual
harassing by the Genoese, day and night, in their
unceasing efforts to break through the cordon — all
told upon the spirits and the temper of Pisani's fleet
A mutiny was on the point of breaking out ; but at
length, on the ist of January 1380, the sails of Carlo
Zeno's squadron were descried upon the offing. His
presence, his fiery and impetuous temper, lent courage

Their Nature and their History 47
to the Venetians, and his sailors formed a welcome
reinforcement to Pisani's exhausted troops. The
siege of Chioggia was pushed without delay. The
Genoese, as a last resort, endeavoured to drive a canal
through the sandbank which divided the lagoon from
the sea, and so to escape. They were repulsed and
cut to pieces ; then they lost heart ; and at last, on
June 24th, 1380, the whole Genoese fleet surrendered
to Venice.
The war of Chioggia was a splendid victory for
Venice. It was the finest display of courage, self-
sacrifice, patriotism, which the growing Republic had
as yet produced. Her great rival Genoa was help
lessly crippled, and never recovered. Venice was
left in undisputed maritime supremacy in the Medi
terranean ; but she was also left single-handed in
those waters, with no ally to assist her against the
Turk when that formidable foe appeared upon the
scene. So far, then, we have followed the growth of
Venetian supremacy by sea. We must now observe
how she began to expand upon the mainland.
Broadly speaking, Venice cannot be said to have
begun the formation of a land empire until her
supremacy by sea was already achieved. It is true
that the Republic had embarked upon wars with
Commachio, a commercial rival ; with Padua on
account of some interference with the water system
of the Brenta; with Ferrara, where the first indications

48 The Lagoons
of a desire to extend upon the mainland of Italy were
clearly manifested ; with the Scalas of Verona, when
that family showed a disposition to absorb all the
mainland round the lagoons, and thus to close every
outlet for Venetian merchandise. But it is not till
after the war of Chioggia, when the house of Carrara
came into collision with the Visconti of Milan, and
were about to be absorbed by them, that the Republic
of Venice took her first decided step upon the main
land of Italy. This policy of creating a land
dominion, though it proved disastrous, was governed
by necessity — was unavoidable ; for it must be re
membered that a purely maritime city like Venice,
without any food-producing territory at her back, was
always exposed to the dangers of starvation after
every signal defeat at sea. Venice had experienced
this danger after Curzola in 1298, after Sapienza in
1354. Moreover, it was certain that whatever Power
held the mainland round the lagoons would be hostile
to the Republic, and would endeavour to make her
pay for the export of her goods, as Scala had done.
A land empire, therefore, became a necessity as the
State grew in population and importance. The
occasion was offered during that difficult period of
Italian history when the various lords of the North
Italian States were engaged in destroying one another.
Venice protected the Carraresi of Padua until she
found them openly hostile, as in the war of Chioggia,
or secretly plotting to blow up the Venetian arsenal

Their Nature and their History 49
and to poison Venetian wells. Then the Republic
joined Visconti in the destruction and spoliation of the
Lords of Padua. Their downfall, in 1405, left Venice
in possession of a large territory on the mainland of
Italy, the Trevisan marches, Padua, Vicenza, Verona,
and their districts, together with the high table-land
of the Sette Communi above Bassano. And this
date of the fall of the Carraresi constitutes an epoch
in the life of the Republic. Henceforth Venice can
no longer be considered as a purely naval and com
mercial Power, with interests centred chiefly in the
East She now becomes a land Power, with a land
frontier to defend, with rivals always ready to attack
that frontier — with all the prestige, but also with all
the dangers, of an Italian State.
The Venetian policy of aggression on the main
land has always been associated with the name of
Francesco Foscari. It was during his reign, under
his guidance, stimulated by his enthusiasm for ex
pansion, that Venice created the land empire which
united all Europe against her. Foscari embarked on
war with the Visconti of Milan, joining the league
which Florence had formed against them. Visconti,
after the fall of the Carraresi, was conterminous with
the Republic, and, therefore, inevitably its foe. By
the help of a series of great mercenary generals —
Carmagnola, Bartolomeo Colleoni, Gattamelata — one
of whom, Carmagnola, proved treacherous and was
put to death, the Venetians extended their mainland
D

50

The Lagoons

territory to the furthest point it ever reached. That
region included the provinces of Bergamo and Brescia ;
it was bounded
by the Alps,
the Adda, the
Po, and the sea.
Venice ac
quired a pre-
ponderatinginfluence in
North Italy,
and her aggres
sive conduct
towards Milan
in the west and
Ferrara in the
south fostered
the idea that
she contem
plated the ab
sorption of all
Italy north of
the Apennines.
Native princes
like Sforza and
Cesare Borgia,
foreign sovereigns like Lewis XIL and Maximilian,
were all equally jealous or equally greedy. A cry
arose against the insatiable cupidity of the Venetians

THE STATUE OF COLLEONI.

Their Nature and their History 51
and their thirst for territory. The enemies of the
Republic coalesced at Cambray, and decreed the
destruction of Venice and the partition of her
dominions. But a hostile combination of European and Italian
Powers was not the only disaster which was threat
ening the very existence of the Republic. Early in
the century the Turks had already begun to cause
alarm, and in 1416 the Venetian and Turkish fleets
met each other for the first time in the famous battle
of Gallipoli. The Venetian admiral, Loredan, reports
that the battle lasted from the morning early till past
two o'clock. The Turks fought like dragons, and
the flower of their men was on board : but Loredan,
himself leading the way, attacked and captured first
one galley, then another, sunk a third, and finally
put the whole fleet to rout. The victory of Gallipoli
was a splendid achievement of Venetian arms ; but
it was quite insufficient to crush, and hardly sufficient
to check, the onward movement of the Turk. The
siege of Constantinople began on the 6th April 1453 ;
a Venetian squadron was in the harbour, but with
orders to confine itself to the protection of Venetian
¦ merchants and citizens. The Emperor Constantine
fought with conspicuous bravery, but on May the
29th the city fell ; the last of the Roman Emperors
was buried under a mound of his followers.
Thus, while the Republic was being brought face
to face with new and difficult complications on the

52 The Lagoons
mainland of Italy, in the Levant also events assumed
a complexion which was hostile to her interests.
For, instead of a weak stationary Power at Constan
tinople — a Power which encouraged • rather than
hindered the development of Venetian commerce — -
the rulers of the East were now a fierce, expansive,
anti-Christian nation, from whom Venice had little
to hope and much to fear.
The Sultan, Mohammed the Conqueror, continued
his victorious progress. The Morea fell in 1460, and
the attack on Mitylene in 1462 warned Venice that she
was face to face with foes who intended to dispute her
supremacy in the Levant. Moreover, the ignominious
failure of Pius il. to carry out a crusade showed that
Europe would leave Venice alone to battle single-
handed with the Turk. The occupation of the Powers
with their own more immediate affairs ; their slight
interest in the Levant ; their jealousy, too, of Venice,
which had enjoyed the monopoly of the Levant trade,
all rendered them indifferent spectators of a struggle
which gradually exhausted the resources of the Re
public. Nor was it possible for Venice to live on terms
of amity with the Turk. She, indeed, did her best to
enter into treaties, to trade with him, not to fight
him ; but the State was Christian in name at least,
and this policy of friendliness with Islam ended by
raising an outcry in Christian Europe against the
perfidy of Venice, who, while absorbing her Christian
neighbours in Italy, was in unholy league with infidels

Their Nature and their History 53
in the Levant — an accusation which was of some
weight in the final combination of European Powers
to undo and dismember the Republic. But even had
Venice been unhampered by the suspicions of Europe,
enduring alliance with the Turk was impossible so
long as Venice held possessions in the Levant which
the Turk desired for his own. Wars were inevitable.
Negropont was lost in 1470; Scutari, heroically
defended by Antonio Loredan, in 1474, but sur
rendered by the treaty of 1478, which closed a
disastrous struggle of sixteen years.
Some compensation for such heavy losses was
secured in 1488, when the Republic, as parent and
heir to Caterina Cornaro, her adopted daughter, took
over the kingdom of Cyprus, which Caterina inherited
on the death of her young and handsome husband,
Jacques Lusignan. But this accession of importance
was marred by the harsh, if not treacherous, conduct
by which it was achieved ; and though it seemed an
addition to Venetian magnificence, it was really a
source of weakness, which kept the Republic at feud
with the Turk and led to the outbreak of a fresh
Turkish war. That war was brief and disastrous.
Antonio Grimani, the Venetian admiral, was defeated
at Sapienza ; and the Grand Vizir, with more truth
than politeness, expressed the situation when he
dismissed the Venetian ambassadors by saying :
'You can tell the Doge he has done wedding the
sea ; it is our turn now.'

54 The Lagoons
From yet another quarter misfortune weighed
upon the Republic. In i486 Diaz rounded the Cape
of Good Hope. A new commercial route was opened
to the world. Hitherto all the traffic between East
and West had passed up the Red Sea to Suez, or up
the Persian Gulf to Ormuz, had been conveyed across
the isthmus or through Asia Minor, and shipped
again at Alexandria or Aleppo for the European
markets. Venice, who was mistress of the Levant,
had reaped almost the entire benefit of the carrying
trade, and the city had become the great emporium
and exchange mart between Europe and Asia.
After Diaz's voyage all the wealth of the Indies
could be carried in unbroken cargoes round the
Cape of Good Hope, and would be discharged, not
at any Mediterranean port, but in the harbours of
Portugal, Holland, and the Hanseatic towns. And,
in fact, the Venetian market began to feel the effect
of the new Cape route almost at once. A Venetian
merchant, Priuli, made note in his diary, when he
heard of Vasco da Gama's voyage in 1497, ' This is
the worst piece of news that we could ever have had.'
Thus upon all the three main lines of Venetian
history — her mainland policy, her Levant relations,
her commerce — this third period of the Republic's
existence was closing in gloom. She had acquired
a large landed territory at the price of a European
combination against her. She had failed to protect
Constantinople against the Turk, and was now fighting

Their Nature and their History 55
for her life in the Levant Both mainland and Eastern
policy were making a ruinous strain upon her ex
chequer ; and just at this critical moment the very
foundation and source of her wealth, her Eastern
traffic, was stolen from her by the discovery of the
Cape route.
The League of Cambray, which was joined by the
Emperor, the Pope, the Kings of France, Spain, and
Hungary, the Dukes of Savoy and Ferrara, was
concluded in 1508. Its professed object was to check
the insatiable greed of Venice and to partition her
empire. All the members of the League were to
receive some portion of the widespread territory of
S. Mark ; nothing was to be left to her save the
lagoon islands whence she had originally emerged.
The operations of the League began from Rome. A
bull of excommunication and interdict placed the
Republic outside the pale of the Church. Venice
forbade the publication of the bull, and caused it to
be torn down wherever it had been affixed to the
walls. The King of France followed up the Papal
attack. The battle of Agnadello, fought on May
14th, 1509, annihilated the Venetian army of Alviano,
leaving only Pittigliano's corps, which was too weak
to offer any valid resistance. No protection stood
between the French and the lagoons ; one blow had
paralysed and destroyed the land empire of Venice,
built up at the cost of so much self-sacrifice in men
and money. A large part of the Cambray programme

56 The Lagoons
had been carried out, and by ist June, says Sanudo,
not a town in Lombardy remained to Venice.
But the dilatoriness of the Emperor, who failed to
appear on the scene, and the bad faith of the Pope,
who deserted the League the moment that he had
secured his share — Ravenna, Faenza, Rimini — com
bined to save Venice from total destruction. The
growing jealousy of French successes rendered it
easier to form a league against them ; and three years
after the signature of Cambray for the annihilation
of Venice we find Venice in league with the Pope,
Spain, the Emperor, and the King of England against
their quondam ally France.
Venice was saved from immediate danger of
seeing the enemy actually in the city. The great
game of rivalry between Francis I. and Charles v.
rendered it possible for her always, by a little skilful
management, to secure an ally who could protect her.
For the future Venice is little more than a pawn on
the chessboard of European politics. Her territory
suffered, of course ; French and Spanish armies
marched and counter-marched, towns were besieged,
taken, recovered. But it is not Venice who is the
actor ; she lies exhausted and passive at the feet of
sovereigns too powerful for her to affront.
In 1529 Charles V. effected the settlement of
Italy. Venice returned to her old mainland posses
sions, extending as far as the Adda to the west, the
farthest point she had reached in Foscari's reign ; and

Their Nature and their History 57
the Adda remained her western frontier till the fall
of the Republic. Her days of expansion were over.
The fourth and last period of Venetian history,
from the year 1530 down to the fall of the Republic
in 1797, need not detain us long. The vital, expan
sive power of Venice was dead ; but the State lived
on as a magnificent pageant The city became
a resort of pleasure, which attracted and dazzled
Europe ' Renowned Venice, the admiredest citie in
the world, a citie that Europe is bound" unto, did you
know the rare beauty of the virgin city you would
quickly make love to her : ' so writes the enthusiastic
Englishman, in love, as so many of his countrymen
have been, with this marvellous city in the sea.
Something, too, of old Venetian courage, of self-
sacrifice, seamanship also, remained to animate the
long, though hopeless, struggle with the Turks. The
defence of Cyprus in 1570-71 was a deed as heroic
as any that Venetians had ever achieved. The
names of Marc Antonio Bragadin and Famagosta
are eternally associated on the bead-roll of fame.
Nicosia fell in August of 1570, but Famagosta held
out another year. Household goods, bedding, sacks,
clothes, everything available was used to repair the
breaches ploughed by the Turkish guns. The
women, the monks, the Bishop of Limasol, all took
their turn upon the walls. But the vast numbers of
the Turks enabled them to hurl fresh troops in assault
after assault upon the besieged, who were slowly

58 The Lagoons
worn out, and unrelieved from home. At length, on
August 2nd, Bragadin consented to hoist the white
flag. The Turkish commander's terms were mode
rate ; the brave Oriental respected his courageous
Christian foe. The garrison was to march out with
flags, guns, and church bells. Mustafa supplied the
ships. Everything went smoothly till Bragadin, with
some of his officers, sought the Turkish camp to
surrender the keys of the city. His reception was
cordial, at first. But something suddenly infuriated
Mustafa ; almost before any one knew what had
happened, four of Bragadin's staff" were killed, and
Bragadin himself was first mutilated, then flayed
alive, and his skin, stuffed with straw, was paraded
through the streets under a red umbrella. The
trophy was taken to Constantinople, but was stolen
from the arsenal there in 1580, and is now contained
in an um in the Church of SS. Giovanni e Paolo
in Venice. The loss of Cyprus was partially com
pensated by the great victory of Lepanto, won in
October 1571. The Venetian fleet, under the Doge
Venier, played a notable part in the battle. But the
advantage was not followed up. The Spanish part
of the Christian armament retired into winter quarters.
No blow was struck at Constantinople ; the Turks
soon recovered from their defeat
The defence of Cyprus in the i6th century is
paralleled by the defence of Crete in the 17th.
Equally heroic was the long resistance of Candia, the

Their Nature and their History 59
capital. The last great Venetian commander, Fran
cesco Morosini, made his first appearance on the
scene. But neither his courage, nor the impetuous
bravery of the French volunteers who took service
against the Turk, sufficed to save Crete from the
same fate as Cyprus. In 1669 the last great Vene
tian possession in the Levant passed away from the
Republic for ever. For one brief moment, in 1686 to
1687, the prowess of Francesco Morosini restored the
prestige of Venetian arms. But by 1716 the Turk
was once more in possession of the Morea, and the
peace of Passarowitz closed here the history of the
Republic in the Levant.
Venice spent the closing years of her life in an
atmosphere of refined enjoyment There was a
revival of art and letters in Longhi and that great
master, Tiepolo ; in Gozzi, Goldoni, and Buratti, in
Gaiuppi, Jomelli, and Hasse. It was a charming exist
ence which Venetians and foreigners alike enjoyed.
But the French Revolution loomed ever nearer and
nearer. The portent of Napoleon crossed the Alps.
He hated the close aristocracy which called itself a
Republic : ' Io non voglio piii Inquisitori ; non voglio
piu Senato, saro un Attila per lo Stato Veneto.' And
before Napoleon's ' io voglio,' Doge, Senate, Ten, and
Great Council had to bow their heads. An alteration
in the constitution was voted on the 12th May 1797 ;
the Venetian Republic disappeared from the history
of the world.

THE GONDOLA

I

An intimate knowledge of the lagoons, and of the
people who live upon them, is almost impossible
without the help of the gondola. Any one, therefore,
who has become enamoured of the lagoons and lagoon
life will find himself obliged to make friends with
the gondola. That is no difficult task, for it is an
historical vessel, unique in itself, and a constant source
of admiration and surprise, as one sees its great length
obeying the impulse of its single rower, who guides
it with a skill that takes rank as a fine art. It is the
most charming carriage in the world, and so thoroughly
Venetian that Venice would hardly be Venice without
it There is a sentiment and a flavour of antiquity
about the gondola which it owes to its leisurely,
natural development It is in no sense an inven
tion ; it is a growth directed by the needs of its native
place, bearing on its structure of to-day the impress
of Venetian life and history. Through centuries of
experience the boat has been fashioned and modified,
until at length it has achieved the union of beauty,
ease, and usefulness. The long black skiff", with its
60 **

The Gondola 6i
graceful lines, its swanlike prow sweeping up from the
water, and its gliding movement, is a dear and lovely
feature, the most familiar in the city of the sea. So
perfect is its structure that the poised oarsman behind,
by a delicate turn of his wrist, may guide the boat
whither he will. The gondola is so obedient, and so
admirably adapted to the work it has to do, that,
among all the narrow and intricate canals of Venice,
there are only two points where a gondola may not
pass, even at low water — the one near the great
theatre of the Fenice, and the other near the Palazzo
Mocenigo at San Stae.
The gondola is made for solitude or for company
— the best company, the company of two — as the
fancy may dispose. The rower is out of sight, behind.
Nothing indicates movement but the ripple and the
lap of water under the bows, the slow swaying of the
steel ferro from side to side, and the slower gliding
by of palace fronts. There is no jolt of springs, no
rattle and bang of wheels, no noise of horses' hoofs
upon the road, above all, no dust ; sea and sky are
in your sole possession, and the breeze just born of
the gondola's progress ; there is an infinite liberty of
contemplation secured by space and solitude. Or, in
company, what lounge more admirably arranged than
the cushions of the gondola? You are near your
companion, but not too near ; you may speak without
raising your voice. Would you lean nearer, or lean
away ? You have only to wait the sway of the boat.

62 The Gondola
yield to it, and the thing is done, naturally, not by you,
without any brusquerie, almost unconsciously. "The
gondola lends itself to its master's mood. It is the
boat for leisure, however, and not for business ; the
carriage of a leisured people : there is no hurry in its
movement ; all is quiet and deliberate. Life was not
meant to be bustled through and done with, by the
men who developed the gondola ; and it would be
difficult to discover any greater provocative to utter
idling than this boat of Venice. That was surely a
work of supererogation which the Venetian doctor
undertook when he addressed a treatise to his English
friend upon the art of sitting in a gondola. The art
is all too easy to learn ; it consists in yielding yourself
to the cushions and the boat. The gondola itself
will teach it you without the help of any learned
discourse. The trade of making, cleaning, and repairing gon
dolas is, of course, active in Venice. The gondola
builders are called squerarioli, after their building-
sheds, known as squeri. These squeri are open yards
usually on the borders of some small canal in the
back parts of the town. They are picturesque places
with their sheds, where the new gondolas are built
and the old ones stored. In front of the shed a long
slope leads down to the water's edge ; this is well
plastered with mud so as not to injure the boats when
they are drawn up or sent down into the canal. The
pitch-pot is usually boiling in one corner, and sending

The Gondola 63
up its thick and pungent fumes, while the men, pitch-
blackened, with trousers rolled up, shirt open, and a
saint or a charm hanging around their throats, move
about like demons in inferno, among the smoke and
blaze ; for the pitch must be applied hot, and the
bottoms of the gondolas are often dried by burning
piles of loose straw beneath them, and the flames
leap high into the air.
The first thing to be done in building a gondola
is to choose the various woods of which the boat is
to be made. The wood must be well seasoned, and
without knots, if possible. These points are of even
more importance in the structure of a gondola than
in the case of other boats, for the planks of which
the vessel is made are so thin that they are
liable to warp, and the knots become loosened and
start. When the wood has been chosen, the sque-
rariol begins to lay down the gondola. The govern
ing measurements, of greatest length and greatest
width, are determined by four posts, placed at these
main points. These measurements are permanent ;
and therefore each gondola that is turned out of a
squero resembles, in dimensions, its neighbours that
come from the same workshop, though choice of
wood, care in workmanship, and such infinitesimal
variations as a quarter of an inch in depth or width
will make all the difference to the speed and dura
bility of the boat The operation of building begins
by setting up the stern and bow posts, the asta da

64 The Gondola
foppe and the asta da prova, which are made of oak.
The ribs, or corbe, of walnut, cherry, or elm, are then
laid down — they are flat at the bottom, for the
gondola is a flat-bottomed boat ; and round the
uppermost ends of the ribs, joining them all together,
the binder, or cerchio, of oak is fastened. At the
points where the bow and stern deckings are to
begin, two bands of walnut, rising in the middle,
and called the ponte fossine, run across - the boat,
from one cerchio to the other, and act as a counter
support to the ribs, which might otherwise be
pressed in by the strength of the binder. When this
is finished, the hull of the gondola, as far as its
strength and structural lines go, is complete. It
remains to add the walls, or nomboli, of pine, and
the fondo, or bottom, likewise of pine ; the floor, or
pagiola, rests upon the ribs, and protects the bottom,
which is too delicate to bear treading upon without
danger of starting. The decking of the bows used
to be made of walnut-wood elaborately carved. It
is more usual now to employ pine in large plain
slabs, called fiubone, divided into four compartments
on each side by the cantinele, thin strips of carved
or beaded wood. The little door which closes the
decking in front, and makes the bows a safe store
house for the gondolier's belongings — his oil, lamps,
sand for polishing, coats, old hats, and dinner — is
called the portella ; and the two steps in bows,
by which one embarks or lands, are the trastolini.

The Gondola 65
The squerariol has only to furnish the two forcole,
or rowlocks, and the foot-rest, or ponta piede, the
sloping piece of wood under the rower's hind foot,
whence he launches himself forward to the stroke,
and his part in the construction of the gondola is
finished ; for the oars, of beechwood, are bought
elsewhere. It must be observed that the gondola is not built
to lie perfectly flat upon the water ; it is tilted slightly
to one side, the side of the forcola da poppe, and is
about two inches deeper in the water on that side
than on the other. Moreover, if a straight line be
drawn the whole length of the boat, from the asta
da poppe to the asta da prova, it will divide the boat
into two unequal parts. The side on which jthe hind
rower stands is considerably larger than the other ;
and the cerchio, or outer line, on the side of the forcola
da prova, is longer and makes a wider curve than the
cerchio on the side oi the forcola da poppe. This tilt is
given to the gondola by cutting away the corbe on the
side of the forcola da poppe so that the angle which
they offer to the water, at the junction of sides and
bottom, is more gentle than on the side where the
hind rower stands. On that side, too, the gondola,
as we have seen, presents a broader bottom to the
water, and therefore more resistance ; and thus the
weight of the rower, which, if the boat lay quite flat
on the water, would raise his forcola too high, destroy
the balance of the gondola, and injure his control, is
E

66 The Gondola
counteracted, and the boat is rendered perfectly
obedient. So far the gondola will have cost three hundred lire.
But there is a great deal to be done yet, before it
is complete in all respects. In the first place, there
are the iron finishings for the bow and the stern.
These are not made at the squero, but at some smith's
shop, and must be thought about and bargained for
separately. Each part of that singular beak, or
rostrum, which ornaments the bows of a gondola has
its own name. The large hatchet-like head is called
the palamento, or blade. Below the palamento come
the six teeth, or broche, projecting outwards ; and
between the broche, in each alternate space, are three
spine, or steel pins, which help to fasten the ferro to
the gondola. In a line with the topmost broca, but
projecting towards the inside ofthe gondola, is another
tooth called the contra-broca. Below the six teeth
comes a long thin strip of steel which curves under
the bows and clings close to the boat, and helps to
keep the whole ferro in its place ; this is called the
paletta. These various parts complete the ferro da
prova. The ferro da poppe is much simpler, being, in
fact, a curve of plain steel, rounding and finishing the
stern-post A ferro, to be perfect, should have the
edges of its broche in one straight line ; but in these
days of hurried workmanship a good ferro is not
always to be found. They used to be made of hand-
wrought iron, light and pliant, that would bend and

The Gondola 67
not break if they came in contact with a bridge. Now,
the new ferri are cast in moulds, and are heavy and
brittle. A good gondolier will, very likely, possess
an old ferro, which may have been an heirloom in
his family for many years ; for the ferri, if properly
cared for and not allowed to rust, are indestructible,
and will outlive many gondolas. The price of the
ferri complete is about one hundred lire ; so that as
yet our gondola has cost four hundred lire.
But, besides the hull and the ferramento, there is
yet a third department to be considered before the
gondola is fully equipped : the feize, tenda, stramazzeti
or cushions, and puzioli or arm-rests, with their brass
fittings of sea-horses, dolphins, harps, or columns.
The feize, or little house in which the passenger sits,
secure from rain or wind, is the most expensive item
in the gondola. It is made of a strong wooden frame,
thickly covered with woollen cloth, always black, and
ornamented by tufts of silk or wool dotted along the
roof It has a door and two windows, and a little
brass shrine for the picture of the patron saint. The
door and all the inside is made of walnut-wood,
stained black and richly carved, frequently with
scenes from Tasso. The mountings of the feize are
of brass ; and the cost of the whole will be about
five hundred lire. The tenda, or summer awning, is
a modern device, so modern that the more conserva
tive among the Venetian families are slow to adopt
it. It was introduced for the convenience of foreigners.

68 The Gondola
and is really extraneous to the gondola. Yet it must
be admitted that the tenda adds considerably to the
enjoyment of the boat in summer weather; and its
pale creamy curtains, lined with blue, help to relieve
that monotony of black, which is sometimes charged
against the gondola. The carpet, the cushions, and
arm-rests must be added, and then the gondola is com
plete. These last items will cost about two hundred
lire more ; and that will bring the whole price of a
new gondola up to one thousand one hundred lire.
A young gondolier, just starting in life, is not likely
to have such a sum by him ; so the practice is to pay
down a certain amount at once, both to the squerariol
and to the fornitore, who supplies the carpets and
cushions, and to guarantee the discharge of the re
mainder in monthly or quarterly instalments. When
a gondola is new, it is left unpainted on the outside
for the first year, as an intimation of its youth, and
also as a sort of guarantee to any possible purchaser ;
the value of a gondola falls immediately after it is
painted, for then it is impossible to ascertain the
condition of the wood and the presence or absence
of knots.
The gondoliers soon become devotedly attached
to their own boats, studying their characters and
learning their peculiarities ; for each gondola has a
character and temperament of its own, in spite of the
fact that they are all built on the same model and
look so much alike, and a gondolier's skill in rowing

ta coitdit:cuit ptfampliaic
circa ixctga:dnp45:o.non
a pafto?ib'ficutftoma:f5
a pO(entio»b^z oitiohbtis
j(Huncii)]:'aducni6: iUic'.^6
Bfecutiocj attUcofugtctib^
IPitu e 1 lutno ejctollendu
laudis p2ecotno:pottiiiVe a
tot taq3 Diuerfis v^biu t op
pido ^ VP Its odita ciuit ate :
gaitosmtUc cutaliincre''
iiicto acfifie fpl^do?e:vna'
iiiiiticurasacuate ofu'are.

dcrtctiaromdultae

FROM EATDOLT's 'FASCICULUS TEMPOEUM,' 1480

70 The Gondola
largely depends upon his knowledge of his boat. He
and his gondola become one. A community of
interests is established between them which soon
ripens into affection ; and his duty to his gondola is
at least as binding on the conscience of a good
gondolier as his duty to his family or his neighbour.
He spends hours every day in sponging, scrubbing,
and drying his boat ; and soon comes to know every
nail in its hull, and every scratch upon its steel or
brass. I have heard of a gondolier who identified,
swore to, and recovered a pair of sea-horses that had
been stolen from him, on the strength of certain
almost invisible scratches, which had escaped the
notice of the thief, or which the thief trusted would
be unknown to the owner.
With so much uncovered metal in the fittings of
a gondola, it is clear that the chief labour connected
with the maintenance of the boat will be to keep
these metals in a state of high polish. The brass-
work does not give so much trouble ; but the least
drop of rain or dew, if it is allowed to settle for
some hours upon the ferri, will produce a rust
spot which may take months of scrubbing to re
move. And this implies a polishing and oiling
of all the steel-work twice a day in wet weather —
a matter of at least an hour and a half Indeed,
the readiest way to determine whether a man who
offers his services is a good gondolier or not is
to give a glance at his ferro ; that will show his

The Gondola 71
professional character in a moment. But besides
the metal fittings, the hull of the gondola requires
constant attention to keep it free of weeds which
foul its bottom, and to protect it from the deadly
teredo which so rapidly bores through its planking.
Once every three months in winter, and at least once
every twenty days in summer, when the sea is warm
and the weeds grow fast, the gondola must be sent
to the squero. There it is hauled on shore, scraped,
dried, either by the sun or by a fire of straw, and
plentifully anointed with grease. This operation
makes a most surprising difference to the speed of
the boat ; and a little practice will soon let one
know whether the gondola has lately been to the
squero, or ought to be sent there. The process of
cleaning occupies a whole day ; so that a gondolier
not only loses a day's work, but has to pay besides
about four lire, the cost of the operation ; and this,
in summer, is a serious tax upon his monthly earnings.
But, on the whole, it repays a gondolier to attend
punctually to his boat If he does so, it will last
him in excellent order for at least five years. At
the end of that time he can sell the hull for eighty or
a hundred lire, keeping, of course, the feize, tenda,
cushions, and other furnishings for his new boat.
A gondola of five or six years old will probably find
its way to one of the less frequented ferries, where
it will do duty for another five years, gradually
losing its graceful curves and form as the woodwork

72 The Gondola
fails, till at length it becomes a gobbo, with its bows
no longer sweeping up in a proud curve, but buried in
the water. Then its day is over. It is fit for nothing
but to be sold for five lire, broken up, and burned in
the glass furnaces of Murano, the crematory of most
ancient gondolas. II
So far we have followed the construction, the
birth, life, and death of a modern gondola. But a
boat of this elaborate character did not come into
being and reach perfection in a single day. Its
development, or natural history, was a slow and long-
drawn process, regulated partly by necessity, and
partly by the movement of life in Venice that pro
duced it. As the city grows in wealth and luxury,
we can observe the growth of that singular carriage
which is so intimately connected with all our associa
tions of Venice.
A race of people who had made their home upon
the sea could not exist without a water-carriage ;
the bare fact of their dwelling-place implied an
intimate connection with boats. And long before
the Venetians had gathered together at Rialto,
while they were still scattered about among their
twelve federated townships, the earliest authentic
document relating to Venice, a letter of Cassiodorus,
Theodoric's secretary, notes the light boats that
were to the Venetians as horses tied to the doors

The Gondola 73
of their houses. And later, in the year 837, William
of Apulia, a Norman poet, describing the habits of the
Venetians, allies of the Byzantine Emperor against
his race, has the following passage : —
' For this race
Hath made its dwelling within sea-girt walls ;
Nor is there passage found from house to house.
Save by the skiffs that bear them o'er the tide.'
The boat, from the very earliest days, was an
essential element in the economy of the lagoons. But
it is certain that these boats were unlike the modern
gondola. More probably they resembled the light
boats with pointed bows which the Venetians call
barchette. The word 'gondola' does not occur till
the twelfth century, and then not at Venice, but at
Avignon. The derivation of the name is still an open
question. But the view which has obtained most
general acceptance is that which connects the word
with the Latin cymba and Greek icvfi^r], the light
boat in which Charon ferried souls across the Styx.
Charon's boat, as it is represented on gems and
marbles, resembles the barchetta, and Charon himself
uses a paddle to guide his boat behind. To this
day, the passenger across a Venetian ferry lays his
obol on the gunwale of the gondola, much as Charon's
ghostly fares were wont to do.
The word 'gondola' occurs for the first time as
the name of a Venetian boat in the ancient Chronicle
of Altino (cir. 1200), where we learn that the Patriarch

74 The Gondola
of Grado enjoyed all the rights of shooting and
fishing in the lagoons beyond Torcello, and the
inhabitants were bound to furnish him with boats
and ' gondolas.' ' Gondola,' therefore, was probably
the generic Venetian name for all boats of the
barchetta build, and remained attached to that par
ticular barchetta form which subsequently emerged
as the modern gondola. With the help of illuminated
manuscripts, designs and plans of Venice, engravings
and pictures, we can trace the development of the
barchetta into the gondola.
The earliest picture of a gondola, or rather of a
barchetta, from which I believe the gondola to be
developed, dates, as far as I am aware, from the
fifteenth century only. Yet the boat there represented
is so simple in construction, that we may take it for
certain that it has varied very slightly from its most
primitive form. The picture is to be found as an
illustration to a manuscript legend of Saint Peter and
Saint Andrew. Saint Peter is trying to walk to shore,
and Saint Andrew remains in his boat, a light skiff,
rising at the bow and stern, of perfectly simple struc
ture, without ^.ny ferri and possessing one forcola only.
There is a touch of reality about this little picture
which proves it to have been drawn by some one
who knew the gondola, and gives it the •value of
true observation ; for Saint Andrew, in horror at his
companion's rashness, has clasped his hands and
unshipped his oar, unshipping it exactly as a modern

76 The Gondola
gondolier would do, by taking it out of the forcola
and allowing the blade to trail flat upon the water.
The precise date of this illumination is not known,
but it must belong to the beginning of the fifteenth
century. The next illustration of a gondola which we have
bears the date of 1480. It is reproduced on page 69.
Then in a view of Venice attached to Breydenbach's
' Peregrinatio ad Sanctum Sepulcrum,' we see a
gondola represented, of the same construction as
that in the illumination, only in this case there are
two rowers and therefore two forcole, though the
German landsman has naively placed them both on
the same side, thereby shaking our confidence in his
powers of observation. This gondola has no fefri,
but it has a rudimentary feize, an arched covering of
cloth supported on four sticks and leaving all the
sides open. If we can trust Breydenbach's view on
such a minute point, we at once find the reason why
these early gondolas had no ferri, and at the same
time we learn the exact value and meaning of the
common word approdare, to land ; for here we see
that all the gondolas come to shore prow foremost,
and that the passenger embarks by the bows, which
the modern ferro would not allow him to do.
Breydenbach's picture is confirmed by the magni
ficent plan of Venice attributed to Albert Diirer,
bearing date 'MD.,' which shows us a gondola of
exactly similar construction, and with the same

The Gondola 77
rudiments of ^e feize. At the close of the fifteenth
century the gondola had reached this stage of its
development : it was a light, short boat, with no
ornament of ferri, and possessing only the most
primitive fclzc ; it was usually rowed by one man
only, and two gondoliers, if they were ever used,
were a sign of unwonted splendour and luxury.
The next two centuries, the sixteenth and seven
teenth, were the great period of Venetian magnificence
and pomp ; and the gondola shared in the national
movement For this period we have abundant docu
ments in the pictures of the Academy and of the
ducal palace The pictures of Carpaccio and Bellini,
belonging partly to the close of the fifteenth century,
show us Venice in its ceremonial aspect ; and from
them we learn the point where the sumptuous develop
ment of the gondola was about to begin. In the
pictures of these masters, the boat still retains the
simple original form of a barchetta ; but the felzi have
become much richer in material and in workmanship.
They are covered with fine stuff's embroidered in
patterns of bright colours, though still open on all
sides and giving shelter above only. The adornment
of the feize was the point of departure for that
excessive luxury which gave rise to so many abortive
sumptuary laws. But the Government itself led the
way in this extravagance by spending large sums on
the fittings of a gondola and its feize, which they sent
as a present to the King of Portugal in the year 1501.

78 The Gondola
At the close of that same century and the opening
of the next, the form of the gondola underwent a
great change, and approached, for the first time, to
the character it at present possesses. The massive
steel ferro, with all its armament of teeth, was added
at a bound. There is a curious engraving in Franco's
rare book, Habiti d'Huomeni et Donne Venetiane, of
the year 1580, which bears for title, ' This is the way
the bride goes in her gondola,' and shows us a
wedding party crossing the lagoons. The gondolas
of the bride and her suite have a ferro at the stern
and a ferro at the bows ; and the stern ferro re
mained in use for a whole century, after which it
was exchanged for the simple steel band which now
prevails. Various reasons have been suggested to explain
the adoption of the ferro ; none, however, seems
satisfactory. It is said that the ferro was introduced
as a measure to allow a gondolier to judge whether
he could pass under any particular bridge ; if his
ferro passed, then he knew that his gondola with
its feize could also pass. Others maintain that the
ferro at the bow acted as a counter-weight to the
rower behind ; biit this theory is destroyed by the
fact that the earliest ferri were attached to both bow
and stern, leaving the balance of the boat just where
it was. Much more probably the ferri were added
for ornament and nothing more.
Another remarkable change in the gondola of

The Gondola 79
1580 is the further growth of the felzc in size and
splendour The fclze of the bride's gondola, in this
same engraving by Franco, is wrought in silk with
heavy fringes, and is closed on either side ; the seat,
too, which in Bellini's time was a hard-backed, or
backless, bench, has now become a cushioned lounge,
not far removed in comfort from the downy softness
of a modem stratnazzeto. The felzi did not as yet
possess a door ; nor were they closed in behind, as
are the felzi of to-day. But the baticopo, or long pall
of cloth, which fell from the top of the feize behind,
and so, in a manner, closed it, was already in use.
The frequent decrees of the Proveditori alle pompe,
the sumptuary magistrates, during the sixteenth and
seventeenth centuries, continually disregarded and
continually repeated, serve best to illustrate the
extent to which luxury in the adornment of the
gondola was carried. The series opens with an
order forbidding the use of colour in the coverings of
^e felzi. All felzi are to be draped in coarse black
woollen stuff"; fine cloth, silk, fringes, and hangings
are declared illegal. All carving, gilding, inlaying
with ebony, ivory, or precious wood is forbidden ; all
steel and metal work must be perfectly plain — neither
carved, chased, nor wrought in any fashion. The
Government experienced the greatest difficulty in
enforcing these regulations, for the nobles were bitten
by a mania for display, and were always ready to
surpass their neighbours in splendour on the slightest

8o The Gondola
pretext, and as occasion offered. One result, however,
of these laws remains to this day in the sombre black
which universally characterises the gondola.
The foreign ambassadors alone were exempt from
the stringent decrees against colour and decoration ;
and they availed themselves of their privilege. Each
ambassador, when he first came to Venice, sought not
merely to outdo his predecessor, but to eclipse the
representatives of other courts. The ambassador of
France in the year 1672, the Count d'Avaux, shall
speak for himself In a despatch to his master, Louis
XIV., he thus describes his entry into Venice : ' As
for my gondolas,' he says, ' since I must mention
them, for the gondolas here are a part of the embassy,
I have to inform you that instead of 2. feize of black
velvet with gold fringes in my first gondola, and a
feize with silk fringes in the second, I put the feize of
black velvet in the second, and a feize of damask in
the third, and for the first gondola I have invented
something new by using a feize of azure velvet
wrought with fleurs-de-lys in embroidery, and by
covering the seats with the same velvet and gold
fringes, the finest I could procure. I desired also to
have four gondoliers, though hitherto the ambassadors
have used three only.' But M. d'Avaux, for all his
pains, was surpassed by M. Amelot, who represented
France at the ducal palace ten years later, in 1682.
' Of the five gondolas of the ambassador, the first and
second were all of gilded carving, enriched by a great

The Gondola 83
number of figures and reliefs. The felzi and all the
furnishings inside, the carpets and seats, were of
crimson velvet for the first, and azure velvet for the
second, embroidered with gold in a very beautiful
pattern. The remaining gondolas were likewise
enriched with figures and ornaments in black and
gold, and hung with damask' These ambassadorial
entries were among the most magnificent of those
spectacles on which the sea city prided herself ; and
we may imagine how the pleasure-loving people of
Venice delighted in the show.
It was only in the eighteenth century that the gon
dola underwent its final modifications and assumed
that form which it now possesses. By the middle
of that century the vessel's career of development
came to a close ; and the gondolas of Guardi's
pictures are exactly like the gondolas of to-day.
The ferro at the stem has disappeared ; that on
the bow is no longer a round club of steel, but has
been broadened into the hatchet-head of the modern
boat. The whole gondola has been lengthened to
gain speed ; and ihe feize has received its door and
glass windows. In short, the type of the gondola
was fixed by the year 1740; and only one part of
the furnishings remained to be added in the present
century — the tenda, with its curtains and hangings
of cream-coloured canvas, sometimes lined with blue
for greater luxury.
What further touch of refinement or of comfort

84 The Gondola
the ingenuity of the gondoliers may hit upon, before
the gondola disappears for ever, it is hard to foresee.
Thanks to its ancient birth, its slow development, and
the loving care which has always tended it, the
gondola seems to have achieved the position of the
most perfect carriage in the world.

THE TRAGHETTI
The traghetti of Venice, the ferries that cross the
Grand Canal, or ply from point to point on the
Giudecca, are a feature no less peculiar to the city
than are the gondolas themselves, and they are quite
as ancient. There are as many as sixteen of these
ferries across the Grand Canal and the Giudecca ;
and each of them has its own history, its own archives
and documents. For from its foundation each
traghetto was a guild, a close corporation with a
limited number of members, with its own particular
rules, or mariegole, inscribed on parchment in Gothic
characters, and adorned with capitals painted in ver
milion, and here and there an illuminated page
showing the patron saint of the traghetto, or the
Assumption of Madonna into heaven. The mariegole
of the various traghetti, in their old Venetian bindings
of morocco and gold, may still be seen in the archives
of the Frari ; and a singular fascination attaches to
the ancient, time-stained parchment which contains
the history of that system of self-government which
was developed by the gondoliers during five centuries
of Venetian story, and whose rules are expressed in

86 The Traghetti
rich and vigorous dialect. The earliest of these
mariegole belongs to the traghetto of Santa Sofia,
near the Rialto, and dates from the year 1 344 ; the
traghetto itself, however, was probably much older.
Yet the same regulations and customs which governed
the gondoliers in the fourteenth century hold good
in the nineteenth. A traghetto of to-day closely
resembles a traghetto of 1 300, though the years have
overlaid its lines with dust ; it is still a corporation,
with property and endowments of its own ; the same
officers, under the same titles, still keep order among
the brothers ; only the whole institution has a some
what ancient air, is marred by symptoms of decay,
and we fear that it may not last much longer.
Indeed, the history and internal arrangement of the
traghetti offer the best example of that which
makes the subject of gondolier life interesting to the
student of antiquity ; for the traghetti are, in fact,
a genuine part of the Venetian Republic imbedded
in united Italy — a fossil survival unique in the history
of the country, and perhaps in that of the world.
The date at which the first traghetto was estab
lished — that is, when the gondoliers plying for hire
first formed themselves into a guild at their ferry — is
not known ; but such a guild was certainly in exist
ence before the middle of the fourteenth century. A
corporation of this natuue was called a scuola at
Venice ; and from the very first these schools of the
gondoliers were of a religious character, dedicated to

The Traghetti 87
a patron saint, and in close connection with the
church of the parish where the ferry was situated.
This is the way in which the scuola of Santa Maria
Zobenigo opens its book of rules : ' In the name of
God, the Eternal Father, and of His Son Misser Jesu
Cristo, and of His glorious mother, the Virgin Mary,
and of the thrice-blessed patron Misser San Marco,
and of Misser San Gregorio, who are the guardians
of us the boatmen at the traghetto of San Gregorio
and Santa Maria Zobenigo ' may they help each and
all of us brothers to live in fear of the Lord God and
with peace and brotherly love between us, first in
health and prosperity and then to salvation of our
souls and the remission of our sins.' And in their
parish church the brothers of each scuola had a special
place appointed for them, usually under the organ,
where they sat in a body on Sundays, their officers at
the head of each bench. The first section of the
rules which governed the schools invariably applies to
Church observances : ' The • school pledges itself to
keep a lamp burning day and night before the altar.
. . . Every second Sunday in the month they shall
cause a solemn Mass to be sung. . . . Every Monday
an ordinary Mass. . . . Every brother shall be obliged
to confess twice a lyear, or at least once',' and if, after
a warning, he remain impenitent, he shall be expelled.
A brother who made the pilgrimage to Loretto, for
the good of his soul, or of his body, was entitled to
one centesimo a day while his journey lasted. ' Those

88 The Traghetti
brothers who continue to live publicly in any deadly
sin, shall be admonished, and expelled unless they
amend.' The fines for disobedience and quarrel
someness were ' appHcate alia Madonna,' that is, they
formed a fund for keeping an oil-lamp burning at the
shrine of the Madonna, 'par luminar la Madonna.'
And the first fare taken at the traghetto each morn
ing was dedicated to the same purpose, and was
called the ' parada della Madonna.'
But these schools were not founded for pious pur
poses solely. They were, in fact, benefit societies
composed of the gondoliers at each traghetto, their
wives and sisters, and, sometimes, a certain number of
poor belonging to the parish. The benefits which the
members obtained in return for their subscription may
be gathered from the second section of the mariegole,
which indicates the duties of the school. ' Of visiting
the sick ' is the first. The chief officer of the school,
the gastaldo, was bound to visit each sick brother ;
and in any case where illness lasted more than three
days, the sick man was entitled to a small sum daily
from the funds. ' Of watching by the sick : ' each
brother might claim a fitting number of watchers by
his deathbed. Any member whose estate could not
bear the expenses of his funeral was buried at the
charges of the school. The school was bound to send
the proper number of torches to the funeral of any
brother who died out of the parish ; and if he died
in the parish the whole fraternity attended, with their

The Traghetti 89
cross and banner. The obligation of one brother to
another endured beyond the limits of Venice ; and
each member had a claim upon the purse and the
assistance of every other member, wherever they might
meet, the school pledging itself to make good the
loan to the lender, up to a certain point.
The last duty of a school was to keep order among
its members and to guarantee their conduct as good
citizens, while it protected their interests. ' If any
quarrel shall arise between the brothers,' so run the
rules, ' within eight days of being admonished they
must make peace together. ... If any member do
or consent to any act hostile to the honour of the
Venetian State, or of Misser the Doge, he shall be
denounced and expelled. . . . Those who play the
game of dice must abandon it within a month of
being warned. ... If any one be insolent to the
Gastaldo he shall at once be expelled. . . . No one
may speak in chapter without the Gastaldo's consent ;
nor may the Gastaldo suffer any one to speak except
to the point . . . Those who disobey the orders of the
school, with them shall the school be at enmity in life
and in death. . . . He who shall compass the destruc
tion of the school, he has God the Father omnipotent
and the Holy Spirit against him ; and may he be
given into the pit of Hell with Judas the traitor.'
So far for the maintenance of order ; while, for
purposes of self-defence, a corporation, with funds,
organisation, and representatives, all recognised by

90 The Traghetti
the Government, could act much more eff'ectively in
the protection of its corporate interests than a private
individual was able to do. There are instances of
a traghetto appealing to the Supreme Court from the
adverse decision of a lower magistracy, and winning
its case.
The advantages conferred by these schools were
so considerable and so obvious, that not only did
every traghetto establish one, but other classes of
boatmen — the burchieri, or bargees, for example —
applied for leave to found a school. The petition
of the burchieri is a curious document It is ad
dressed to the Council of Ten, and sets forth 'that
this glorious lagoon is constantly in need of dredging,
and should your excellencies grant our prayer, you
will always have barges at your disposal for this pur
pose. Moreover, if we be allowed to found a school,
we shall put an end to the dirt and noise on the
Grand Canal, under your windows. And we promise
to pay eighty ducats, yearly, to the Water Commis
sioners. And on the festival of the Ascension we will
make a triumph with our barges, to accompany the
Doge when he goes to wed the sea.'
There is a fact about the nationality of the gon
doliers in the fifteenth century which is worth noticing
in passing. From the lists of the members of each
traghetto it appears that less than half were natives
of Venice. Some hail from Treviso, from Ravenna,
Padua, Bergamo, Brescia, or Vicenza; very many

The Traghetti 91
from Sal6, on the lake of Garda ; but by far the
largest number come from the Dalmatian coast, from
Sebenico, Zara, Segna, Traii, Spalato. A century
later these foreign names had disappeared. The
gondoliers had either become-, for the most part,
Venetians proper, or, more probably, the foreign
names had been dropped, as the families took root in
their new home. However that may be, the men
who first established these schools, with their admirable
system of government, were chiefly foreigners and
not Venetians. In fact, the citizens of Venice ceased
to be sailors early in their history. At the present
day the crews of the trading ships are all drawn
from Chioggia, Pelestrina, and Burano, or else from
the Istrian and Dalmatian coast ; and in early times
the Venetians produced great shipowners and sea
captains, but they rarely manned either their mer
chantmen or their war-galleys.
Every gondolier who worked at a traghetto be
longed, ipso facto, to the scuola of that traghetto ; and
his title was barcariol del traghetto, to distinguish
him from his natural enemy the barcariol toso, or
loose gondolier, who went about poaching on the con
fines of the various ferries, and stealing a fare when
ever he could. The Venetian administration desired
that the gondoliers of the traghetti should be, as far
as possible, a self-governing body, subject only to the
occasional supervision of a Government department
The departments responsible for the regulation of the

92 The Traghetti
gondoliers varied at different epochs. For example,
the traghetti were originally under the magistracy of
the Giustitia Vecchia ; that was superseded by the
Proveditori di Comun ; then, in virtue of the law
which rendered all the traghetti liable to supply men
' for service in the navy, the college of the Milizia da
Mar obtained a concurrent voice in the government
of the gondoliers. The disorders which followed on
the disastrous League of Cambray necessitated a
special commission to revise all arts and trades,
including that of gondolier ; and when that com
mission was withdrawn, the Censors were intrusted
with the maintenance of order at the traghetti.
The form of government which the schools adopted
under the sanction of the Venetian authorities, was
the same at all the traghetti. The whole body of
brothers composed the chapter of the school, which
was supreme. The chapter held its meetings in
the church of the patron saint, and on that saint's
festival it elected its officers for the year. From the
chapter the officers received their instructions as to
the application of the guild property ; and it was the
chapter which decided all questions touching the ex
istence or well-being of the corporation. The chief
officer, the gastaldo, was the official representative of
the school, recognised by the Government, and held
responsible by them for the good behaviour of the
brothers and for the payment of all Government taxes.
The gastaldo presided at the chapter ; and together

The Traghetti 93
with the two compagni and the scrivano, or secretary,
who were elected at the same time as himself, he kept
all the accounts, and disbursed all moneys in the
name of the school. By the laws of the fraternity
he was bound to balance the books and to go through
the inventory of the school property once every
month. The office of gastaldo lasted one }'ear ; and
three years had to elapse before a gondolier who
had been a gastaldo was re-eligible for the post
In the early life of the schools the office oi gastaldo
was sought and prized. But the law which made
the gastaldi responsible for the taxes of their respec
tive traghetti, combined with the disorder and poverty
which came upon the traghetti during the sixteenth
century, rendered the post more onerous than agree
able : and the gondoliers adopted every device to
avoid election, or, if elected, they left their ferry and
took to hiding for their year of office. Matters
reached such a pass that the Government was obliged
to fine any gondolier who refused to serve ; and if
he left his traghetto after his election, he thereby
forfeited his licence to ply as gondolier.
The gastaldo was the chief officer of the guild, and
as councillors he had two compagni, and, later on, two
sindics. These five men formed the executive, and
were called the bancali, from the banca or cross
bench on which they sat when the fraternity met in
chapter. All cases of disorder or disobedience among
the members came before the bancali, and were tried

94 The Traghetti
by them. And very hard work they found it to keep
order among the younger gondoliers, who were
always behaving ' with little fear of God or of the
world,' as their elders phrase it. In any extreme
case where their authority was defied, the bancali
could always appeal to the Government for support,
and the result was the arrest and imprisonment of the
offender. For example, the bancali of Santa Sofia, in
the year 1518, applied for power to fine their trouble
some lads. Their petition runs thus : ' In the name
of God and of our Lady, and of Misser San Marco,
chief and governor of this thrice noble city, the
which may God preserve and maintain by sea and
land, and in the name of our protector, Misser San
Zuan, chief and patron of this our blessed guild,
which belongs to the men of the traghetto of Santa
Sofia. Seeing that there is great riot among us
boatmen, and seeing that the banca has endeavoured
to provide for the abatement of the said errors and
misdeeds, we pray you now to make provision for
these disorders by proclamation of imprisonment and
fine, because there are come among us some who
have bought their liberties at this traghetto, and who
have become lions of San Doni, so that neither young
nor old can live by reason of their threatenings and
their readiness to break the heads and arms of old and
young, of passengers and even of foreigners who come
to give us the hire whereby we live.' Recourse to the
Government, however, was seldom adopted, for it was

The Traghetti 95
naturally unpopular ; and the mariegole of the schools
gave their bancali sufficient powers in the way of fines,
suspension, or expulsion to enable them to keep order.
Under the bancali came the six deacons for the
men and six deaconesses for the women. These
deacons divided all the non-official members of the
school into six companies, each with a deacon at its
head. The duties of the deacons were to attend the
sick, to arrange the funerals of the dead, and to
answer to the gastaldo for the subscriptions and the
taxes of their respective companies.
The government of the school, then, was composed
of the bancali and the deacons. The election of new
members took place in chapter and by ballot of the
whole school, the bancali presiding. The entrance fee
was fixed by law, in the year 1461, at one ducat ; but
this sum was steadily, though illegally, increased, till
in the year 1774 it amounted to five ducats or thirty-
one lire. Besides the entrance fee, custom required the
new member to give a breakfast and a dinner to the
brothers of the traghetto ; and under this heading the
school made larger and larger demands, mounting
from two ducats to as much as ten. The entrance
fees and the yearly subscriptions formed the fixed
revenue of the school. But there was a method by
which the brothers could raise an extra sum of money
for any special expenses, such as the repair of the
landing-places, or to meet extraordinary taxes, such as
that imposed on the traghetti for the support of the

96 The Traghetti
fugitive nuns of Candia. The method was to let
certain extra places at the traghetto over and above
the number which was fixed by law. To do this the
traghetto had to obtain a special leave from the Govern
ment This is the petition of the gondoliers of Santa
Sofia, in the year 1537, addressed to the Proveditori
di Comun : ' Most illustrious Proveditori, it is as easy
for us poor gondoliers of Santa Sofia to supply the
Government with ten men for the navy at such exces
sive cost, as it is to fly to heaven. For we have many
old men at our traghetto who, seeing that the taxes
are so heavy, and that they live only by letting their
place on the traghetto, can scarcely keep soul and body
together for themselves and their poor families. We
therefore beg your leave to let three more boats on
our traghetto. The revenue from these to be applied
to furnishing ten men for the navy. These three new
comers to be over and above our full complement
of forty, but to take the place of the first three who
die, so that the traghetto may return to its ordinary
number. We are very poor, and have only fifteen
sound men who can pay all their dues. The rest
are either sickly or old.' The revenue which the
traghetti derived from the sale of these extra places —
liberties, as they were called — varied with the good
ness of the ferry itself — that is, with the amount of
traffic that passed over it — and also with the condition
of the city at the time ; war, plague, and heavy taxes
always reduced the sum paid for a liberty. But,

TR-\.GHETTiJ OF SAN i A MARIA ZOBENIGO.

The Traghetti 99
allowing all weight to these considerations, the
differences were surprisingly great For example, at
Santa Maria Zobenigo, in the year 161 8, a liberty
sold for one hundred and ninety-five ducats, while at
Santa Lucia, at the same date, the price was only
seventy-three ducats, and at the piazzetta only ten
ducats. And again, as illustrating the variations at
the same traghetto, the highest price paid for a liberty
at Santa Maria Zobenigo was three hundred and
twenty-four ducats ; the lowest, during the great
plague of 163 1, seventy-one ducats.
The scuole, it is true, exist no longer in all their
clearly defined constitution ; the passage of time has
broken down this structure of the early gondoliers.
But the traghetti still survive, and each is governed
by its ancient officials, its gastaldo and bancali. The
bancali are still responsible for the good order of the
men ; they arrange the rotations of service ; they see
to the cleanness and safety of the landing-places ;
they retain their powers of trying, fining, or suspending
a refractory brother ; if the city authorities have any
orders to issue, they communicate with the gastaldo
and bancali; these officers are a true survival from
the fourteenth century, with their duties, character,
and powers undiminished by the lapse of years. And
the arrangements which these officers made of old
for the good govemment of their traghetti retain their
force in the Venice of to-day. In no profession are
antique words more frequently to be found than in

lOO The Traghetti
that of. gondolier ; the customs and phrases of their
trade seem to have become hereditary in the blood
of the boatmen, though it is only when modern
regulations are imposed upon them that the men
discover how deeply seated is their attachment to
their ancient art
The arrangements of the traghetti are simple and
efficient to maintain order; for though the noise is
often great, and a stranger might well believe that
the men spent the larger part of their time in
quarrelling, yet, as a matter of fact, a serious quarrel
between two brothers, while on duty, rarely occurs.
The internal arrangements of a traghetto will be most
easily understood by taking a typical instance, the
traghetto of Santa Maria Zobenigo. Each traghetto
will present slight variations upon its neighbours ;
but the general scheme of arrangement is the same
at all. The traghetto of Santa Maria Zobenigo has
one other traghetto, that of San Maurizio, and one
station, that of the Ponte delle Ostreghe, attached to
it, and worked by the men of Santa Maria. Besides
serving these three posts, the gondoliers have duty at
the neighbouring hotel ; and lastly there is the patula,
or night service, which will be explained presently.
All the members of the traghetto, forty-two in all,
are divided into six companies, each of which works
in rotation as follows : — One day at San Maurizio,
one day at Santa Maria Zobenigo, one day at the
Ponte delle Ostreghe ; then come the two most

The Traghetti loi
important and profitable days for work, at the hotel,
alia Locanda, and the pattda. One of the companies
is on dut}' at the hotel each day, and the men answer
in turn to the hotel porter's summons of poppe a uno
or a due, as one or two rowers are required. It is
well to remember that, should one wish to secure a
particular gondolier, he must be called by his number ;
the rules df the tragJutto forbid him to answer to his
name. After the service at the hotel comes the
patula, or service of twenty-four hours at the principal
ferry. The fare for ihe parada, or passage, from one
side to the other, is five centesimi during the day, and
ten after the great bell of Saint Mark's has sounded
at evening. The reason why this service of the
patula is so profitable is the following : the service
lasts from nine a.m. till the following nine A.M. ; at
four P.M. all the men, except those belonging to the
company on duty, leave the traghetto, thus reducing
the numbers to a sixth, and increasing the gains.
From four P.M. till nine A.M. the men on the patula
have the ferry all to themselves, and take all the hire
that comes, both for services of an hour or more, as
well as the fares for the parada, the only restriction
being that the ferry must never be left with less than
two men to attend to it. Their dinner is brought
down to the ferry by the gondoliers' wives or children,
and, in the summer, one may often see a whole family
party supping together in the bows of a gondola. In
the hot weather the men sleep in their gondolas, and

I02 The Traghetti
in winter as many of them as can find room crowd
into the little wooden hut which stands at the
traghetto — the only remnant now of their chapter
house — where the bancali meet to settle the affairs of
the fraternity. Sometimes the men on the patula
club together, and divide the whole gains for the
night in equal portions ; sometimes each works on
his own account
The ordinary profits of the traghetto used formerly
to be so great that the gondoliers neglected the
service of ihe patula, preferring to spend their nights
at home, or in the wine-shop. But now a gondolier
will tell you that his largest permanent gains each
week come from the patula. At nine A.M. those who
have been on ihe patula the previous night leave the
traghetto for the whole of that day. This rotation of
six days, three at the three posts, one at the hotel,
one on the patula, and one off-day, makes up the
diurnal life of the gondolier, unless he should be
fortunate enough to have found a padrone, in which
case he is free from all the rules and service of the
traghetto. While on duty at the ferry a few excellent
rules suffice to keep order among the men. Those
on duty are arranged numerically, and, when a
passenger comes to the ferry, no one may call to him
but the gondolier whose turn it is ; the only exception
to this rule being that, if a friar wishes to cross the
ferry, the boat last in the order is bound to serve him,
and for nothing. This custom is, however, falling

The Traghetti 103
into disuse. No gondolier on duty may tie his boat
to the pali, or posts, of the traghetto, nor may he wash
his boat in cavana, the spaces between the posts
where the gondolas' bows run in. While on service
he is forbidden to go to the wine-shops ; if he does
he loses his tum, and when he comes back he takes
his place last on the list.
The Govemment of Venice hoped to maintain
their control over the guilds of the gondoliers through
the officials of the guilds themselves, the gastaldi and
bancali. But the task was by no means easy, for the
gastaldi invariably took the part of their brothers,
and helped them to avoid taxation and military
service ; while any pressure brought to bear on the
officials of the traghetto only made the gondoliers
more unwilling to accept office, and more irritable
when driven to do so.
But the chief difficulty and danger which menaced
the schools arose from inside. The history of their
decay and collapse, which we have now to follow, is a
history of disintegration wrought from inside, not of
attacks directed against the corporations from without
The selfishness and shortsighted stupidity of the
gondoliers themselves brought about the destmction
of their schools.
Whenever the traghetti became close corporations,
the principal object of those inside was to exclude all
others, and to reduce their own numbers, so that their
individual gains might be the greater. Instead of

I04 The Traghetti
endeavouring to maintain their traghetti at a high
state of efficiency by the gradual admission of new
blood and young men, the original members thought
solely of their own pockets, without any regard for
their corporate existence. For example, the traghetto
of Santa Maria Zobenigo entered among its earliest
rules this, that no gondolier should be eligible who
was not fifty years of age, and who could not prove
six or seven years' continuous service in some private
family ; and the gastaldo assured the Government
that it was only on these conditions that the bancali
could guarantee the safety of its passengers. At the
same time the bancali succeeded in reducing the
number of gondoliers at the traghetto from forty to
twenty -eight. The result of this selfish and exclusive
policy was, as we have seen, that certain traghetti
were unable to furnish men for the navy, as they had
' only fifteen sound members ' out of a complement of
forty ; and an abuse of this crying nature compelled
the Government to intervene in the management of
the schools.
A most serious difficulty, however, in the regulation
of the traghetti was that which turned on the question
of liberties, or licences tb row. Indeed, the whole
history of the decline of the schools of the gondoliers
centres round this point of the liberties. The question
of the liberties resolved itself into two subsidiary
questions : who was the original owner of the liberties
—the school or the Government ? and if the liberties

The Traghetti 105
belonged to the school, did the school hold them in
its corporate capacity, or was each member the owner
of his liberty ? and if so, for how long — for life, or in
perpetuity ? One question was between the Govern
ment and the school, the other between the school
and its own members, who claimed to be not merely
lessees, but actual proprietors of the liberties which
they had bought.
There is very little doubt that, originally, the
owners of the liberties at a traghetto were the members
of that traghetto ; and the Government virtually
acknowledged the fact ; for in many early decrees of
the Proveditori di Comun, those magistrates distinctly
allowed the full right of the brothers to elect new
members in the place of those who died, or to permit
a brother to transfer his liberty, with the sanction of
his colleagues, to a man who was not at the time a
member of the traghetto, with this limitation, that the
statutory number of members must not be exceeded.
The Government reserved to itself the power of
ratification, and nothing more. The name of a new
member, after being balloted and accepted, was sub
mitted to the Proveditori, and the election counter
signed. And if any doubt on the point remained, it
would be dispelled by the case of Santa Maria
Zobenigo against the Proveditori, in the year 1514.
The Proveditori at that date put in a claim that the
vacant liberties should be filled alternately by the
scuola and their own office. The gastaldo of the

io6 The Traghetti
traghetto took the opinion of the Court of Avogadori,
by means of counsel ; and, having proved a scriptory
and prescriptive right to elect the members of the
fraternity, the traghetto obtained a decree in its favour,
which was confirmed by the Council of Ten.
The traghetti as corporations enjoyed a very strong
position ; but the rapacity which governed their
action was destructive of their cause — it ruined their
autonomy, and compelled the Government to interfere.
For, as liberties fell vacant, the gastaldi neglected to
fill them up, as they were bound to do, thinking that
the fewer there were at each traghetto the greater the
gains of each individual. This remissness gave rise
to serious disorders, and furnished the Proveditori
with a pretext for issuing a decree which compelled
the gastaldi to report each vacancy within three days
of its occurrence ; and if this were neglected, the right
to fill up the vacancy lapsed to the Proveditori, who
were then entitled to put in a gondolier who should
be free of all charges to the school, except his yearly
subscription. This was the thin end of the wedge ;
and from this point forwards the Government gradu
ally assumed a more direct control over the liberties,
being forced to do so by the carelessness of the
gondoliers themselves.
There remained the further question of the nature
of the gondolier's property in the liberty which he had
obtained from the traghetto. And here, again, the
action of the men themselves ruined their schools.

The Traghetti 107
When the schools had established their property in
their liberties as a corporation, each individual of the
corporation endeavoured to establish his property in
his own liberty ; and he met with little opposition
from his brother gondoliers, who were all bent on the
same result as himself A father found no difficulty
in passing his liberty on to his son, or his nephew ;
election by the school was a mere formality in such
cases. But more than this ; the gondoliers took to
selling their liberties to private individuals outside
the school, and even outside the profession, though
the name of the original owner remained on the
books, to mislead the Government. And in this way it
came to pass that, in the year 1530, the real holders of
liberties, in a large number of cases, were ' foreigners,
masons, dyers, bootmakers, priests, gentlemen and
women.' Of course, this miscellaneous crowd did not
themselves work at the traghetto, but let their liberties
to any one who would pay for them — children of ten,
young men of riotous lives, broken-down soldiers who
had never touched an oar. The consequences of this
disintegration were inevitable. The gastaldi found
themselves quite unable to govern these men, over
whom they had no real hold, who belonged neither to
the quarter nor to the school. The scandals and dis
orders wrought by these lessees of liberties brought
about the final ruin of the schools as proprietors of
the liberties at their traghetti.
The Government were compelled to take notice of

io8 The Traghetti
the dangerous condition of the traghetti in the year
1 530, and found themselves obliged to interfere. They
set forth their reasons for doing so in language at
once forcible and picturesque. ' It is these lessees,
these tosi affituali, who work all the mischief at the
traghetti, who demand excessive fares, and who use
all sorts of insolence to Venetians and foreigners
alike, because they do not belong to the traghetto,
and therefore have no dread of being expelled ; but
as soon as any difficulty arises, they leave the ferry,
and are off wherever they choose. The larger number
of them have neither wife, nor child, nor settled home,
but live like the birds in the branches who have their
home over their heads.' To put an end, therefore, to
such irregularities, no gondolier for the future shall
be allowed to let his liberty ; and he never possessed
the right to sell it, for it was not his property, but the
property of his school. The only exceptions to this
rule are in favour of the old and infirm, and of those
men who are drawn for service in the navy. In both
these cases the holders of the liberty may put a
substitute in his place ; but this substitute must be
over twenty, a proved oarsman and of quiet habits.
The women who hold liberties must resign them at
once, in favour of young men over twenty ; the choice
of these men must be made within two months, other
wise all rights over the liberties will lapse.
But these regulations, which the Government hoped
would be sufficient, failed to produce their effect

The Traghetti 109
The confusion into which the books and registers
of the traghetti had been allowed to fall, and the
impossibilit}-, in man)- cases, of discovering the real
holders of a libertv-, which often stood in the name
of a dead man, rendered the efforts of the Government
abortive. The disorders continued and increased ;
the tosi took to robbing the schools, and carried off"
the crosses, the votive offerings and ornaments which
hung before the Madonna's shrine. The traghetti
became dangerous to peaceful passengers, for the
young ruffians armed themselves, and exacted their
fares hy threats, or compelled the citizens to pay,
a modo loro, b}- driving them forcibly on board
their gondolas, taking them into the mid canal and
feigning to upset the boat, until the soldi were forth
coming. The gastaldi were helpless, and found
themselves between the anvil and the hammer ; for
the Government still held them responsible for order,
which they could not maintain. Fines and punish
ments inflicted on the gastaldi only called forth
lamentable confessions of impotence. 'The lads at
the traghetti,' they say, 'who lead ribald and
scandalous lives are protected by their padroni,
gentlemen of bad repute. If they are spoken to,
they challenge to a duel.' It was the days of bravi,
and these riotous young gondoliers were either bravi
themselves, or knew how to find bravi among their
friends, who would see them through their quarrels
by the help of sword or dagger. ' But what is more

I IO The Traghetti
important than all,' continue the gastaldi, ' they will
not be obedient to the company, nor will they keep
the rules of our mariegole. And should any of us say
to them that they ought to obey, and stand within
the rules, they have the audacity and arrogance to
abuse us and to give us vile language. And if we
fine them some small amount of wax or oil, or other
forfeit, to light the Madonna at our traghetto, and pay
for our masses, they have the hardihood to say they
will not pay. . . . They threaten us, and bring others
of a vicious life down to the traghetto to threaten us.
And, if we do not provide for this evil, we shall
presently be at such a pass that we shall not know
how to govern our traghetto!
That pass had, however, long been reached. It
was impossible that the situation should continue;
and, at the opening of the seventeenth century, the
Government was obliged to revolutionise the whole
character of the traghetti by going to the root of the
mischief, and taking away their property in the
liberties. Hitherto there had been five modes by
which a man might become a member of a traghetto :
either by election in chapter of the school ; or by
the renunciation of a brother in his favour ; or by
exchange between two members of different ferries ;
or by order of the Proveditori as filling a vacancy un
filled by the school ; or by order of the Proveditori as a
reward for good naval service. Now, all the liberties,
whenever they fell vacant, were put up to auction in

The Traghetti 1 1 1

*&

the office of the Milizia da Mar, and knocked down
to the highest bidder. From this time forward, till
the close of the Republic, purchase at auction from
the Government became the only way in which a man
could obtain a licence as gondolier. The Government
undertook the supervision of the registers, and any
libert)- that remained unoccupied through neglect, ill
health, or death, was sold immediately.
Thus the traghetti lost the control over their
liberties ; and with that control disappeared the most
important part of their functions and powers as a
corporation. From that date to this, the Government
of the day has been the virtual owner of the liberties,
and the final resort in all questions affecting their
management Until quite recently a young gondolier
might buy an old one out of his place at a good
traghetto, for about three hundred lire ; and the
municipality readily sanctioned such exchanges. But
the present town-council desire to put an end to this
remnant of ancient privilege, and insist that they
alone shall appoint or transfer, and that the gondo
liers have no claim to initiative in the matter.
The regulations of the Government on the subject
of liberties restored comparative order to the traghetti,
though they could not alter human nature, and we
come across occasional outbursts of the riotous spirit
among the young gondoliers, who still bullied their pas
sengers, and exacted more than their due centesimo
for the fare across the ferry. In the year 1702 the

1 1 2 The Traghetti
Censors threaten the whip, and other tortures, for
those who carry pistols or knives in their boats ; and,
as late as 1800, one Francesco Pelizzari distinguished
himself by crowding twenty-nine unfortunate people
into his gondola, and refused to land them till they
had paid a modo suo. For this exploit, however, he
was banished from Venice.
The corporate life of the traghetti was closed by
the action of the Government in the sixteenth century.
The schools survived, though with diminished vitality,
until the extinction of the Republic ; and even now
certain of their functions are still performed by the
modern traghetti. The traghetti are still friendly
societies. A brother who falls ill receives a certain
sum daily from the fraternity as long as his illness
lasts ; and the gastaldo and four brothers attend his
funeral with torches, and accompany him to his last
home at San Michele, when he dies. The bancali are
still the recognised heads of the traghetti, and hold
their sittings in the wooden shelter huts at each
ferry's end. But this is all that remains of an institu
tion which was once among the most remarkable and
complete of those that flourished under the Venetian
Republic.

A GONDOLIERS' BANK
The Venetians have always been bankers. As early
as the twelfth century the nobles of Venice, like their
neighbours of Florence, began to engage in private
banking, and continued for four hundred years the
greatest bankers in Europe. A series of Black
Fridays, towards the close of the sixteenth century,
put an end to most of the private houses, and the
Government established a public bank in their place.
But an instinct, so spontaneous as that of banking
appears to be in the Italian temperament, cannot be
wholly obliterated by the process of time. Among
the people there still survives a vigorous system of
traffic in money, conducted by themselves for them
selves, and quite independent of any commercial
movement in the great world.
The traditions and instincts of republican Venice
endure with greatest tenacity among the gondoliers.
They have always considered themselves a guild, and
were once treated as such by their fellow-citizens,
though they have now lost the formal recognition of
that status which they used to possess. For centuries
they have been accustomed to govern themselves.
H

114 ^ Gondoliers' Bank
They, more than any other institution of Venice, have
successfully withstood the changes and chances of
progress. It is among the gondoliers chiefly that
this popular system of banking goes on ; hidden away
from the knowledge of the stranger, who would hardly
suspect that the tall grave rower behind him, silently
urging his gondola out to the Lido or -San Giorgio,
was, in truth, a most capable financier. Yet, if some
happy touch of sympathy or friendliness should
loosen his tongue, he would have something to say
about the society to which he belongs.
A bank is formed in this way. A company of
thirty men — it rarely exceeds this number — come
together. They are for the most part gondoliers and
their friends among the small tradesmen, the owners
of wine-shops and eating-houses. Each man pays a
deposit of ten lire on the spot, and pledges himself
to a weekly payment of one lira throughout the year.
The hours for paying this weekly lira are from six
to eight on the morning of each Monday ; and the
fine for failure is ten per cent per week for every
lira that is missing. The company then proceeds
to elect its officers. These are four in number — a
controller-general, a secretary, a cashier, and an
esattore whose duty it is to exact the fines. These
officers are intrusted with the management of the
bank, and they are paid in the following way. Each
member is bound by the rules of the society to borrow
from the bank at least one hundred and twenty lire,

A Gondoliers' Bank 1 1 5
in sums of any size he chooses, but the whole must
amount to one hundred and twenty lire in the year.
Upon this he pays ten per cent, interest — that is to
say, twelve lire ; and out of this sum, though not
absorbing the whole of it, the salaries of the officers
are defrayed. It might seem simpler for every
member to pay down twelve lire at once towards the
working of the bank. But, by the arrangement which
they have established, each associate is entitled to the
use of one hundred and twenty lire of ready money
in times of pressure ; whereas the poverty of his credit
and the smallness of the sum would prevent him
from borrowing of a banker, while his neighbours,
who might be willing to lend, would ask more than
ten per cent, interest.
The bank thus created proceeds to work in the
following way. Loans are advanced to members
only. Any member may borrow from the bank at
the dictation of his needs, as long as it has capital
available to lend. The terms upon which loans are
advanced are these : — the sum borrowed must be
paid back at the rate of ten per cent, per week, while
ten per cent, is charged as interest upon the whole ;
therefore, in theory, every debt to the bank is repaid
with its interest in eleven weeks, and all loans cease
eleven weeks before the end of the financial year.
But of course this rule cannot be always strictly
observed, and the fine for a breach of it is ten per cent.
upon whatever is wanting of that weekly instalment

1 1 6 A Gondoliers' Bank
which, if duly paid, would annihilate both debt and
interest at the close of eleven weeks. The interest
on loans and the two fines — the fine for the non
payment of the weekly lira, and the fine for failure
to repay the instalment on the sum borrowed — form
the profit of the bank, which is divided equally among
the members at the close of each year, when the
capital which each has invested, the ten-lire entrance
fee and the fifty-two lire of weekly payments, is also
returned. Each member of the company keeps a
pass-book, in which he notes the sums he has
borrowed and the dates and amount of his repay
ments. This pass-book is tallied weekly with the
secretary's ledger. In this way a check is established
upon the officers of the bank ; and should any doubt
as to their good faith arise, the members have only to
meet, add up the sum in their various books, and they
at once arrive at the actual position of the bank.
The system is obviously a strong inducement to
thrift. The man who borrows no more than the
obligatory one hundred and twenty lire in the course
of the year can hardly fail to be the gainer. Even if
the bank did no business at all, he could not lose
more than twelve lire, which he pays towards the
working of the company. But such a contingency
never happens ; and the gondoliers are willing to
take whatever risk there may be. All of them expect
to borrow ; but they prefer to pay the interest of ten
per cent, to the benefit of their friends rather than a

A Gondoliers' Bank 1 1 7
larger sum to shopkeepers for permission to run up a
bill. In fact, each member of the bank is a ready-
money man to the outside v\orld. The gain to the
thrifty is clear. It is harder to understand how the
unthrifty ones find it to their advantage to pay so
much as ten per cent, for their money. But, in the
first place, they would find it difficult to get money
cheaper. Then eleven weeks, the theoretical Hmit to
their indebtedness, seems a very short time ; and
during that short time there is a constant jogging at
their elbows to make them pay. No doubt many of
them, who are not morally robust, rely upon this
weekly pressure to keep them up to the mark of re
payment. Indeed, the perils that threaten a defaulter
are great enough to induce the most lazy to make an
effort ; for if at the end of the year a man is still
indebted to the bank, he forfeits all claim on the
general profits and loses the capital he has laid out in
starting the bank. All these are inducements power
ful enough to guarantee most men against a system of
laissez-faire concerning their debts, and it is this
which proves so ruinous to workmen who are living
on their daily gains ; but, beyond this, a member of
one of these societies knows that, should the worst
come to the worst, and the year's end find him still a
debtor to the bank, his debts are cancelled on the
winding-up of the company, and he is free, though
irretrievably ruined in credit.
The bank lasts a year only — from September to

ii8 A Gondoliers' Bank
September. On the first of September the members
meet, the accounts are presented by the officers and
checked by a committee of non-official members, the
profits are divided, the bank wound up, and the affair
is over. But before separating the members usually
proceed to the formation of a new company for the
ensuing year. It is to be understood that this is an
entirely fresh venture, and has no connection with any
of its predecessors. Those of the old society who are
willing, and are not defaulters, remain, and new names
are submitted to the company. Should no objection
be taken, these new members are accepted on pro
bation for three weeks. On the 21st of September
the new bank is definitely made up. Those of the
probationers who have paid their lira weekly and
regularly are enrolled in the society and undertake
the conditions of the bank.
But business is not the only object, though the
main one, which brings these men together. The
members dine in company at least twice a year^
once during the Carnival, and again on the winding-
up of the bank. There is therefore every reason
to choose a good fellow as a companion, and one
who is well known. This acts indirectly as a
guarantee that the new member will not prove a
defaulter. These dinners are compulsory, and the
fine for absence is three lire, which go to lessen
the expenses of those who dine. Very jovial the
company is — frank, friendly, and orderly. They

A Gondoliers' Bank 119
dine at great length, bestowing about three-quarters
of an hour on each course ; and after dinner, towards
midnight, come the music and songs and dancing
till six o'clock in the morning.
The gondoliers have the advantage of being an
antique guild. They enjoy a long professional
ancestr}-. The regulations of these banks are the
result of a series of experiments, and an illustration
of the esprit de corps which still vivifies their art,
and has preserved it, hitherto, alone among the many
institutions ofthe Venetian Republic.

FLOODS IN THE CITY
The sea and the wind are responsible for floods in
the city. No doubt, before the rivers — the Piave,
the Sile, and the Brenta — were canalised, and their
mouths diverted from the lagoons into the open sea,
a flood on the mainland would mean high-water in
Venice ; but now the principal author of a flood in
the city is 'that son of a dog, the scirocco.' A
heavy wind blowing up the Adriatic for two days,
and sending a turbid sea rolling on the sands of
the Lido, virtually blocks the mouths by which the
tidal waters escape from the lagoons into the open.
The down-going tide cannot pass out till it has lost
its hour for falling, and begins to tum and rise again.
Then it comes sweeping in before the wind, swirl
ing round the point by Sant' Elena and the public
gardens, streaming along the curve by the Riva degli
Schiavoni, dividing at the point of the Dogana, where
half the grey-green flood pours up the Grand Canal,
and half fills the wider Giudecca from marge to
marge. The floods usually take place in the morning.
As one opens the window, a blast of warm, moist

Floods in the City 121
air streams into the room, wetting all the walls and
standing in drops on the scagliola pavement ; the air
is thick and heavy, and charged with salt sea-spray ;
and far off, above the roofs of the houses, there
reigns a continual booming noise, unremitting and
impressi\'e in its pervasiveness — it is the roar of the
sea on the Lido, two miles or more away. Then
the small canal below the window begins to feel the
incoming tide. The chips of hay or of wood, the
cabbage-stalks and scraps of old matting, move
uneasily, as if in doubt which way they are to go ;
then, with a final turn on their pivots, they yield to
the current and sweep away towards the Giudecca.
The colour of the water changes to a pale pea-green,
not quite clear, but looking as if it had come fresh
from the sea Steadily the tide flows faster and
faster under the bridge, and the market-men and
gondoliers secure their boats to the posts. So it
goes on for an hour or more, till the jade-coloured
flood has nearly brimmed to the edge of the fonda-
menta, but not yet overflowed it. Then the water
begins to appear in the calle ; it comes welling up
through every drain-hole and between the flags of
the pavement, bubbling like a little geyser and
making a low, gurgling noise ; for the sea begins to
flood Venice under the pavements, and not over
the fondamente, which are usually higher than the
streets. Presently the baker puts out a board to
serve as a bridge for his customers ; but soon the

122 Floods in the City
water from the canal has joined that in the calle ;
the bridge ceases to be of use, and floats idly away.
Persistently the sea rises ; it creeps under the large
door of the palace, and swells the little pools that
are bubbling up in the courtyard, and flows right
out by the great gates on the Grand Canal, con
verting the whole cortile into a lake. Then the first
boat passes down the calle, stopping at the shop
doors to pick up fares ; and bare-legged men offer
their services as porters from the high bridge steps
to the upper end of the street, which is still dry.
Indeed, the flood is an excuse for the display of
bare legs, and half the population of the quarter are
tucked above the knee. All the windows are full of
women and children, laughing at the traffic below — ¦
laughing at the thrifty, high-kilted housewife, out
for her marketing, who grudges a centesimo for the
boat and shrinks from the porterage ; laughing at
the thin-shod dandy, whose hat was blown off" and
umbrella turned inside out, and who looks disgust
at the wind ; laughing at the heavy man who nearly
brings himself and his bearer prone upon the water.
Then suddenly, without a moment's warning, there
is a dazzling flash of lightning, a rattling peal ; every
face disappears from the windows, and all the green
shutters go to with a bang.
The streets are full of people, most of them bound
for the piazza to see the fun. There is laughter and
jesting everywhere, and the impression of a capital

Floods in the City 123
joke in bare legs and top-boots ; the people get
their amusement out of it all, though the basements
of their houses are soaking and their winter fire
wood slowl)- taking in the water. Here is one
woman marching along through the flood, serenely
regardless of indiscreet disclosure ; another in a pair
of high top-boots, lent by her friend, who stands on
the bridge and looks on. The piazza is one large
lake from the door of Saint Mark's up to the raised
walk that runs under the colonnades, and right down
the piazzetta out into the stormy lagoon. Under
the colonnades a crowd promenades or stands in the
arches watching the boats, the gondolas, sandolos,
and barche, that charge two centesimi for a row.
The bright mosaics of Saint Mark's fagade and the
long lines of the two Procuratie seem to gain in
colour and in form as they rise right up from this
level of the sea. The doves go wheeling about in
the upper air, half in alarm at the unwonted sight
below them. Hard by the two granite columns at
the sea end of the piazzetta, some speculators have
fixed a rickety wooden bridge two planks wide, that
leads to the Ponte della Paglia ; but the wind is so
high that only a venturous few attempt the passage,
and more, it would seem, to keep the game alive
than from any pressure of business. They are
greeted with applause or laughter as they make
their transit in safety or lose their hats on the way.
Presently the water begins to go down, and then

124 Floods in the City
comes a regular stampede of all the boats in the
piazza, for, once caught there, it is a serious matter
to lift a gondola down to the sea. In a moment
the bridge is broken up, and the boats, in inextric
able confusion, come streaming down the piazzetta,
bumping together, or now and then giving an omi
nous crunch against the flags. There is laughter,
encouragement, and help from the onlooking crowd.
Any excuse serves for some one to rush into the
water : a hand to this gondola, a lift to that barchetta.
In a very short space the piazza is empty once more.
The water falls fast, leaving patches of green sea
weed on the stones. Out towards San Giorgio and
the gardens a heavy haze hangs in the sky ; a wind
laden with foam drives inward from the sea. There
is the perpetual boom of the Adriatic on the beach,
and the hot breath of the scirocco sweeping over
the heaving grey expanse of water that breaks in
waves on the marble steps and foundations of the
piazzetta.

THE CASA DEGLI SPIRITI
On the north-eastern side of Venice, looking across
the northern lagoon, there is a solitary house which
is said to be haunted. The house must once have
belonged to a wealthy Venetian family, for there
are traces of splendour about its balconies and the
mouldings of its windows. But now it is deserted
and falling into disrepair. The green shutters of
the upper stories are always closed, and they are
beginning to part from their rusty hinges ; a little
more and the wind will surely make ghostly noises
at night as it whistles through the gaping woodwork,
blowing hard and keen across the water from the
hills where it is bred above Trieste.
The position of the house is remarkable, one of
the most remarkable in Venice. It stands on the
easternmost point of the city, near the Church of
Madonna dell' Orto, and not far from the reputed
homes of Titian and Tintoret From the windows
the view to north and east is unconfined ; the eye can
follow the sweep of that old-world plain which closes
the water avenue of the Adriatic, a plain once popu
lous with cities — Aquileia, Grado, Oderzo, Altino —
125

126 The Casa degli Spiriti
• and watered by rivers of historic names — the Taglia-
mento and the Isonzo, on whose banks the Empire
of the East was lost and won. A mist usually over
hangs the plain ; but above the mist rise the crests
of the Julian Alps and the mountains of Titian's
country, the Cadore ; and, following this line from
peak to snowy peak, the eye is led at length to its
vanishing point among the hills of Carniola. Nearer
at hand, upon the lagoon, lie Burano and Torcello,
distinguished by their campanili — Burano's thin and
pointed, Torcello's solid and square. Nearer still
is Murano, beneath a curtain of smoke that is sent
up daily from its glass furnaces ; while nearest of
all is the square brick wall of the cemetery, over
topped by cypress trees. Every day the picturesque
Venetian funerals pass from the city to San Michele.
The sad processions steal slowly out upon the lagoon
from under the bridge near San Giovanni e Paolo,
with lights and music. The priest's boat, with little
white acolytes holding the cross in the bows, leads
the way ; it is followed by the funeral barge, the
bier, draped in black and gold, rising high in the
middle. The dull beating of the drums, the wailing
of the flutes, the sob of the celloes, comes muffled and
moaning across the water to the windows of this
solitary house.
But immediately under these windows the scene
is more lively ; for the large basin, that surrounds
the house on two sides, is used as a store-place

The Casa degli Spiriti i 27
for the rafts of pine-wood which are sent down the '
Piave from the mountains of Tyrol. The pale yellow
planks, bound together by withes, come floating
leisurely along with the tide, like some long yellow
water-snake ; or, when the tide turns, they are moored
to the posts \\hich mark the canal from the Piave to
Venice. These rafts are so lengthy that it takes five
or six men to manage each ; and as the journey
occupies a week or so, the men build themselves
shelter huts upon the planks, in front of which they
cook their polenta, and sleep inside, on beds of
shavings. The rafts are brought to shore in the basin
under the haunted house, and the withes are cut, and
each plank, one by one, is drawn out and placed on
its end in the long wood-stores, where they are left
to season for several years before they are shipped
to Egypt and other woodless countries. These wood
sheds are curious and charming places, with their
delicate and pervasive perfume of the pine, the inter
minable vistas of planks arranged like the letter A,
the long grassy walks between each file, and the
boundary walls that are mantled deep in ivy. Quiet,
dreamy places, where the perfume and the stillness,
the light lap of waters on the wharfing, invite to
sleep. The Casa degli Spiriti, for all its splendid situation,
has an evil repute in Venice. It may well be the
local habitation of one of those rare Venetian ghost-
stories which are told by the old women of the place.

128 The Casa degli Spiriti
They say that there was once a wealthy Venetian
gentleman and his wife, who lived in this house.
The gentleman had a friend who was his groomsman
at his wedding, and then, according to Venetian
custom, godfather to his first child. In Venice this
relation of godfather, or compare di San Zuan, is a
very sacred one, nearer and more sacred than any
other. As time went on, the lady and her compare
fell in love with one another ; the husband knew it ;
and all three lived most miserably. Presently the
compare fell ill, and died ; and the lady, for grief,
likewise fell ill, and came to the point of death. One
night she said to her waiting-maid, who knew the
whole story of her love, 'When I am dead I wish
that no one but you should watch by me.' The maid
promised ; and in a day or two the lady died. The
other servants wished to make the vigil for their
mistress ; but the maid replied that it had been
ordered otherwise. So the servants went away, and
left the maid alone with the dead. She, when they
were all gone, lit four torches about the couch, and
sat down to read the office for the departed. When
midnight came the door of the room opened, and the
dead compare came slowly in. When the maid saw
the dead man coming towards her, her blood ran to
water ; she could not move nor cry. The ghost
motioned her to follow him to the bed. Then he
raised the lady up, and she began to dress. When
she was dressed, the ghost drew her arm through his.

The Casa degli Spiriti 129
and, signing to the maid to light them down-stairs,
they all three left the room. Down and down they
went, till they reached the lowest vaulted cellar of
the house ; then the ghost struck the torch from the
waiting-maid's hand, and she fell in a swoon on the
floor. This is the story that is told to account for the
ominous reputation of the haunted house. But the
rationalists also have their say in the matter ; and
two reasons are assigned for the singular name of
the Casa degli Spiriti. Some say that the house was
once the resort of a literary and artistic society, and
that it takes its name from the beaux esprits who
used to congregate there. Others, with a grimmer
probability on their side, affirm that the house was
used for purposes of autopsy by the medical students
of Venice ; and the dead bodies lay the night there,
before they were carried to San Michele in the early
morning. Whichever view one pleases to adopt, the Casa
degli Spiriti, with its splendid and solitary situation,
its ominous repute and its singular name, is an
object of no small interest. It would have made a
fine setting for some weird yet realistic story by the
author of La Grande Breteche.

SANT' ELENA
Among the many beauties of Venice which are
already dead or surely dying, not the least lovely
and remarkable was the island of Sant' Elena. Was,
not is, for already the iron-foundry, to which the
island is condemned, has altered its aspect and
impressed a rigid regularity of brick wall and low-
roofed worksheds upon the once beautiful and varied
outline of convent and garden parapet. No one who
has seen Venice is likely to forget Sant' Elena. It is
that little island which, of all the islands in the
lagoon, lies nearest to the city : just off" the point of
the public gardens. It was always a beautiful object
— whether in spring, when the buds were bursting on
the trees of its garden ; or in late autumn, when the
bare branches stood out in relief against the warm
red walls of the old convent, and the pines and
cypresses at one corner acquired a greater value of
colour from the absence of all other greenery. The
island was so beautiful in itself, and is so picturesquely
placed, detached from the city and yet in a' measure
belonging to it — like a full stop at the close of that
noble paragraph in the book of Venice, the Riva
130

Sant' Elena 131
degli Schiavoni and the public gardens — that the
memory of it haunts some still and sacred corner of
the mind.
There are places which seem marked for public
applause, and praise is lavished upon them till it
becomes commonplace : there.are others which we all
of us know and love, and yet, for some reason, we
keep our knowledge to ourselves, and do not go into
raptures over them ; we even feel a sense of injury,
as though a trespass were being committed on our
private demesne, should we by accident discover that
some one else holds the same appreciative views,
which we believed to be peculiar to ourselves. For
instance, no one talks or writes about the lake of
Bourget as they do of Como ; yet every traveller by
the Cenis knows how lovely that lake is by daylight,
or, better still, when the moon is pouring her Hght
upon its waters through a mellow haze 'just tinged
with blue,' and the great chiteau of the House of
Savoy gleams cold and weird above its headland on
the farther side.
So it was with Sant' Elena. The little island
established itself in the silence of a loving memory.
It was so pleasant to go there on a lazy afternoon in
spring ; one was sure of quiet and plenty of sunshine.
The old gardener — a character whom Scott would
have delighted to draw — seemed to have become a
part and parcel of the place he tended ; as venerable
as the ivied church, as peaceful and dreamy as the

132 Sant' Elena
cloistered garden. It could hardly be called a garden,
but rather a wild shrubbery, surrounding a stretch of
lawn that spread beneath an avenue of elms and
sycamores. In the sward, the periwinkles, violets,
and potentillas — with fruit like strawberries, and called
therefore inganna donna, or lady's deceit — ran riot
together. At one end a little grove of pines and
cypresses offered their shade, and, at the other, a row
of pomegranate trees put out their scarlet blossoms in
July. The old cloister of the monastery enclosed a
garden of roses, which grew in native wildness as they
chose, while up the slender shafts and spandrels of
the cloister vine stems were twined. The walls were
coated with a fine surface of lichen, and the Silentium
above the dormitory door was half filled with velvety
mosses and ferns that had taken root there and
among the heavy mouldings of the lavabo outside the
refectory. The whole place was in an admirable disorder,
tangled and wild and left to itself, and beautiful to
see. From the corner of the wall overhanging the
channel that surrounds the island, one looked across
the lagoon to the green point of the public garden.
The crabs had it all their own way in the shoal water,
and chased one another over the mudbanks, making
little ripples on the surface where they moved. The
Alps rose up behind Venice, each familiar ridge and
peak clearly defined in serene weather: Antelao,
Tofana, Sorapiz, known to the wanderer in the

Sant' Elena 133
Dolomites. To the left hand, far away, the Euganean
Hills threw the reflection of their cones upon the
water. The place was perfectly peaceful and quiet,
save for the distant and muffled sound that stole
across the lagoon from the arsenal.
But now the old monastery walls have been pulled
down, their place is taken by iron-girdered workshops ;
the quiet convent cemetery has been dug up and the
crosses overthrown ; most of the trees are felled, and
the axe is laid to the roots of those which remain ; a
yawning ditch is cut across the lawn ; the church is
to be the engine-house if the walls can stand the
tremor, and in place of campanile and bells it has the
tall brick chimney with its smoky pennon ; a new
square island of forced earthwork, carrying wharves
and landing-stages, has sprung up round the original
island, destroying its beauty of line. There is no
hope of resurrection. Sant' Elena is lost for ever to
its friends of old.
The lover of Venice may be allowed to record, with
a certain regret, the beauties that must pass away ;
and a sacred and beautiful feature of Venice has
perished in the desecration of Sant' Elena. For the
island church, besides containing the tombs of many
famous Venetians of the Giustiniani and Loredano
families, was held to be the last resting-place of an
empress-saint, no less a person than Helen, mother of
Constantine the Great To Englishmen this disturb
ance of the imperial tomb should be distasteful ; for

134 Sant' Elena
Helen, if we may trust the dim and dubious outline
of her story, was an Englishwoman, born at Colchester.
To be at once an empress and a saint, mother of
Constantine and inventor of the cross — for this it
was which won for Helen her exalted rank in the
hierarchy — is a conjunction of honours that can
hardly be paralleled. Yet all this lustre has barely
sufficed to rescue her name from oblivion ; no one
now would keep Saint Helen's Day, the i8th of
August, and few remember who Saint Helen was who
gives her name to the beautiful island of the lagoons.
Dreaming in the quiet of the island cloister, the
silence and the ruins of the old monastic life combined
to draw a perfume from the cadenced Latin of Saint
Ambrose's rhetoric. The false antitheses, strained
almost to impiety, and the unreality of the spiritual
attitude in this speech which Ambrose places in the
empress's mouth when she, the mother of the man
destined to baptize the empire officially, stood in
Golgotha — that journey ended which was to achieve
her saintly rank — are condoned and made supportable
by the persuasion of this decadent Latin, set in the
quiet of a cloister garden. 'Accessit,' he says, 'ad
Golgotham et ait, ecce locus pugnae, ubi est victoria ?
Quaero vexillum salutis et non invenio. Ego in
regnis, et Crux Domini in pulvere. Ego in aulis, et
in ruinis Christi triumphus. Quomodo me redemptam
arbitror si redemptio ipsa non cernitur? Aperiatur
humus ut salus effulgeat Quid egisti diabole ut

Sant' Elena 135
absconderes lignum nisi ut iterum vincereris ? Vicit
te Maria, quse genuit triumphatorem, quas sine im-
minutione virginitatis edidit eum qui crucifixus vin-
ceret te, et mortuus subjugaret Ilia quasi Sancta
Dominam gestavit ; ego crucem ejus investigabo.
Ilia generatum docuit, ego resuscitatum. Ilia fecit
ut Deus inter homines videretur, ego ad remedium
peccatomm divinum de ruinis elevabo vexillum.'
After her death the empress's remains suffered the
usual post-mortem voyages which fall to the lot of
saints ; until, in the year 121 1, they found a resting-
place among the lagoons. But now the saintly and
imperial ashes have been disturbed once more, unless
indeed, as the pious hope, that urn contained them
which was lately removed to San Pietro in Castello.
If it be not so, then indeed —
' Sceptre and crown
Have tumbled down.
And in the dust are equal made
With the poor crooked scythe and spade.'
The island of Sant' Elena has passed through
many vicissitudes of fortune : it has been monastery,
barracks, even bakehouse before now— at the begin
ning of this century there were forty-three ovens on
the island, and a regiment of one hundred German
bakers. From all these it has suffered little ill, or
time has repaired the ravages inflicted. It would be
mere folly to hope that it can ever recover from the
injury of the iron-foundry to which it is doomed.

OSELE
One of the most familiar objects at a Venetian
landing-place is the old man with the hook who
draws the gondola's bows up the steps and holds the
boat steady while the passenger alights. He expects
two centesimi for his services from native Venetians,
but from foreigners his expectations reach a far higher
figure. These hookers are of very little real use, for
any gondolier is quite able to bring his boat up to
the riva without their aid. But they are an old-
established body, intimately connected with the gon
dolas and the traghetti of Venice. Rough, ragged,
unkempt-looking creatures they are ; some of them
wrapped in picturesque tatters, which gape and show
a chain and a charm around the neck. Most of
them have wide slouched hats, which they hold out
obsequiously for their fee. But for all their rags and
misery they are a close society, impiegati ; and not to
every one does it chance to be hooker. The muni
cipality allow only a certain number of men — chiefly
old gondoliers — to ply the trade ; and no one may
do so without a licence, and until his name has been
entered in the municipal registers. The Venetian
136

VENETIAN OSELF,

138 Osele
name for these men is ganzeri, taken from the instru
ment of their trade, the long pole with a hook, or
ganzo, at the end, by which they draw the boats to
land. Some of their hooks are most elaborate and
formidable-looking instruments, with steel heads like
a Lochabef axe. The pole or handle is often adorned
with scraps of glass, mosaics, cameos, coins, and
medals, which the hooker slowly gathers up for the pur
pose. Most of the coins are common enough — copper
pieces of the Republic, or of the Provisional Govern
ment, or else the rejected effigy of Pio Nono, or the
three hills of San Marino. But now and then one
may light upon a rarer medal, of a value unknown to
its owner ; and among these medals the most curious
and interesting are the Venetian osele, should you be
lucky enough to chance on one.
The osele are little silver pieces quite peculiar to
Venice. They derive their origin and their name
from a very ancient Venetian custom. As early as
the year 1275, the Doge numbered among the duties
to which he pledged himself in his coronation oath
that of sending to every nobleman a present of food
about Christmas-time. The season of the year (mid
winter) determined the nature of this present, which
usually consisted of five wild ducks, shot in the
lagoons beyond Torcello, or farther east still, near
the castle of Marano, where the Doge possessed all
the rights of fishing and of shooting. Between the ist
of December and Christmas Day thousands of these

Osele 1 39
mazzorin, as the Venetians call them, were brought
into Venice and distributed by the Doge's steward.
The care with which the steward discharged this
delicate task, and coupled the fat and the lean so as
to avoid jealousy, has passed into a proverb of the
Venetian market The poultry-sellers at the Rialto
still say when they sell a brace, ' One fat and one
lean, like the birds from Marano.'
Though the distant and solitary reaches of the
lagoons still are, and always have been, rich in water
fowl, }et it soon became impossible to find sufficient
birds to satisfy all who had a claim upon the Christ
mas present. Seven thousand fresh duck, fat or lean,
could not be brought into Venice during the early
days of each December. The Great Council, therefore,
in the year 1361, allowed the Doge, Lorenzo Celsi, to
substitute a sum of money when the birds fell short
of the required number. But, in spite of strict pre
serving, it became more and more difficult to find the
birds, while the number of those entitled to receive
them steadily increased, till, in the year 1521, it
would have required nearly nine thousand wild duck
to satisfy all just claims. The Doges were obliged to
spend large sums from their private purse ; and the
custom and ceremony of the Christmas present began
to fall into a disorder which was most repugnant to
the Venetian temper.
Accordingly, on June 28, 1521, the Great Council
passed a decree authorising the Doge to substitute.

1 40 Osele
in every case, a silver medal for the present of wild
duck. The medal at once took its name from the
birds it represented, and was called an osela, the
Venetian for a bird. When the Christmas present
from the Doge to the nobility was altered from five
wild duck to a silver medal, the prince in person
could discharge his duty on one day,- and with
greater convenience and ceremony than hitherto.
The day fixed for the presentation of the osele was
the 4th of December, Saint Barbara's Day. On her
festival all the nobility assembled at the ducal palace,
and were ushered by groups into the presence, where
they paid their respects to the Doge, and received the
medals from his hand.
The osele were ordered to be coined at the mint
of Venice ; and the Government supplied the silver
to the amount of a quarter of a ducat for each medal,
and thus relieved the Doge's purse of a serious burden.
Two years later, in the reign of Andrea Gritti, the
die for the osele was fixed. ' On the one side shall
be stamped the image of Misser San Marco, standing
up, with the serene Prince kneeling before him, and
having the standard of the Republic in his hand, and
the same legend that the ducat bears. On the other
side these words shall be impressed, " Andrece Gritti
principis munus anno pr imo!" And this is the form
which the osela preserved, with some few variations,
till the year 163 1, when the Doge, Francesco Erizzo,
substituted the lion of Saint Mark for the figures of

Osele 141
the saint and the prince. After 163 1 the variations
are considerable, for each Doge was at liberty to select
his own die, and the design was usually changed
every year.
The silver osela was not, in its origin, a coin of
the Republic, but a medal struck by each Doge each
year of his reign. Some of the nobility, however,
into whose hands the osele came, were poor ; and,
as the medals were supposed to contain a fixed
quantity of silver, they soon passed into circulation,
but without any legal standard of value. To remedy
this abuse, the Council of Ten, in the year 1541,
ordered the osele for the future to be cast of the size
and value of three silver marcelli ; and at this rate
they entered the regular currency of the Republic.
A complete collection of these medals may be
seen at the Museo Civico. The series begins in the
year 1521 with the reign of Antonio Grimani, and
is continued, in unbroken succession, down to the
close of the Republic in 1796, under the Doge Lodo
vico Manin. The series is unique, for no other
State has minted an uninterrupted sequence of
medals through two hundred and seventy-five years
of its life. But, besides being singular both in origin
and in completeness, the artistic interest of the series
is of no small account. The designs for the obverse
were more or less fixed and conventional ; but the
designs for the reverse display all the varieties of
the dominant taste, passing from the simplicity of

142 Osele
Antonio Grimani's inscription through the florid and^
decadent periods of decoration, and returning to a
severer style in the later years of the eighteenth
century. The reverse was designed each year by
the master minter, or massaro d'argento, as he was
called, whose initials are usually to be found in the
exergue at the base of the medal. Sometimes the
massaro d'argento produced a design so successful
that the Doge adopted it in permanence during his
reign. For example, the medal of the Doge Marino
Grimani, designed by Sebastian Marcello, was re
peated year after year. It bears on the reverse a
winged and aureoled lion of Saint Mark, rampant,
holding a cross in his right paw, with this mysterious
legend, 'Sydera cordis! Until the ninth year of
Francesco Loredano (1761) the osele were stamped
by the hand, with a die and hammer ; and, in the
hurry of striking a large number, the impressions
are frequently twisted in such a way that the obverse
and reverse do not correspond. In the year 1761
the press was introduced, and the whole character
of the osele was changed. The first of the minted
osele is an interesting medal. On the reverse is a
fine design of the clock-tower in the piazza ; and on
the obverse Venetia seated in a study surrounded
by mechanical, artistic, and mathematical instru
ments ; over her head the legend, ' A rtium studior-
umque mater et altrix! After this date the dies are
often finely conceived, especially the female figures

Osele 143
and the galleys, which occur frequently. The osela
of the third year of Alvise Mocenigo iv. is a good
example. It represents a fully armed ship of war,
riding at anchor bow and stern, with this motto,
' Binis immota vianebo!
But the chief interest of the osele lies in the his
torical allusions of their designs and legends. Each
year the Doge selected some event, of public or of
private importance, to commemorate upon his medals.
And so this series is rich in reminiscences of Venetian
history and illustrative of the various tempers of the
Doges ; one is pious, another patriotic, another proud
of his family honours or of his own achievements.
On the very first medal of the series, for example,
Antonio Grimani records the tragedy and the triumph
of his life. The osela shows Peace and Justice hand
in hand, with the legend, ' fustitia et Pax osculates
sutit! After the disastrous battle of Sapienza,
Antonio Grimani, who had commanded there, was
cashiered and ordered to present himself at Venice
in chains. The injustice of the order stung Grimani,
and he sailed to Venice in his own flagship, and
without chains. On his way he touched at Parenzo,
on the Istrian coast ; his son Vincenzo met him there,
and in vain implored him to submit, and to obey
the order of the Government. Grimani refused to
bend. At length Vincenzo himself kneeled down,
and with his own hands put the irons on his father's
feet Antonio probably owed his life to his son's

144 Osele
insistence, for when he reached Venice the people
met him with cries of rage and clamoured for his
execution. No one answered to his bona sera as
he landed at the piazzetta. He could hardly walk
for the weight of the chains, till his son, the Cardinal
Domenico, came behind his father and held them
up. So, supported by his children, he went to prison.
He was banished to Istria, but escaped to Rome,
whence, for the good services he rendered the Re
public at the Papal court, he was recalled to Venice,
and elected Doge after nineteen years of exile. He
struck this medal in the first year of his reign to mark
his sense of Justice satisfied and Peace restored.
The heroic deeds in Venetian history find ample
record in the osele. Francesco Morosini, of Pelopon
nesian fame, stamped a drawn sword on one of his
medals, and ' Non abstinet ictu ; ' on another, an
armed hand holding swords, bows, daggers, etc.,
and the legend, ' Quern non exercuit arcum! The
ninth year of Francesco Molino celebrates Venetian
constancy and single-handed courage against the
Turk in this motto, ' Et non fulta non fluxal above
a solitary flame that floats over the waters. The
fourth year of Marcantonio Giustiniani lauds the
same qualities by a winged and aureoled lion,
rampant, regardant, holding in one paw a single
palm, and in the other a bundle of palms, with this
legend, ' Et solus et simuV, Alone or allied. The
famous victory of Lepanto, in the year 1571, is

Osele 145
commemorated by the Doge Alvise Mocenigo I.
The medal bears 'MDLXXI. Anno MagncB navalis
victories dei gra. contra turcas' and the Mocenigo
rose of five petals at top and bottom.
Some of the Doges love to introduce their family
badges on their osele. The great House of Mocenigo,
for example, were never weary of their rose ; they
are constantly referring to it, carving it, and painting
it on their houses, stamping it everywhere. Their
family coat, per fesse, azure and argent, two roses
counter-changed, occurs more frequently than that
of any other Venetian nobles. Some of the Mocenighi
medals are almost sentimental in reference to their
roses. One of Alvise Mocenigo II. (1705) shows
a clear heaven with the crescent moon and many
stars, at one side a rose in full bloom, and above
this legend, ' Magis redolet luna serena! This is bad
national history, however, for the crescent moon re
presents the Turk, and the medal commemorates an
alliance between the Republic and her natural foes.
But it remained for Alvise Mocenigo in. to express
the profoundest belief in the family badge ; he re
presents himself, on the first medal of his reign,
reclining against a bed of roses, with this motto,
' Fulcite me floribus' Prop me on flowers, if only they
be roses. Other princes refer to matters of the purest
family history, quite unconnected with the nationa
life. Silvester Valier, for example, recalls the fact
that his father before him was Doge, by stamping
K

146 Osele
two eagles, crowned with ducal caps, flying towards
the sun. And Marcantonio Memmo laments the
entry of his son upon a religious life, under the in
fluence of Saint Carlo Borromeo, by the motto, ' Doce
mefacere voluntatein tuam!
Municipal reform, and great public works, such as
the rectification of the Brenta and the Adige, receive
their share of illustration in the osele ; and not a
single medal in the collection but recalls some point
of interest in the history of Venice. The medals of
the last Doge, Lodovico Manin, have an ominous
ring about their legends, when we remember that
the convulsions of the French Revolution were about
to sweep away one of the oldest and most remark
able commonwealths in Europe. The first medal
bears the word 'Libertas' at its base. The third
year's legend runs, ' Concordia civium felicitas rei-
publica! The seventh year, the last year but one
of all the Doges, has for its motto, 'Pax in virtute
tua,' which reads like a mocking epitaph upon the
dying Republic.
The few examples here mentioned will suffice to
show how wide is the field and how varied the interest
which this collection covers. Genuine osele may still
be met with, but they are becoming fashionable as
ornaments, and forgeries must be looked for and
avoided. Perhaps the safest hunting-ground is the
staff" of the ragged hooker at some of the many
landing-places in the city.

SAILS AND SAILMAKING
The sails of the Venetian fishing-boats are among
the most vivid and beautiful features in the landscape
of the lagoons. Their hues are so rich and varied as
they shift in the changing light ; so salient are the
reds and oranges on their canvas, when relieved
against the dominant white and grey of Venice and
the lagoon, that they form a glowing point of colour
from which the whole picture falls away, through end
less subtle gradations and that perpetual play of light
which shimmers over the waters of Venice. The sails
are always a beautiful sight, whether one finds them
in the auroral clearness of an early summer morning,
grouped near the point of the gardens, where the
fishing-boats come to anchor and discharge the pro
duce of their long night's toil, all their large canvas
hanging loose and motionless in the unwindy shelter
of the garden trees ; or whether it be later in the day,
when the boats put out to sea once more, with their
great sails distended as they tack against the fresh
scirocco breeze : they cross and recross each other,
like coloured shuttles on the grey water-web, or like
stately ladies threading the mazes of some strange
147

1 48 Sails and Sailmaking
sea dance, till they have gained the point of Sant'
Elena and the wind blows fair that sweeps them out
to sea by the Lido port. Or, yet again, they are
beautiful to see from San Nicoletto and the point of
the Austrian fortress, as they lie in the far offing,
towards Trieste and near their favourite fishing-ground
by the mouth of the Piave, a shifting city of sails with
sunlight full upon their orange, red, and white.
The majority of boats in use upon the lagoons are
flat-bottomed. The waters of the lagoons being of a
peculiar character — for the most part shoals intersected
by deep channels with strong currents — the boats which
were to ply upon these waters required to be adapted
to the necessities of the case. The Venetians found
by experience that flat-bottomed boats, with no keel
and a very large rudder, sunk far below the bottom of
the boat and curving some way under it, were best
suited to their purpose, and for two reasons. The
first is the obvious reason that, if the boats had a keel,
they could not cross the shoals about their business of
fishing. In fact, the boats of the lagoons had to be so
built that they should be capable of sailing in deep
water and of being rowed or punted in the shallows ;
and a large rudder, which could be shipped and
unshipped at pleasure, enabled them to do this. But
the second reason has been less generally observed.
It is well known that, in the open sea, with large
spaces for tacking, where the wind is the chief factor
in the motive power, and currents count for little, a

Sails and Sailmaking 149
boat with a keel will make less leeway than a flat-
bottomed boat. But the case is different at the ports
of the Venetian lagoons, where the outgoing or
incoming tides run with the speed and volume of
large rivers. There the current counts for as much
as the wind ; and the keel of a boat that is tacking
presents such a surface to the opposing water that
the power of the sails is minimised, and the boat
loses seriously upon each tack. For purposes of
entering the lagoons from the sea against wind and
water, a flat-bottomed boat, which off"ers no resistance
to the current below and feels the full value of the
wind above, has every advantage over boats that are
built with a keel.
Those who live by an open and stormy sea enter
tain a general idea that flat-bottomed boats cannot
be good or safe sailors ; but a short residence in
Venice would soon dispel this belief. The Venetian
sea-going boats, whether pilot or fisher, are excellent
sailors if made in the true Venetian fashion. The
whole secret of the vessel's structure and capabilities
lies in the rudder. This is made very large and deep,
and, in fact, it takes the place of the keel. That
being the case, the whole stability of the boat is at
the stern ; the bows have no hold on the water. And
it is for this reason that the Venetian boats of two
masts carry the larger sail at the stern and the
smaller one at the bows, an arrangement which
is rather surprising to English eyes, and which gives

150 Sails and Sailmaking
the boats a character of their own. Everything in
the management of the boat depends on the steers
man's tact and understanding of the rudder, and in
skilful hands it is surprising to see the large spread of
canvas that these flat-bottomed boats will carry in a
high wind.
When one first comes to Venice, and takes to the
water, the variety of boats seems interminable. The
ear is confused by a legion of strange names : tra-
baccoli, bragozzi, topi, cavalline, barche, barchette, peate
burchii, sandoli, vipere, bissone, bucintori, etc. But
presently, out of this multitude, one begins to dis
tinguish four or five as the dominant types. The
trabaccoli are those large coasting traders which,
for the most part, bring stone and wood from Istria,
and wine from Dalmatia and the Romagna, and
whose masts stand crowded together at their proper
anchorage in the Giudecca canal, behind the Salute.
They are not lagoon vessels at all, and so we will
not speak about them here. The gondola and san
dolo, the two boats of pleasure, are not really built
for sailing, for a rudder forms no part of their
equipment, and is difficult to fix, owing to the manner
in which their sterns are cut away and the small
amount of bottom they have upon the water. Never
theless, if a rudder can be attached, which may be
done in the case of the sandolo, these boats sail
fairly well, though not so well as their sister boats
the topi. The gondoliers are fond of sailing their

Sails and Sailmaking 151
gondolas, if the wind be behind midships, using an
oar as a rudder with considerable skill, after the
manner of the vikings. It is no easy accomplish
ment at first, for the gondola has a trick of falling
away from the wind. But the two sailing-boats of
the lagoons, par excellence, are the topi and bragozzi.
The topi are the smaller ; they are undecked boats,
chiefly used by the pilots at Malamocco and Lido,
by the sardellanti, or sardine-fishers, of San Piero,
and by the market-gardeners of Chioggia, Pelestrina,
and Mazzorbo. Every one knows how picturesque
they look, with their bright sails spread above a pile
of tomatoes, pumpkins, pomegranates, grapes, and
figs, and the men stretched in lazy length on the
top of all. The topi carry the usual cut and rig of
Venetian boats, two lug sails and a jib. Those
who are curious may always distinguish a Chioggian
boat from any other by this note, that the Chioggians
alone carry the yards of both sails on the same side
of their masts.
The bragozzi are much larger than the topi, and
immensely broad in the stern. They are decked,
and are chiefly employed in sea-fishing. They often
sail far out in company, towards the banks off" the
mouth of the Piave, and every morning one of their
number returns to Venice, laden with the whole results
of the night's fishing, which is sold at the Rialto ;
provisions for the fleet are bought, and the boat sails
out again to join its companions. The bragozzi are

152 Sails and Sailmaking
the most picturesque boats that traffic upon the
lagoons. They carry a vast spread of canvas on their
mainmast, thanks to the great breadth of their stem.
At the masthead they usually display a curious
weather-cock of fretted woodwork, filled in with
bright-coloured bunting, and sometimes above that
again, for luck, the little figure of a humpbacked man,
a gobbo ; for in Venice it is a sign of luck to meet a
humpback in the street, while a zotto, or lame man,
is a sure precursor of misfortune. It is the bragozzi
alone that carry upon their bows those wonderful
flying figures of Fame blowing a trumpet in a swirl
of drapery. Nothing can be prettier than to see
the bragozzi lying, bow by painted bow, in a long
row, at the Riva degli Schiavoni on a Sunday
morning while the men are gone to mass — for the
fishers of the lagoons are a pious folk, and fish are
dear, and tiot fresh, in the Venice market on Monday
mornings. The Venetians are not good boat-builders. The
only boats they make successfully are gondolas and
sandoli; all the sea-goers come from Pelestrina or
Chioggia. But they have a reputation for skill in
cutting sails. I once had an opportunity to test their
ability, A sail was to be cut for me on the model
of another owned by a friend, and the difficulty was
to find a piece of dry land in Venice large enough
to allow us to spread out the model sail. The Riva
was decided on, and an early hour named, so as to

A BRAGOZZO.

Sails and Sailmaking 155
avoid, if possible, the crowd which inevitably collects
in Venice if one dares to stand still even, much more
if one be about such a business as cutting a sail,
which offers so many opportunities for comment and
criticism. Early one moming, then, we went to the
Riva, and found our old friend with the pattern sail.
A space was swept on the pavement, and the sail
spread out The crowd began to collect — milk-boys,
policemen, sailors, loafers, the firemen from the
neighbouring station. 'General of the devils'! ' cried
the old sailor to the boys, ' what do you want here ? '
But the more he pursued them the louder they
laughed and the more lightly they skipped across his
sail ; so he had to let them be to see the business out.
It was a bright, breezy morning, the lagoon all
rippled and dancing in sunlight As we waited for
the master sailcutter to come, a sandolo, with sail
spread and badly handled, upset between the Riva
and San Giorgio. Everybody saw it, but no one
took much heed, most just turned their heads ; the
chief fireman called to two men who were rowing by,
and pointed casually in the direction of the sandolo,
upon whose upturned bottom a wet and dripping
figure was seated, drifting out to sea. The men in
the boat nodded, and then all returned to the process
of cutting the sail. Presently comes the master, with
quick, decided steps and conscious air, gravely salutes,
takes out his knife and piece of charcoal, and has the
sail stretched out tight. The dimensions are marked

156 Sails and Sailmaking
off" on the pavement in black ; the four corners and
the lines for the reefs. Then the long roll of sail
cloth is unwound and cut into lengths, one overlapping
the other, to allow for the sewing. The lengths are
numbered, folded, and carried away to be made up.
The whole process took about twenty minutes. Again
the master salutes gravely, pockets his knife and
charcoal ; the crowd disperses with various prophecies
as to the result of the sail. But in spite of all
assurances that the sail would be the best in Venice,
it did not turn out well ; for sailmaking is a very
fine and delicate affair, by no means so simple as it
looks. Although the sail may have been accurately
cut, yet, in the sewing, the difference of the tenth of
an inch in each strip of cloth — a difference which may
happen from the mere drawing of the thread — is
enough to ruin the whole, to make the sail shiver at
the edge or lose the wind in the middle, and so do
only half the work it should.
After the sail is made it has to be painted.
Almost every boat of build smaller than a trabaecolo
carries painted sails. The colouring matter is a kind
of earth, like the reddle we use for marking sheep,
which is sold in the shops of Venice. The earth is
mixed with water and dissolved, and for a paint
brush one uses a sponge. The colours to be obtained
in these earths are limited in number ; they are red,
orange, blue, and pale green. The two latter are
rarely used, and the majority of sails are painted in

Sails and Sailmaking 157
orange and red. The designs are of infinite variety,
according to the caprice or the patience of the paron ;
they range from perfectly plain sails, painted all in
one colour, through stripes and geometrical patterns,
up to the most elaborate representations of saints and
madonnas. The process of painting is easy enough.
You simply walk round the outline of your madonna,
or saint, with a sponge full of colour, fill in the details
of feature and drapery, and lay on the background
in large masses. The result is sometimes rude, but
always effective. When the sail has been painted, the
colour is fixed by dipping the whole three or four
times in the sea and leaving it to dry in the sun.
The patterns on the Venetian sails are one of the
most charming and peculiar features of the place ;
though it is to be feared that they are fast falling from
their ancient splendour. The decay of the religious
sentiment is fatal to the art of sail-painting, as it has
been to so many other arts. But Saint George slay
ing an ink-black dragon, or Saint Anthony, or Titian's
Madonna in the Assumption, are still displayed to the
winds of the lagoon. Some of the most beautiful
effects are obtained by simple colour without any
design ; there is one bragozzi which carries a large
red sail with a canton painted in deep blue, pale sea-
green, and white ; in the distance it looks like the
colouring on a drake's head and neck. The ragged
and patched sails are no less picturesque, with here
and there a splash of clear sky-blue, which you

158 Sails and Sailmaking
discover, on near approach only, to be a rent in the
canvas and the real sky glowing through it. But
the majority of sails that are not content with mere
geometrical patterns — and these are by far the larger
number — bear some symbolical design. Fortunes,
lighthouses, the globe surmounted by a cross, even
a huge yellow polenta on a red background. These
are easy to interpret, and the significance of the last
is not to be missed by a hungry seafaring people with
a voracious appetite for their favourite food. Some
designs, however, are not so easy to decipher. What
is one to make of a cock with a star on its beak, for
instance ? or a star with a flash of lightning striking
across the sail? and a heart split open by a wedge
looks almost as though the maladie du siecle had
reached these fishing-folk ; it is a device for Leopardi
or De Musset, but hardly for a sailor of the Venetian
lagoons. The only sail I have ever seen with an
historical significance in its design is one which
carries the arms of Cyprus, Jerusalem, and Armenia,
a cross with four crosslets in the cantons, recalling
the time when a Venetian lady bore these titles and
the Republic stole her kingdom from her.
No place possesses such a power of harmonising
details as Venice does, thanks to the vast expanse of
air and water wherein each feature finds its proper
rest. Even were they less picturesque than is their
habit, the Venetian sails would still be an important
item in the general impression of the lagoons, giving

Sails and Sailmaking

159

a sense of life and movement as they walk the waters.
But as it is, with their brilliant colour, their quaint
designs, the fla\our of salt, free life that belongs to
them as they spread to the sea and sky, the sails of
Venice must always remain one of its dearest features
for those who love the city in the sea.

CHIOZZOTTI.

A VISION OF LA SENSA
The seafaring people of Venice, and the sea on which
they live, the union and interpenetration of these two
elements in Venetian life, are the main subject of
this book. The Venetians have always been con
scious of this intimate relation between themselves
and their home, a relation which still exists, and which
gives to Venice so much of that peculiar charm which
she exhales. The relation still endures, but the out
ward and visible sign of it, the seal and sacrament of
the union, that nuptial ceremony of Ascension-tide
when the Doge in the name of Venice wedded the sea,
has passed away with the Republic that created it.
Once a year the marriage rite was performed, and all
Venetians recognised it as their great and peculiar
ceremony, the signature of their nationality, the token
of their indissoluble union and undying love. A
reminiscence of this national function, whereby the
Venetians declared and solemnised the singularity of
their home and of their union with it, we maf be
allowed to portray on these pages which have dealt
chiefly with this aspect of Venetian life ; but it is as
a vision only, as a fancy of the night, that we can
recover and justly'place the recollection of a ceremony

A Vision of La Sensa i6i
that has been so long time dead. The fragments of
the Bucentaur are lying in the Arsenal Museum ; the
piazza, in the broad sunlight, no longer knows the
Doge, the councillors, nor the noble train that used
to tread its pavement. It is the realm of fancy and
the watches of the night which must help us to re
constitute the solemn function of Ascension Day.
It is the vigil of Ascension Day, and two o'clock in
the moming. The piazza is all deserted and silent.
The full light of the May moon streams in unbroken
splendour down the middle of the piazzetta, from
where she hangs high above San Giorgio ; the centre
of the pavement is a broad stripe of silver white
between the deep shadows that lie beneath the colon
nades of the old library and of the ducal palace. The
summit of the campanile and the corner of Saint
Mark's are also touched with frosted silver ; and out
to sea the surface of the lagoon is broken into ripples
in whose hollows the moonlight is caught and shivered
into dancing flecks of white.
But is it Ascension mom of 1883? What large
and stately bark is that which lies beside the mole ?
She bears a golden figure of Justice on her bows ; and
her topmost deck slopes upwards to the stern, where
two carved figures hold aloft a curving shell that
forms a canopy for a throne. Over the throne floats
the broad silk banner of Saint Mark, on a crimson
ground a golden lion, winged and aureoled, with paws
L

1 62 A Vision of La Sensa
upon the open evangel. From stem to stern this
upper deck, this gallery of a hundred feet, is roofed in
crimson velvet, and its walls are rich in carved wood
work overlaid with gilt, and pierced by windows,
forty-eight in all. From the port-holes of the lower
deck forty-two great oars project, and lie upon the
water ; each oar with its four rowers, workmen from
the arsenal, waiting to row the Doge to wed the sea.
But not a sound rises from all the hundred and sixty-
eight on board, nor from the crowd of boats and
barges, gondolas and skiffs, that have suddenly
covered the face of the lagoon. They hang there,
motionless and silent upon the water, waiting.
And now from the high carved portal of the ducal
palace there issues, in silence, a long and stately
procession. An old man, bowed with age, walks first.
His beard is snowy white. The strong features of
his face, the nose and lips and brows, that the skin
seems to cover like parchment, are set in dignity and
calm. Over a white linen cap he wears the ducal
bonnet, unjewelled, made of simple gold brocade.
His shoulders are covered by a rich ermine tippet,
fastened with buttons shaped like nuts; and below
the fur the heavy gold-brocaded mantle reaches to
his feet, and trails upon the ground. After the Doge
comes a train of nobles and great officers of State ;
the ambassadors of Caesar, of the most Christian
and of the Catholic kings ; the Procuratori, the
ducal councillors, the Senate, the nobles of the

A Vision of La Sensa 163
Great Council, in robes of crimson or of scarlet and
the stoles of the various knightly orders to which
their bearers belong ; a train of splendid colour,
passing in silence down the cool, broad, moon-
besilvered pavement of the piazzetta. But no sound
of footfalls echoes from the flagstones as they pass.
They sweep on board the Bucentaur; the nobles
range themselves down either side of the long gallery,
and through their midst the Doge passes upward to
his throne. The oars strike the water, but no sound
is heard. The great barge slowly leaves the shore.
The standard of Saint Mark unfurls itself to an im
perceptible breeze. The throng of other boats form
silently behind, and follow in the wake of the Bucen
taur. The Doge of the Nicolotti leads the train ; he
is the chief of the Venetian popolo for this Ascension
Day, and marshals the crowd that follows. First
come the barges of the glass-workers from Murano ;
their trophies of crystal, ruby, or of opal wares shimmer
and scintillate as the moonlight falls on the curves or
facettings of cup and goblet. Behind these are the
barges of the six great fraternities— the Carita, San
Giovanni, the Misericordia, San Marco, San Rocco, and
San Teodoro ; each bears the banner of the brothers
at its stern. And after these comes the whole popula
tion of the city, that streams forth on this their most
Venetian festival, when by a solemn act of matrimony
they proclaim that they and the sea on which they
live are wedded and for ever one.

164 A Vision of La Sensa
In silence, without sound of oars, the whole long
water train sweeps far away over the spaces of the
moonlit lagoon ; the great Bucentaur towering in the
van. As they pass the island convent of Sant' Elena,
another barge steals noiselessly over the water to join
the procession. Its rowers bring it close up to the
Bucentauf's stern, and the white-mitred Patriarch, with
all his company of bishops, canons, priests, and chapter
of his church at San Pietro, pass on board the Doge's
barge. Behind the Patriarch come three acolytes,
who carry three golden basins filled with roses. In
a cloud of incense, the high priest of Venice moves
up the middle of the gallery, between the noble crowd,
and takes his seat below the steps that lead to the
ducal throne. Then the Do^e beckons the acolytes,
and they approach and stand beside his chair. From
the golden basins of flowers he gives a rose to each
of those who are with him on the barge, to keep in
memory of this Ascension Day.
And now the great Bucentaur and all its train has
passed between the towered fortresses of Sant' Andrea
and San Nicolo, and reached the open beyond the line
of the Lido. The barge slowly turns its bows towards
the land, and its stern towards the wide and calm
expanse of Adriatic Sea. The Doge and Patriarch
both rise, and the priest sprinkles a little water on the
ring which the Doge holds in his open hand, and
blesses it. Alone, the Doge passes out by a door in
the carved work behind his throne, on to the stern

A Vision of La Sensa 165
gallery of the barge. In silence he raises the ring on
high and drops it into the sea. There is a little splash
as the ring touches the water and sinks in the deep.
Then, for the first time, the silence of the ceremony
is broken, and, as the ring falls from his hand, the
Doge cries, ' Desponsamus te, Mare ; ' and instantly,
from all the thousand throats of that great throng,
there bursts the answering cry of ' Desponsamus te.
Mare,' and rolls away across the tide beneath the
glittering moon.
Then the barge turns once more, and the crowd
of smaller boats harness themselves to her bows to
draw her home. With shouts of joy and singing,
the whole procession sweeps away again, round by
the corner of the Lido, and enters the lagoon. The
sea resumes her old tranquillity, and the moonlight
falls in broad masses on her surface. The sounds of
mirth are borne far off upon the breeze that blows
inland from the water. The nuptials of Venice and
her Adriatic are complete. The sea lies wedded, yet
alone, beneath the spring night and the silent stars.

PROCESSIONS
The Venetian Republic from the earliest times laid
great stress upon the external ceremonies ofthe Church.
Its action in this matter was governed by policy as
much as by piety. The early history of the Republic,
its great commercial development and the consolida
tion of its power, belongs to the Orient rather than to
the West It was not till the year 1425, in the reign
of Francesco Foscari, that Venice entered the political
system of Italy, and became a factor in the diplomacy
of Western Europe. Before that date, the policy of
the Ver\etians had been devoted to fostering their com
merce with the East, and to maintaining a neutral
attitude towards the endless embroglios of the Italian
States. Rome was the focus of these embroglios.
Any connection with Rome must inevitably have
involved the Republic in the 'minute complications
of the peninsula ; and therefore the Venetians, while
always professing themselves good sons ofthe Western
Church, tacitly claimed an ecclesiastical independence
of Rome, and asserted that their Patriarch, the heir of
Saint Mark, was the equal and not the inferior of Saint
Peter's representative. In order to further this policy

Processions 167
of differentiation from Rome, the State did everything
in its power to render the Church of Venice a national
Church. The Doge officially took part in all the great
ceremonies side by side with the Patriarch ; these
ceremonies, even in their religious aspect, would have
been incomplete without his presence. The greatest
church in Venice was- not the Patriarch's cathedral at
Castello, but the Doge's chapel attached to his palace.
The Doge's chaplain, the priniiciero, and the chapter
of Saint Mark's, were the most powerful ecclesiastical
body in Venice, completely overshadowing the Bishop
of Olivolo, in whose diocese they were. On the other
hand, no event of foreign or domestic importance to
Venice — victory over the Turk or deliverance from
plague or conspiracy — could occur, but the Govern
ment ordained its commemoration by an ecclesias
tical function. And thus the Venetians learned to
read the history of their country in the ceremonies of
their Church.
So Venice became a city of festivals and proces
sions, in which the people flattered their patriotism
and honoured their own achievements. Many of
these processions were purely religious, such as the
ceremony of Palm Sunday, or of the Corpus Domini,
the record of which, in all its splendour and pomp
of colour, of golden bier and lighted tapers, of rich-
robed priests and sunlight on the mosaics of Saint
Mark's, stands blazoned for ever on the canvas of
Gentile Bellini. Others were domestic in character.

1 68 Processions
like the thanksgivings for liberation from the plague
on the days of the Salute and the Redentore. Some,
again, commemorated turning-points in the history
of the Republic, like, that procession which the Doge
made yearly to San Vio, on the isth of June, to
render thanks that Venice had been saved from the
conspiracy of Tiepolo, in 1310. That conspiracy,
the most formidable in all Venetian history, more
formidable than that of Maririo Faliero forty-four
years later, was a violent protest against the closing
of the Great Council, and the stereotyping of the
Venetian constitution as a close and rigid oligarchy.
The little church of San Vio — surely the tiniest in
all Venice, and perhaps the oldest, for it dates from
the year 917 — stands in a campo of its own, opening
down to the Grand Canal. It is a beautiful Byzantine
building, raised in courses of red and white marble,
with a mosaic over the door, and, higher still, one of
the few Byzantine crosses that yet remain in Venice.
The church is seldom used now — only for Mass once
a year ; and Elias Howe with his sewing-machine
gracelessly occupies the larger part of one exterior
wall. But the church was once the honoured resting-
place of the Beata Contessa Tagliapietra, a noble maid
of Venice, whose pretty story is now almost forgotten,
but might have served the pencil of Carpaccio. She
lived with her father on the other side of the Grand
Canal, and from the very first she showed great piety,
and a passion for the service of the Church. In season

Processions 1 7 1
and out of season, the child would steal away to the
shrine of San Vio, and remain for hours in ecstasy
and prayer. Her father thought such conduct ill
becoming in a gentle maid ; but, finding remon
strances of no avail, he sent down orders to the
gondoliers at the traghetto below his windows to
refuse his daughter passage. When the child came
down to the traghetto one day, and found she could
not cross, without a moment's hesitation she set foot
upon the water, and so, to the amazement of all, she
won her way to her favourite shrine, and achieved
her place in the hierarchy of heaven.
Most of the great Venetian festivals and processions
have passed away with the Republic which gave them
birth. Only those survive which have been consecrated
in the hearts of the people, and draw their tenacity
from the popular life ; these are the furfctions of the
Salute and the Redentore, and the processions peculiar
to each parish in the city. On its own especial saint's
day, each parish church holds its sagra, or festival, of
the patron, and all the parish is en fete. In the
early part of the day there is a procession, which
makes the giro of the whole district, stopping at
every shrine to incense it.
Wonderful effects of colour and of grouping these
processions make in the clear air of the lagoons.
First come the facchini, bearing the crosses, banners,
candelabra, madonnas seated on their tottering chairs,
all the paraphernalia of the church, furbished and

172 Processions
cleaned for the sagra. These facchini are divided
into groups, each group wearing a different-coloured
ephod over their work-day clothes ; the first are
blue, the next scarlet, and the last white ; tall, bare
headed, dark-haired men with bronzed throats and
bright eyes, that glance up and smile at the windows
as they pass slowly along the little calle, staggering
somewhat under their various loads. Behind the
facchini comes the nonzolo, or sacristan, alone, in
scarlet, a person of importance, who walks back
wards, ringing a bell, marshalling the crowd and
keeping the boys in order. Then the musica,
trombone, fife, clarionet, and drum, playing the
lightest of airs, and marching gallantly in front of
three Httle acolytes who send up clouds of smoke
from their silver censers. Then, beneath a canopy,
the old parocco in his most gorgeous robes and
laces, bearing the Host reverently in his hands,
and followed by all the lesser functionaries of his
church. Behind the priests come all the pious of
the parish : the men first, in black, and bare-headed ;
then the women, in long black veils. Each carries a
lighted taper, held sideways across his breast for fear
of the falling wax ; and by the side of each torch-
bearer walks some one who catches the dripping wax
in a paper bag. So the procession passes on through
all the winding streets, often delayed, halting here
and filling up there, the crowd below nodding up to
the crowd above that fills every window and balcony.

Processions 1 7^
The last bridge in the parish is hung with brilliant-
coloured mats ; there the procession halts, the priest
alone under his canopy climbs to the highest point
of the arch and raises the Host in air ; the music
stops ; a hush falls upon the throng ; each head is
uncovered and every knee is bent for a moment or
two ; while the breeze blows salt and free down the
canal, lifting the hair on the kneelers' foreheads, the
waters glide persistently by, and above is the thin
clear strip of blue, roofing it all from house to house.
Then the band breaks into its gayest waltz, the
procession returns to the parish church, and the rest
of the day is devoted to festivity. In the evening
there is usually an illumination in the principal
campo of the quarter — extra gas-lamps and Bengal
lights. The picture of the saint, with a little oil-lamp
before it, hangs out of many windows. Round the
fringes of the campo are the stalls of the fruit-sellers ;
chestnuts caldi di bogio, boiling hot, or fried cuttles,
or fried puffs of pastry, are the staple fare. The stalls
themselves are gorgeous with those huge brass plates
so common in Venice ; and there is a constant fire
of good-humoured raillery passing between buyer
and seller, and general laughter follows on some
extra witty stroke, for a Venetian's real deHght, when
in the swing of a holiday, is to draw a laugh. There
is dancing, too, in a space cleared in the middle of
the square. The lights, the music, the upturned
faces, the pleasant-tempered, gay, and joyous crowd.

1 74 Processions
the scraps of song from the neighbouring wine
shops, all combine to make a stirring scene, only too
theatrical in the mixed Hght of moon and lamps.
These feste are entirely popular, and the people
enjoy them to the full. ' O benedetto San Lucca ! '
cried a young fellow on that saint's feast, as he
embraced his companion in sheer exuberance of
heart, and the true Italian delight in lamps and stir
and music. The people manage the whole affair
for themselves. They elect a capo, who gathers
subscriptions in the quarter, and, according to the
funds he raises, he arranges the scale of expenditure.
Sometimes, if they are very well off and the subscrip
tions come in copiously, the whole affair will close,
about half-past twelve at night, with fireworks,
rockets, Catherine-wheels, and Bengal lights de
fining the bridges. Then all the crowd applauds,
the capo loudest of all, delighted at the success of
his own designs ; and screaming ' Musica ! musica !
where is that son of a dog the music?' he plunges
away to hurry up the lighted barge of the musicians
that comes floating lazily along the canal, as they
play ihe finale of ' Viva Italia ! viva el Re ! '

SAN NICOLO DEL LIDO
It is natural that Venice should possess a church in
honour of the patron saint of sailors, San Nicolo di
Bari. The church stands at the most beautiful point
on the Lido, overlooking the Lido port, by which
the warships and the merchantmen of the Republic
sailed out to conquer the Mediterranean, and to ' hold
the gorgeous East in fee.' Before sailing, and on
their return, the crews would land to ask a blessing
on their voyage, or to render thanks for their safe
home-coming, in the temple of San Nicolo. And
near the church was the artesian well whence the
ships drew their supplies of water, counted miracu
lous, for after the longest voyage it remained sweet
and fresh as on the day that it was drawn. The
church was built in the eleventh century by the Doge
Domenico Contarini, about the time that the saint's
body was brought from Asia to Italy.
San Nicolo was Bishop of Myra in Lycia ; and it
is not likely that he became the sailor's saint until
the people of Bari, for some unknown cause, were
suddenly enamoured of him, and determined to steal
his body from its Asian resting-place. Fired by this
176

176 San Nicolo del Lido
pious purpose, three merchants of Bari set sail for the
Levant ; and after many difficulties and dangers they
succeeded in breaking open the bishop's tomb and
carrying the relics away to Italy, in the year 1087.
At Bari the bishop worked many miracles, and his
fame spread all down the Adriatic shore. At that
time Venice was not undisputed mistress of the
Adriatic, and rivalry between herself and other sea
ports, Ancona and Bari, ran high. The possession
of the saint's body was made a test question and a
trial of supremacy. Venice claimed the relics, and
endeavoured to obtain them by force. She failed in
the attempt ; but with her accustomed pertinacity
she spread the fiction that the saint's body had been
really brought to Venice, and the church on the Lido
was raised in his honour. San Nicolo of the Lido
still watches over and protects the sailors of the
lagoon, for his campanile is a sea-mark to those who
sail from Istria, and when it is in one straight Hne
with the towers of San Piero and San Marco, then
the master knows he has the route to find the Lido
port. The day which the Lido keeps in honour of San
Nicolo is not that saint's proper day, the 6th of
December, but the day of his translation, the 9th of
May. And this change is fortunate, for then this end
of the Lido is coming into all the richness of its
spring. Long before Sant' Elizabetta and the baths
were invented, before the days of steamboats and

San Nicolo del Lido 177
tramways, while the path from the lagoons to the sea
still led through a tangle of rank sea-grasses that
covered the low sand-dunes, whose wildness the
brothers of San Lazzaro had not yet tamed to the
richest garden lands near Venice, — the shady green
ery of San Nicolo was the favourite haunt of the
Venetians on a summer's afternoon. It was the cus
tom then to take one's food and sup upon the grass
beneath the trees. There is no grass half so green,
nor any shade so profound and cool, within miles and
miles of Venice. The grass is full of violets, and
overhead is the sun-proof shelter of the acacia and
catalpa groves. Beyond the groves stretch wide
green meadows, bounded by a hedge where the
blackthorn blossoms, and watered by lazy-flowing
water-courses that counterfeit an English stream ; the
path that leads from the meadows is flanked by
poplar trees, and is deep and cool as an English lane.
The sea is shut out on the one side, and the lagoon
on the other. The whole scene recalls the midland
counties ; only here the flowers are richer, and in
place of buttercups you find hyacinth and narcissus,
yellow and white. Everywhere there is green — green,
the only colour that the eye seriously misses and
sometimes longs for in the Venetian landscape.
The whole point of San Nicolo has been enclosed
by the brick walls of an Austrian fort ; and the earth
ramparts make a splendid promenade. From that
superior height you command Venice on the one side,
M

178 San Nicolo del Lido
its bell-towers and churches composed against their
everiasting background of the Alps ; the campanile
and domes of San Giorgio and the Salute grouped
together like the minarets and cupolas of some Eastern
mosque. On the other side the Adriatic opens away.
If the weather be perfectly clear you may catch the
faintest blue indication of the Istrian hills, and follow
the mountain chain right round the head of the gulf,
by Friuli and the Dolomites, till you lose it again
near Monte Adamello in the Bresciano — a sweep of
sea and sky and mountains that cannot fail to satisfy
the appetite for space. In spring the ramparts are
covered by a carpet of grass and salvias and poppies
that is Persian in its audacity of colours, green and
scarlet and purple, dazzling to the sight.
The approach to San Nicolo is worthy of the place.
As you row towards it in spring the scent of the
acacia meets you out on the water. From the lagoons
the boat passes, under a high stone arch with Saint
Mark's lion, half effaced, and the Mocenigo coat on
either side, into a long, narrow creek. On the one side
is the odorous acacia grove dipping down to the water,
and the green of its cool recesses is restful to the eye
after the dancing sunlight on the lagoon. At the
end of this creek are some broken marble steps, and
beyond, an avenue of trees where the hooped and
powdered and brocaded ladies may have sauntered
and flirted their fans, like any group out of Watteau
or Pater. On the other side are the rows of mulberry

San Nicolo del Lido 179
trees that are ruthlessly stripped each spring to feed
the silkworms ; and right in the heart of the mul
berry grove is the Buon pesce, where one may fare
plainly but well. The little house with its pergola of
honeysuckle and vine, and its large garden behind,
in whose ivy-covered walls the blackbirds build and
sing, is all that now remains of an ancient nunnery.
Where the barracks now stand, clustered around
the church, there was once a monastery ; and the
story of one of the brothers who dwelt there is the
most picturesque episode in the history of the Vene
tian cloisters, and most intimately connected with the
life of a great Venetian family, the Giustiniani. In
the year 1170, the Venetians were at war with the
Emperor Manuel I., and the whole family of Gius
tiniani followed their Doge to the Levant, except
one lad Nicolo, who was a monk in the monastery on
the Lido. The Venetians took the island of Chios ;
but, while wintering there, a fierce plague broke out
among the fleet, so that the Doge returned to Venice,
the following year, with only sixteen ships out of
a hundred and twenty. In this expedition all the
Giustiniani were killed, either by plague or in battle,
and the family seemed doomed to extinction. But
the loss of such a vigorous race was deemed a public
calamity. The Government therefore petitioned the
Pope to release Nicolo from his vows, and to allow
him to marry. The Pope assented. Nicol6 was
formally made a layman once more, and wedded to

i8o San Nicolo del Lido
the Doge's daughter. They had a family of nine
sons and three girls. After re-establishing his house
upon this solid basis, Nicolo returned to his convent,
where he won such a reputation for holiness that,
when he died, the Church bestowed on him the title
of ' Blessed Confessor.' His wife founded a nunnery
on one of the islands near Torcello, where she ended
her days. The people gave her the rank of her hus
band, and she was afterwards known as the ' Blessed
Ann.' But Nicolo's cloister has long ceased to exist ; it
is occupied now by the Corpo della Disciplina, the.
regiment whose ranks are filled by all the troublesome
spirits in the Italian army, sent to do penance on the
Lido. The convent gardens are a musketry practising
ground, and eyery festa the Italian flag flies over the
ancient monastery door.

THE DOVES OF SAINT MARK
In Venice the pigeons do not allow you to forget
them, even if one desired to forget a bird that is so
intimately connected with the city and with a great
ceremony of that ancient Republic which has passed
¦ away. They belong so entirely to the place, and
especially to the great square ; they have made their
home for so inahy generations among the carvings
of the Basilica, at the feet of the bronze horses, and
under the massive cornices of the New Procuratie,
that the great campanile itself •is hardly more essen
tial to the character of the piazza than are these
delicate denizens of Saint Mark's. In the structure
of the ducal palace the wants of the pigeons have
been taken into account, and near the two great wells
which stand in the inner courtyard little cups of
Istrian stone have been let into the pavement for
the pigeons to drink from. On cold, frosty mornings
you may see them tapping disconsolately at the ice
which covers their drinking troughs, and may win
their thanks by breaking it for them. Or if the borin
blows hard from the east, the pigeons sit in long rows
under the eaves of the Procuratie ; their necks drawn
181

1 82 The Doves of Saint Mark
into their shoulders, and the neck feathers ruffled
round their heads, till they have lost all shape, and
look like a row of slate-cploured cannon-balls.
From Saint Mark's the pigeons have sent out
colonies to the other churches and campi of Venice.
They have crossed the Grand Canal, and roost and
croon arriong the volutes of the Salute, or, ih wild
weather, wheel high. and airily. above its domes. They
have even found their way to Malamocco and Maz
zorbo ; so that all Venice in the sea owns and protects
its sacred bird. But it is in Saint Mark's that the
pigeons "' most do congregate;' and one cannot enter
the piazza, arid stand for a moment at the corner,
without hearing the sudden rush of wings upon the
air, and seeing the white under-feathers of their.
pinions, as the doves strike backward to check their
flight; and flutter down at one's feet in expectation
of peas or grain. They are boundlessly greedy, and
will stuff" themselves tilU they can hardly walk, and
the little red feet stagger under the loaded crop.
They are not virtuous, but they are very beautiful.
There is a certain fitness in the fact that the dove
should be the sacred bird of. the sea city. Both
EngHsh 'dove' and Latin columba mean the diver;
and the dove uses the air much as the fish uses the
sea. It glides, it dives, it shoots through its airy
ocean ; it , hovers agains^ the breeze, or presses its
breast against the scirocco storm, as you may see fish
poised in their course against the stream ; then with

The Doves of Saint Mark 183
a sudden tum it relaxes the strain" and sweeps away
down the wind. The dove is an airy emblem of the
sea upon which Venice and the Venetians live. But
more than that :' the most permanent quality in the
colour of the lagoons, where the lights are always
shifting, is the dove-tone of sea and sky ; a tone
which holds all colours in solution, and out -of which
they emerge as the water-ripples or the cloud-flakes
pass — ^just as the colours are shot and varied on a
young dove's neck.
There is some doubt as to the origin of these
flocks of pigeons which shelter in Saint Mark's.
According to one story, Henry Dandolo, the Crusader,
was besieging Candia; he received valuable informa
tion from the interior of the island by means of carrier
pigeons,' and, later on, sent news of his successes
home to Venice by the same ¦ messengers. In re
cognition of these services the Government resolved
to maintain the carriers at the public cost ; and the
flocks of to-day are the descendants of the fourteenth-
century pigeons. The more probable tradition, how
ever, is that which connects these pigeons with the
antique ceremonies of Palm Sunday. On that festival
the Doge made the tour of the piazza, accompanied'
by all the officers of State, the Patriarch, the foreign
ambassadors, the silver tmmpets, all the pomp of
the ducal dignity. Among other largess of that day,
a number of pigeons, weighted by pieces of paper
tied to their legs, used to be let loose from the gallery

184 The Doves of Saint Mark
where the bronze horses stand, above the western
door of the church. Most of the birds were easily
caught by the crowd, and kept for their Easter
dinner ; but some escaped, and took refuge in the
upper parts of the palace and among the domes of
Saint Mark's. The superstition of the people was
easily touched, and the birds that had sought the
protection of the saint were thenceforth dedicated
to the patron of Venice. The charge of supporting
them was committed to the superintendents of the
corn stores, and the usual hour for feeding the
pigeons was nine o'clock in the morning. During
the revolution of 1797 the birds fared as badly as
the aristocracy, and were left to take care of them
selves ; but when matters settled down again the
feeding of the pigeons was resumed by the munici
pality, and takes place at two in the afternoon, though
the incessant largess of strangers can leave the birds
but little appetite for their regular meal.
In spite of the multitudes of pigeons that haunt
the squares of the city, a dead pigeon is as rare to
see as a dead donkey on the mainland. It is a pious
opinion that no Venetian ever kills a pigeon, and
apparently they never die; but the fact that they
do not increase so rapidly as to become a nuisance
instead of a pleasure, lends some colour to the sus
picion that pigeon pies are not unknown at certain
tables during the proper season.

THE DUCAL PALACE
The work of restoration has been in progress for
thirteen years. It was begun in 1876, when, in the
presence of the Queen of Italy, the new base for the
'Judgment Corner' column was laid. The cost of
the works up to the present date has been 850,000
lire, or about ;£^34,ooo, not a great sum when the size
of the undertaking is considered. In the office of
the works are large designs of the facade on the
piazzetta and of the fagade on the mole, showing
exactly what had been done : how much work is
quite new, how much is old work taken out and
replaced, how much untouched.
We will begin by stating what work is quite new
in both these facades. On the piazzetta, or west
side, taking the lower loggia first, the foundations
and the bases of the columns all the way along are
new ; so is the cornice above the arcade upon which
the columns of the upper loggia rest Beginning
from the Judgment Corner, the following columns
are new: — i, 2, 3, 10, 12, 13, 14, 16, 17, 18, and 19,
which is the ' Fig-tree Angle ' column. The following
capitals are new: — 10, 12, 16, 17, 18, 19. Several
of the capitals, and notably the ' Judgment Corner '
186

1 86 The Ducal Palace
capital, have been strengthened by circling them
internally with copper. In the upper loggia on the
piazzetta side, only eight columns are new ; they are
the 13th, 23rd, 28th, 29th, 32nd, 34th, 36th, and 39th.
The 4th, 19th, 22nd, 23rd, 25th, 26th, 27th, 28th, 29th,
33rd, 34th, 35th, and 36th capitals are new.
On the southern or mole fagade, in the lower
loggia, the foundations and bases of the columns,
and the cornice above the arches, are all new. The
new columns, counting from the ' Fig-tree Corner,'
but not including the Fig-tree column, which has
been already numbered, are 2, 4, 5, 6, 12, 14, 16, and
half 1 8, which is the ' Vine-tree Corner ' column. The
new capitals are 2, 3, 9, 13, 14, 16, 17. In the upper
loggia the following columns are new : — 2, 3, 6, 19,
20, 24, 27, 31, 32, 33, and 34 ; and these capitals, 2, 4,
5, 6, 17, 18, 19, 20, 23, 24, 26, 27, 28, 33.
The new capitals have been cut from casts taken
from the originals ; and in every case the workman
has had the original before him while employed in
carving the new capital. The work appears to have
been carried out with affection, care, and patience ;
and the uneducated eye, at all events, cannot dis
tinguish between the old and the new, except for
the dark, smooth patina which time and salt-sea wind
and sun have laid upon the older work. Any one
who examines the original capitals will be convinced
that it was impossible to preserve them in their
place compatibly with the safety of the building.

The Ducal Palace 187
They are cracked and broken into many pieces, with
fissures passing through and through them. In many
cases this destruction has been caused by the de
fective way in which the capital was applied to the
column. The tops of the original columns on which
the capitals were to rest, and indeed all joinings of
stone in the old \\'ork, show grooves running in
towards the centre. These grooves were intended to
receive molten lead, which was poured into them so
as to fill up any inequalities of surface between
capital and column, and therefore to distribute the
pressure equally ; but in many cases the lead did not
reach its destination, leaving hollow spaces where the
superincumbent weight has produced a fissure. The
original capitals which have been removed are now
collected in the courtyard and basements of the
palace. They have been clamped and riveted to
gether, and will be preserved in the museum, where
artists will still be able to study the original work
manship and compare it with the new.
On the south fagade, and in the intersections of
four arches of the lower loggia, there are specimens
of an incrustation in marble. It is certain that the
original design intended these incrustations to be
applied at every intersection along the whole fagade,
for hollow spaces and groovings are left to receive
the marbles. But the scheme, whether for artistic or
for economic reasons, was never carried out, and the
Government decs not intend to complete it ; so that

1 88 The Ducal Palace
the two incrustations remain as specimens of what
was meant to be. It is to be hoped that the Hon
and doge above the large window of the west fagade,
and the lion above the large window on the south,
both of which were removed by Napoleon, will be
replaced. The medallion of Venice subduing the
stormy sea, which fills the rose above the famous
seventh column from the ' Fig-tree Corner ', on the
piazzetta side, has been refurnished with crown and
broach. The crown is of bronze, slightly gilded ;
and' the broach is studded with precious stones which
once formed part of the stock of a Venetian jeweller,
who failed at the time the restoration was in hand.
The stones bear precious names, but their quality is
defective, though they glint brightly on the breast of
Venice when the sunlight falls along the west fagade.
We have now described the restorations of the
Ducal Palace which are visible from outside. We
must turn to the question, more interesting and
structurally more important, of the dangers which
threatened the building inside. The enormous
weight of the upper story of the Ducal Palace,
resting upon the two light colonnades, made the
work of underpinning and raising the building, in
order to remove the damaged columns and capitals
and to replace them by new ones, a serious under
taking. It was especially perilous at the angles.
The shorings, upon which the success of the opera
tion depended, were constructed of huge timbers in

The Ducal Palace 1 89
such a way that the pressure was borne by them
perpendicularly. When they were ready and in
place, the building above the column which was to
be removed was forced slightly up, and the column
extracted, an operation which usually took two days.
The substitution of the new column usually required
eight days more. When the new column was in
place, fine wedges of copper were driven in between
the column and the building suspended above it ;
these wedges were forced in, one after another, until
the blow of the hammer on the wedge at the column's
head was felt on the battlement immediately above
the column ; then the shoring was removed, and the
building settled down upon the column. This method
was followed wherever a new column or capital had
to be introduced.
But the two greatest difficulties in the restoration
were encountered at the points marked A and B in
the accompanying plan. At the ' Vine-tree Angle ' at
the Ponte della Paglia a most serious settlement had
been going on for long. The causes of this dangerous
subsidence were three in number. First, the ducal
palace is not built on piles ; its foundations are laid
on a bed of very hard clay, which is generally ex
cellent throughout ; but the canal which debouches
at the Ponte della Paglia has always had a rapid
current, and just at this angle the water has invaded
and somewhat softened the clay bed on which the
palace stands. Second, for a space of twenty metres

190 The Ducal Palace
the wall marked AA was built upon old foundations,
supposed to date from the time of the Emperor Otto.
These foundations were in themselves defective, and
were rendered weaker by the liquefaction of their
clay bed. Some attempt had been made to fortify
them by placing blocks of stone along them laterally,
but of course without effect ; and here the most
serious part of the settlement took place. Third, the
great fire of 1577 calcined the stones and injured the
beams which formed the roof of the upper loggia
and the floor of the Maggior Consiglio above. The
heads of these beams had already suffered by the
infiltration of water, and were rotten, more especially
the great larch beam at point D, which carried over
the upper loggia the tressa del Paradiso, the eastern
wall of the Sala del Maggior Consiglio, upon which
Tintoret had painted his ' Paradise.'
The restorations recently effected have been as
follows. The foundations of the ancient wall from
A to A have been taken out, bit by bit, and new
foundations put in until the more recent foundations
and the firmer bottom was reached. Da Ponte's
disfiguring arch was taken down, and in doing so
the bases and capitals of two little columns were
discovered. These little columns had once served
to carry the larch beam of the Paradise wall, before
its head was damaged by fire and water. They have
now been restored, the original capitals being used ;
and they may be seen from the mole, cutting the
rose between the ninth and tenth arches from the

The Ducal Palace 191
Vine-tree Corner. In place of the old larch beam
of 1 344, a new beam, composed of four larch beams
bound together by iron, was placed upon the little
columns ; and upon that beam the Paradise wall,
where it passes over the upper loggia, now rests.
Four great iron tie-rods let into the walls, two run
ning south and north, and two running east and
west, hold the corner firm. Further, the wooden
beam which ran from Da Ponte's arch to the Fig-tree
corner, carrying the damaged beams of the Maggior
Consiglio floor, was removed.
The second great difficulty was encountered at
point B. Any one who examines the fagade of the
Ducal Palace on the Piazzetta side will notice that
the seventh and ninth columns from the fig-tree
corner are thicker and stronger than any of their
neighbours, column seven being much stouter than
column nine. This variation is not the result of
caprice, for though there is some slight disparity in
the thickness of the columns, it is never more than
three centimetres — the result of accident and not
intentional. The columns were intended to be equal
in size, except the angle columns and columns seven
and nine. The reason for the greater thickness of
these two pillars is that each of them carries a wall
which runs east and west, and reaches to the whole
height of the building. The wall carried by column
nine is not a heavy one ; it is a comparatively modern
partition wall, forming on the upper floor the southern
end of the Sala dello Scrutinio. But column nine has

192 The Ducal Palace
a very different load to bear. It carries what is con
jectured to have been an outer fortified wall of the
older Ziani Palace, and is now the southern wall of
the inner courtyard, and nothern wall of the Sala del
Maggior Consiglio. This great wall, where it passes
over the upper Loggia, is carried on a beam (E)
similar to that which supports the Paradise wall, the
beam head resting above column seven. This column
and capital were in great disorder, and had to be
replaced by new work. The underpinning and lifting
of the great Ziani wall, as well as the external upper
wall, the removal of the old column and capital, "and
the replacing of the new, were serious undertakings ;
and though they were, successfully carried out, the
operation was a most anxious one. When the new
column and capital were in their place, so great was
the pressure that the scaff"olding could not be taken
down again, but had to be cut out.
These works, perhaps one of the most successful
restorations ever accomplished, are virtually com
plete ; and the noble building is in a condition now
to last for many centuries, and to afford daily pleasure
to all the hundreds that pass along its walls. The
new work has been carefully discoloured so as to
match as near as may be the weathering upon the
older work ; and it would require a singularly trained
eye to distinguish between them. Even Mr. Ruskin,
when last in Venice, declared himself satisfied. Both
Loggias are now open to the public, and the visitor
may wander along the splendid upper colonnades.

The Ducal Palace

193

past the older Loggia of Doge Ziani, past the columns
engraved with the graffiti of many centuries, and the
walls encrusted with ducal arms ; he may lean upon
the balustrade and look across the basin of Saint Mark
to San Giorgio, rosy red and white upon the lagoon,
and feel, as the old Venetians felt, the salt sea breeze
that blows from the Lido and the Adriatic Sea.

a,0

N

ALL SOULS' DAY
The Italians keep their Lemuria, or festival for the
dead, not in May, as their Roman ancestors did, but
in November. The 2nd of November, All Souls'
Day, and its octave are more generally observed than
any other of the minor holy days in the Roman
calendar. No festival could so unite all classes of
people as this, on which each family pays the tribute
of memory to its lost ones, and acknowledges the
power of that great Democrat, Death. Every day
throughout the octave, the churches of Venice recite
a mass for the souls of those who are gone, and
implore for them the intercession of All Saints, whose
festival comes immediately before the day of the
dead. In the evening another service is held, a
little after sundown. There is a sermon ; and then
begins the lighting of candles all through the church,
before each altar and round the catafalque in the
centre. It is upon the vigil of All Souls, the 'notte
dei Morti,' as it is called, and at the Church of the
Gesuati, upon the Zattere, that the greatest illumina
tion takes place. The Gesuati is that late Palladian
church, built of Istrian stone, almost opposite the
194

All Souls' Day 195
nohler fagade of the Redentore, and more formally
known as Santa Maria del Rosario. The Church is
called thfe Gesuati because hard by — but long before
the foundation of this present building, which dates
from the last century only — the company of the
Blessed John Colombini, which was called the Gesuati,
first established itself in the year 1392. Among the
other pious duties of the brotherhood was that of
supplying and carrying the torches at funerals. And
hence it cornes that the Gesuati makes this display
of light every 2nd of November. The Order of the
Blessed John was suppressed in the year 1668 ; but
the Dominicans who succeeded the Gesuati in the
possession of their monastery and church, continued
the custom of the candles.
Outside, over the main door of the church, is a
large black board, and, in white letters, an invitation
to all good Christians to pray for the souls of the
departed. Round this tablet hangs a wreath of laurel
leaves, twined on a black-and-white ribbon. Each
other door of the church has a similar garland above
it. The sun is setting in a cold and cloudless sky,
serene and almost hard. In the zenith the colour
is deep blue, but towards the west a thin film of
gold is spread where the sun is sinking. The wind
comes fine and searching, as it so often does on an
autumn evening. The broad and rippled waters of the
Giudecca Canal seem as hard as the sky they reflect
Inside the church, through the open door where

196 All Souls' Day
women troop, pulling their shawls up over their
heads as they enter, all is dark and gloomy, every
column, pilaster, and architrave draped in black cloth
with silver fringes ; and wreaths of laurel are twined
round each pillar's base. The high altar is hidden
by a towering cenotaph, raised in the middle of the
nave ; against its blackness the thin white stripes
of the tapers that surround it, stand out clear. The
people, chiefly women and boys, scuffle and whisper
subduedly as they kneel in rows. The black-walled,
black-roofed church seems to enclose and compress
them as if in some vast and lugubrious tomb ; and
their mutterings sound like the gibbering of ghosts.
The sermon begins ; a voice alone, full of inflexion,
passion, forcible cadences, speaking out of the dark
ness. Though the preacher is invisible, the mind
unconsciously and perforce pictures the action that
must accompany this strong Italian rhetoric. The
voice holds the church ; and there is silence in the
congregation except for the dull thud of the padded
doors as some new-comers arrive. The sermon is not
long ; only a few rapid passages, and then comes the
close; The shuffling and whispering are resumed ;
and the sacristans begin to light the candles. Through
the darkness the little yellow tips of fire move noise
lessly, touching the tall wax tapers before each altar,
and down the nave, and round the cenotaph in the
centre. Presently the church is faintly illuminated
by these warm yellow stars, that waver to and fro

All Souls' Day 197
in the gloom, but do not o^¦ercome it There is a
short hush of silent prayer ; then the congregation
rises and shuffles out down the steps of the church
on to the broad pavement of the Zattere.
The sun has set, the wind died away ; the air
is mild and clear; the sky in the west is mellowed
to a wonderful enamel of molten blue and green and
daffodil ; and no stars are shining yet The crowd
disappears rapidly ; the boys rush off" with shouts ;
the men follow in twos or threes, with long swinging
step and conscious manly movement ; the women,
linked arm in arm, go clattering down the narrow
street on their noisy pattens.
On All Souls' Day it is the custom to visit the
graves of relations and friends in that grim cemetery
of San Michele, whose high brick walls you pass on
the way to Murano or Torcello. The church itself
is a lovely specimen of Lombardi work, with delicate
bas-reliefs in Istrian stone upon the little pentagonal
Cappella Emiliana adjoining it But there is some
thing terrible and sinister in the cemetery itself,
where the dead lie buried in the ooze of the lagoon-
island. On this day the Venetians carry wreaths
to lay on the graves. The wealthier have garlands
made of real flowers, but, for the most part, these
wreaths are twined out of Venetian beads — red and
blue. Madonna's colours, for the women ; or black
and white for the men, who have no universal patron
in the heavens.

198 All Souls' Day
There is one old custom connected with this festival
of the dead which still survives in Venice, and recalls a
Latin, or even an earlier, superstition. The pious man
in Ovid's ' Fasti ' rises at midnight to fling black beans
behind his shoulder. Nine times he flung his beans,
and then the ghost was laid. The Venetian does not
fling away his beans ; he eats them. In Venice this
custom of eating beans through the octave of All
Souls' is extremely ancient The monks of every
cloister in the city used to make a gratuitous dis
tribution of beans on All Souls' Day to any of the
poor who chose to come for them. A huge caldron
was placed in the middle of the courtyard and the
food ladled out to the crowd. The gondoliers did
not come with the rest, but had their portion sent
down to them at their ferries. This grace was granted
to them in consideration of the fact that all the year
round they rowed the brothers across the canals for
nothing. Indeed, though the custom is almost ex
tinct, they still do so ; and you may sometimes see
a brown-cowled friar crossing a ferry with no other
payment than a pinch of snuff" or a benediction. As
the Venetians grew more wealthy, true beans became
distasteful to the palates of the luxurious, who were
yet unwilling to break through the custom of eating
them on All Souls' Day. The pastrycooks saw their
opportunity, and invented a small round puff", coloured
blue or red or yellow, and hollow inside ; these they
called fave, or beans ; and these are to be seen at

All Souls' Day 199
this time of the year in all the bakers' windows. If
a man should happen to be courting at this season, it
is customary for him to make a present of a boxful
of these fave to his lady. But the pious mind has
never been quite at ease under this gastronomic
deception ; and so, — though you may hate beans and
keep your hands from them as scrupulously as any
pupil of Pythagoras, — should your cook chance to be
a good Catholic you will assuredly, about the month
of November, have beans set before you for dinner
in Venice.

THE MADONNA DELLA SALUTE
Venice has never forgotten to be grateful to ' Mary
the Mother of Health,' who freed her from her last
great plague. Every year, on the 21st of November,
thanksgiving services are held in the Church of the
Salute, whose group of cupolas and fanciful buttresses
and statues form such a wilful and picturesque object,
standing, as they do, on the point of the Dogana, and
opposite the graver fagade of Palladio's San Giorgio.
The church was built in quittance of a vow made to
the Virgin if she would save the city from the plague.
The pestilence had raged for sixteen months, destroy
ing eighty-two thousand people in Venice and the
neighbouring islands. It stopped suddenly in
November of the year 1631, as the winter drew on.
The public prayers had apparently been answered,
and the vow of the Senate accepted. The joy was
boundless, for this plague had been the most terrible
of all the seventy which, up to that date, had
desolated Venice. Jndeed, the city was rarely free
from infection ; and only fifty-five years before, she
had lost as many as fifty thousand inhabitants.
Venice had built the votive church of the Redentore
200

The Madonna della Salute 201
then, as a thank-offering for liberation in answer to
her supplication ; the Govemment determined, on this
occasion, to raise a still more splendid church. But
that could not be done in a moment, and the city was
impatient to celebrate a service of jubilee without
more delay. Accordingly a temporary church of
wood was built upon a piece of land which had been
given to the Republic by the Knights Templars ; and
thither the Doge, the Council, the Senate, the nobles,
and the people went on the 28th of November.
The procession started from the high altar of Saint
Mark's. When it reached the middle of the piazza
a halt \\'as made, \\'hile the officers of public health
officially declared that the plague was at an end
through the intercession of the Virgin. The an
nouncement was received with salvoes of artillery,
the blare of trumpets, and the clang of bells. Then
the train moved forward through the narrow streets
and crossed the Grand Canal to the wooden church
by a bridge of boats. The letter of a contemporary
tells us that the day was cloudlessly fine; and this
long procession filing across the bridge, the priests in
their coloured robes, the. silver and gold candlesticks,
the flags of the various companies, the young nobles
in their tight hose and slashed doublets, the elders
each with a long white taper in his hand, must have
made a picture that Gentile Bellini should have lived
to paint. The Senate did not neglect their vow, and,
after a public competition, Longhena, a Venetian,

202 The Madonna della Salute,
was chosen to build the votive church, which, in
spite of its audacity, and taking it for all in all, we
cannot help admiring more, the more familiar it
becomes. The Venetians have never omitted this festival.
Each year they celebrate their thanksgiving anew,
with much the same ceremony as on that first
November day, in 163 1.
On three occasions only in the year are pontoon
bridges thrown across the Grand Canal — on the Day
of St. Anthony, the Day of the Redentore, and this
Festival of the Salute. The gondoliers of those
ferries where the bridges cross receive three francs
apiece in compensation for the work they lose. On
the Day of the Salute there are two bridges — one for
going and one for coming. The crowds that pass
backwards and forwards all day are very large, for
the inhabitants of Venice, even those who are
ordinarily indifferent to the Mass, feel bound to visit
the church upon this festival.
From the very earliest morning the tramp of feet
'begins below one's window, and sleep is impossible.
It is best to get up and go with the crowd. The
cloaked and muffled throng look dim and ghostly and
unwonted in the doubtful morning light, as they
stream across the bridges. All round the open space
by the church, stalls are set up, and a small fair goes
actively forward with the sale of hot fish, coffee,
statuettes of the saints in plaster, rosaries, ' portraits '

The Madonna della Salute 203
of Madonna, pamphlets of her miracles, but above all
galletti, a mixture the Venetians delight in at this
season. Galletti is made of flour, lard, and white of
e<go^ raised to a froth, like whipped cream, by the
yeast that is beaten up in it. They serve it to you in
little conical cups of pastrj- ; but those who expect
the flavour of whipped cream would probably be dis
appointed. At half-past ten the great function takes place.
The procession of all the parishes musters in the
piazza. The priests of each parish wear different-
coloured stoles to distinguish them from one another ;
and the procession, when seen from the steps of the
fagade as it moves slowly over the bridge, looks like
some huge serpent with bands of various hues upon
his skin. Inside the church, the devout light the
candles they have carried, one taking the fire from
another, and press forward after the priests up to the
altar rails ; there the tapers are handed over to the
sacristans and placed beside the high altar, where
'Madonna stands, triumphing over a figure of the
plague. Thousands and thousands of candles are
passed over the rails until the whole space by the
altar seems like one solid wall of embossed gold
as the flames waver and flicker in the draught. In
return for their candles and some centesimi, the pious
receive a picture of Madonna, which is devoutly kissed
and put away inside their shirts or shawls.
Then the long service begins ; but this church.

204 The Madonna della Salute
which consists of one large circle under a dome, with
a smaller circle attached, to form the choir, is badly
built for music, and for the most part the congrega
tion pays little attention. In the body of the church,
under the great cupola, the men move about where
the crowd will let them, all with their hair brushed,
clean shaven, and in Sunday shirts, their huge black
hats with the peacock's feathers tucked under their
arms. The women sit still and look at them. The
Venetian gondoliers are artists in flannel shirts, and
this fluctuating crowd is ' a symphony in shirts ' set
upon figures conscious of their becomingness— black
and white checks, mauve, blue, red, and black ; and
most of the men wear blue scarfs round their waists.
The services go on all day long, one succeeding the
other, till the final vespers and benediction at five
o'clock. But the Venetians do not end their festa there ; they
keep it up far beyond midnight ; and from the wine
shops and eating-houses come bursts of laughter and
of song—' Viva Italia ! viva el Re ! ' Or later still,
towards the small hours of the morning, you will
likely be wakened from a first sleep by the notes of
an accordion and the lilt of feet that, keeping time
to the tune, go swinging down the street below your
window. Half in dreams, it sounds like some en
chanted air that swells nearer and nearer and then
dies away, drawing the senses after it to woodland
glade and grove and stream ; like some divine chorus

The Madonna della Salute

205

of a Bacchic rout, with laughing voices that accom
pany it But dreams are famed for cheating, and
this is nothing else than ' Mariannina ' and a band
of young Venetians who have kept the feast of the
Salute late into the night.

WELL AND COURTYARD.

HOME LIFE'
The home Hfe of the Venetian people is as strongly
characterised and as peculiar as everything else in
that unique city. No face possesses a more distinctive
set of customs, or clings to them with greater tenacity,
than the Venetian popolo, or basso, plebe, as they always
call themselves. The isolated position of the city,
solitary as it is upon the water and severed from the
mainland, assists a natural tendency to individuality
which underlies the Italian character, and which
finds admirable illustration in the people of Venice.
For not only are the customs of Venice, as a whole,
peculiar and distinguished from those of neighbouring
Italy, but inside the city itself each quarter has some
modification of the universal custom ; and this modi
fication is special to the quarter, and is cherished as
the distinctive badge which differentiates it from
its neighbours. The division of the quarters is still
strongly felt in Venice. One district speaks of
another as a separate nation ; there is the nation of
San Nicolo, the nation of Castello, the nation of the
Giudecca. And the physical peculiarities, and even
1 In this, and the two following articles, I am indebted to the
collections of Sig. D. Bernoni.

Home Life 207
the dialects of the inhabitants of these various
quarters, almost justifies this very pronounced dis
tinction. The men and women of Castello are
different in build and type of features from those of
San Gregorio ; they call their parish church San
Piaro, while the people of San Gregorio render their
saint almost unrecognisable by metathesising him
into Sannegrorio ; at Santa Marta there are old
women who have never been in the piazza of Saint
Mark. The people of the same quarter know each
other intimately ; the good fortune, the wealth, the
misery, the scandal of each family are the common
property of all its neighbours, but the interest in it
ceases at the frontier of the quarter ; beyond that
invisible line people have other cares, gossips, scandals,
to occupy them. So strong is this sense of union
inside the quarter and separation from every other
district, that a girl who marries out of her own
quarter will talk as if she were going to a foreign
country, though her new home may be but ten
minutes' walk from her father's house ; and a lad
pleads, thus against the fact that his home is in
another quarter from his love's :
' Butite sui balcon e dame un segno.
Ma no badar che sia da Canaregio ;
Ma no badar che la strada sia longa,
Che un cuor che se vol ben presto se agionga.'
' Lean out, my love, and smile to me.
And say you will be mine ;
And never heed though my home be
So far away from thine.

2o8 Home Life
' Nor never heed the weary way,
Nor do thy love such wrong ;
A loving heart will never stay
To think the road is long.'
The life of the Venetian people is governed by
ancient and general custom. Costume is sovereign in
Venice ; and the Hfe of one family, in all its externals
at least, resembles precisely the life of its neighbour.
This costume is a ri^id law which no one. would
venture to break. It surrounds and moulds the lives
of all ; and is maintained by the sanction of a stern
criticism, relentlessly appHed to all who violate its
smallest regulations. This obedience to custom and
dread of criticism are the two most potent factors in
the daily life of the Venetian people.
It is a matter of surprise to observe the great cost
at which this costume is maintained, under the dread
of critica. Custom must often press heavily upon a
poor man's purse ; yet he bears the burden cheerfully
to all appearance, and if he grumbles at all, it is only
to his dearest friend and in the recesses of his own
home. To see the gondoliers in company upon any
public occasion — at a baptism, a wedding, a bank
supper, or a day in the country — one would suppose
them to be either extremely well off, or else most
reckless spendthrifts. As a rule, however, they are
not one nor the other. For this lavish expenditure
in public is counterbalanced by great frugality at
home. In this they are not peculiar, but share in the

Home Life 209
general habit of the Italians. In the houses of the
upper classes, upon public occasions, )'ou will find
magnificence and display of luxury, while the daily
private life is perfectly simple, and the comforts — or,
as we should call them — the necessities of life, do not
exist. So it is with the people ; they will wilHngly
spend a hundred and twenty lire as best man or as
godfather in order to make a bona fegura and to
avoid, critica, while for months^ after, at home, they
will hardly touch meat. Or a man will drink seven
or eight litres of wine at a supper party, who at home
scarcely touches a quinto a day, and, as often as not,
is content with a tumbler of lemonade. The gon
dolier class, and indeed all Italians, are of admirably
frugal habits, spending little on meat and drink, and
easily satisfied with a routine of food that never
varies. They have their weak side, which is a love
of display and of fine clothes ; indeed among the
gondoliers an ' ambitious man ' means nothing else
than a dandy. When costume has to be maintained
they never hesitate about the cost. For instance,
nothing would induce a gondolier to buy an iron bed
stead though he could get one for fifty francs ; it is
the costume to have walnut bedsteads. That his
paron sleeps on an- iron bed is nothing to him ; that
may be his paron's custom, it is not his. And so, if
he have not one hundred and fifty francs by him, the
gondolier will go without the bed, and wait until he
has gathered up that sum. O

2IO Home Life
Costume is powerful in the internal economy of the
house ; but it is in the outward functions and cere
monies of life, in marriages, baptisms, funerals, that
its potency is most clearly displayed. A young man's
independent life begins only on the death of his father,
or on his own marriage. Until one or other of these
events takes place, he lives in his father's house, and
his earnings, whatever they may be, are added to the
family store, in which he will share on his father's
death or on his own marriage. This arrangement,
besides other natural causes, drives the young men to
marry, and early unions are the rule. The audacity
with which young people commit themselves to the
untried waters of a double life, is as remarkable in
Venice as it is elsewhere among the poor. For the
women marriage is an undoubted advantage ; they go
to meet hard labour, it is true, labour that is constantly
increasing as the family grows ; and there are all the
difficulties of the commissariat ; but their name is
safe, which would not be the case if they remained
unmarried, and they secure a position and some
slight liberty.
The costume which hedges courtship and marriage
in Venice is lengthy, expensive, and ceremonious.
Love begins in the calle, on the bridges, at the
windows of the narrow streets. When the young
fellow finds himself incapricciato, he has first to
discover what chances he may have with the fair ;
whether she has already a moroso ; and if not, whether

Home Life 2 1 1
she will run the course with him. This he does in a
dozen different ways — by walking before her house,
by giving her good-day, even by singing some night
below her windows. If the girl has not a mind to
him, he will soon find it out She will never be at
her window, she will not return his salute, or she may
sing, sotto voce, this verse as he passes her ; the first
line will be enough for him, for it is in common use
to give lovers their conge. It runs thus —
' Ti passi per de qua, ti passi indano :
Ti frui le scarpe e no ti ga guadagno ;
Ti frui le scarpe e po anca le siole :
No t' aspetar da mi bone parole.'
' You pass by here, you pass in vain :
You wear your shoes and take no gain ;
You wear your shoes and eke your feet ;
Kind words from me you ne'er shall meet.'
But should he discpver that the way is open to him,
he is off to his friend ; imparts the fact that he is in
love, and the two, in their best clothes, call on the
father of the girl, and the lover formally asks leave
to court his daughter. If the parents are assured of
the lad's good intentions, and satisfied with his family
and profession, they appoint a certain time, two or
three months, during which the pair shall keep
company and see whether they suit one another
At the end of this time, if they do not go well
together, the matter drops and nothing more is said
about it ; on the other hand, if the affair prospers.

212 Home Life
then the parents of the girl name a day, and invite
the lover to sup at their house. The man goes with
his own parents and nearest relations, and the two
families are formally introduced. After supper the
lover demands the hand of the girl in marriage, and
makes her a present ; the father gives his consent in
a little speech on the blessings and the duties of the
married state, and all the guests wish the couple joy.
A day or two after the dimanda comes the betrothal,
or segno ; another supper at the parents' house ; and
the lover takes with him the wedding ring and other
rings, all of which he gives into the girl's keeping,
and the pair receive the names of novizza and sposo
respectively. If after this the girl throws over the
man, she has to give him back all his rings and
presents ; if the man leaves the girl she keeps every
thing. In the province of Udine the penalties on a
jilt are stricter still ; for the girl has not only to
restore all presents, but has to pay the man for the
days he has wasted in courting her, and gives him a
new pair of shoes.
After the betrothal, the presents which pass between
the pair are all regulated by costume ; and every sposo
knows exactly what he will have to provide for. He
may, of course, add any others which he pleases ; but
if he confines himself to the following he cannot be
criticised, and will have fulfilled the whole duty of a
sposo. These presents are : at Christmas, a box of
mandolato and a jar of mostardo, a confettura of fruit

Home Life 213
and raw mustard seed ; on Saint Mark's, a boccolo, or
button-hole of rosebuds ; at Easter, a fugazza, or cake ;
on All Souls', a box oifavc ; and at Martinmas, roast
chestnuts. The girl replies by silk handkerchiefs or
neckties, embroidered with the lover's initials, or his
name, or a rose, or two hearts. On no account must
one give a comb, for that is an instrument the witches
use ; scissors signify a cutting tongue ; books or
pictures of saints bring misfortune ; and any one of
these is of evil augury for the marriage. After the
betrothal both parties begin to think of the wedding.
As in the Highlands of Scotland the wife furnishes
the house and brings her husband's shirts, so in Venice
the bride is expected to find the furniture for the
house ; or, if that be too great a tax, at least for the
bedroom, which must have a bed of walnut wood,
six chairs, two chests of drawers and a looking-glass ;
this is imperative.
Until his family makes its appearance, a gondolier's
house usually contains two other rooms besides the
bedroom, a dining-room, or tinello, and a kitchen. The
tinello often has those open beams across the roof
which so frequently ornament a Venetian chamber ;
and the wife takes a pride in hanging to those beams
as many copper pots, pignate and seed, as possible.
The more she brings the greater the proof of her
family's honour, for these bronze pots are heirlooms,
carefully gathered up from generation to generation,
and portioned out among the daughters of the house

214 Home Life •
as they marry off". Besides the bronze pots and
caldrons, the wife will also bring, for the tinello, rows
and rows of pewter plates, which are never used, but
stand in shining order on ledges round the room. All
this metal work is polished three or four times a year
for the great Church festivals, and very bright and
splendid the roofs and walls appear after one of these
cleanings. There are the table, chairs, sofa, and
credenza, or sideboard, to add, and the photographs
of relations and friends on the wall ; and then the
interior of a gondolier's house is complete, and this
is the part that the bride has to think of before her
wedding day.
On the other hand, the bridegroom has to find
among his friends his best man, or compare — riot
always an easy task, for the compare's duties are
onerous, and will not cost him less than one hundred
lire if he wishes to escape criticism. The ceremony
for securing a compare is this : The bridegroom will
go to the traghetto or to his favourite wine-shop,
where he is sure to meet his friends ; to one of these
he will hold out his hand, and say ' Pare la ; ' if his
friend takes his hand, and replies ' Pare paron,' then
the bargain is struck ; if not, the groom must look for
another. If the compare wishes to make a bona fegura
and be a compare cortesan, this at least ,he must do :
the day before the wedding he must send, not take,
to the house of the bride a large box lined with silk
and filled with bon-bons, on the top of which must

Home Life 2 1 5
lie a baby in sugar ; along with the box a bouquet of
sham flowers and a bouquet of real, and his present
to the bride, which should be a brooch or earrings, but
not a ring. He must also send six bottles of Marsala,
Cyprus, and liqueur for the wedding supper and four
large candles for the wedding mass. Besides this he
has to provide four gondolas for the guests who come
to supper, to fee the nonzolo of the church, and to pro
vide largess for all the poor who crowd about the doors.
This accumulation of duties renders a compare not
so easy to find. But when he has been secured the
day for the marriage is fixed. It is, almost invariably,
a Sunday. The other days of the week are unlucky
or unsuitable for various reasons : on Monday you go
mad ; on Tuesday you suffer ; Thursday is the day
the witches comb themselves and are loose, and so on.
Saturday alone is a good day, and that is reserved for
the wedding of widows. The ceremony takes place
at the earliest Mass to avoid a crowd and the in
evitable critica, of which all concerned have such a
lively dread. The bride wears a black veil, and the
second of her two wedding dresses ; the better is kept
for the supper and the dance. The groom is dressed
in black ; he, too, keeps his best and newest for the
evening. The compare takes the bride ; the sposo
takes the compare's nearest female relative, who is
called the comare ; the parents and relations follow ;
and so they walk to church in the early morning air.
The bride, bridegroom, and groomsman kneel at a

2i6 Home Life ,
crimson-covered faldstool before the altar ; the rest of
the guests range themselves on either side of the
chancel. The Mass is galloped through ; the compare
places the wedding ring on the bride's middle finger ;
the sacristan gives them the pax to kiss ; the register
is signed ; the priest and nonzolo duly feed ; the doors
are flung open, and the beggar boys shout, 'E.viva la
sposa!' and the compare scatters his copper coins. So,
in the same order that they came, the procession re
turns to the house of the bride.
From the moment that the marriage ceremony is
performed the bride is under the immediate charge
of the compare ; he is responsible for her during the
day ; he must never lose sight of her unless he has
consigned her to her mother's care. So the bride
returns on the groomsman's arm to her father's
house ; and all the guests partake of the rinfresco —
lemonade, coffee, Cyprus, Marsala, and cakes. Then
they separate till four o'clock, the hour of the supper.
The supper is ordered at some inn. There are
three or four of these inns which lay themselves out
especially for wedding suppers. The bridegroom has
to pay for eight people — himself and his wife, his
compare and comare, and the fathers and mothers
of himself and his bride. Of the other guests each
pays his own share ; and as many as choose may
go, for there are no special invitations issued. The
wedding party frequently numbers as many as fifty
or sixty. The guests assemble at the house of the

Home Life 217
bride, and the order of their going is as follows : —
The^ bride and her compare, the groom and the
comare, the parents of the couple, then the rest of
the relations in order of affinity. Each man carries
his lady's shawl upon his arm, and helps her into the
boat, and then is the moment for criticism, and for
each one ' to say his own,' dire la soa, as they put it.
The bridges and fondamente are crowded, so are all
the windows that look upon the Canal, and woe to the
man who is awkward or tries to enter the feize head
foremost At the osteria the company disembark in
the reverse order, and the newly wedded pass to the
supper-room through a long lane of all their friends.
They seat themselves at the middle of the table
vis-a-vis, the elders of each house at the upper end,
and the rest where they will. The supper is a serious
and long-drawn affair, occupying at least four hours.
Like everything else in the wedding ceremony, the
dishes are prescribed by costume ; and they are, Risl ;
lesso, manzo e polio ; rosto, polio co la salata ; frittura,
de figa e de cervele indorae. When dessert comes, a
huge pyramid of hardbake is placed before the bride ;
she breaks it open, and out flies a little bird, and all
the company cry, ' E viva la sposa ! '
Then the tables are cleared away ; the music
arrives, and fresh guests who have come for the
dessert and dancing. The compare leads out the
bride, and the sposo the comare, for the first dance ;
and after that the general company fall-to and dance ;

2i8 Home Life
waltzes, polkas, and schottische being the favourites,
varied by two native dances, the mirror dance and one
that is known as ohime.
The mirror dance is simply one of the familiar
figures of the cotillon. A chair is placed in the
middle of the room, and the company arrange them
selves around, the men on one side and the women
on the other. One of the men seats himself in the
chair, holding a mirror and a handkerchief in his
hands ; then one of the women rises, goes and places
herself behind the chair, in such a way that her face
appears in the mirror. If the man does not wish to
dance with her, he wipes the glass with the handker
chief, and the woman goes back to her place amid
the laughter of the guests, while another tries her
luck. When she has come whom the man desires,
he rises, lays down the mirror, the music strikes up,
and they waltz together till it stops ; when the
woman takes her seat in the chair and the dance
proceeds from the men's side, and so on alternately.
In the dance of ohime the company arrange them
selves in the same manner. One man stands up in
the middle, and when all is ready he cries ' Ohim^ ! '
(ah me) ; one of the company demands ' Cossa c'e ? '
(what is it?) 'Sento dolore' (I am in pain), he replies.
' Dove ? ' says she ; ' nel cuore,' is the answer ; ' per
chi ? ' (for whom). Then the man names the woman
he wishes to dance with and leads her out to waltz
till the music stops. Then the woman takes his

Home Life 219
place, and goes through the same process in choosing
her partner ; and so on.
They keep it up till one or two in the morning, and
then the whole company attend the sposi to the door
of their house. There the groom receives his bride
from her compare ; there is endless kissing and hand
shaking, and buona notte, buon riposo ring down the
calle as the last footsteps die away and leave the
couple on the threshold of their home.
The novelli sposi soon settle down to their new
life, he to his work, and she to her household duties
and attending on him ; for a Venetian wife is dis
tinctly her husband's servant. House rent is cheap
in the city of fallen palaces, and for half a franc a
day a man can find a house of four or five rooms
in a healthy quarter, and in moderately good repair.
The food for the couple will be at the same moderate
rate until other mouths come to be fed ; a man and
his wife can live in comfort on a franc and a half
a day. Their food is always the same — coffee in the
moming and bread ; polenta and fish, or rice and
vegetables at midday ; the scraps of their midday
meal cold in the evening, and a soup of shell-fish or
the fondi of artichokes when they are in season.
Once a week only, on Sundays, will they eat meat.
They are a frugal people easily pleased. Upon two
points alone is a Venetian at all dainty — wine apd
bread. The number of different breads in Venice is

2 20 Home Life
bewildering, when you are expected to know one
from the other and to have a preference. There is
Piave bread, Chioggian bread, biscotto, busolai, pane
col ogio, and pane commune ; but all are excellent.
With the wine it is very different It is almost im
possible to find good wine in Venice. The great
vintages of Conegliano and Limena hardly reach
Venice, and then only in a watered condition. The
wine merchants make one pay for these names, and
so no gondolier would ever think of ordering them.
Besides, red wine will not keep in Venice, and white
wine is only good when it is sweet, and if it be sweet
the gondoliers do not like it. So that at one time
of the year only is it possible to drink good wine ;
that is immediately after the vintage when the new
wine comes in from the country round Padua and
the Veronese. Then there is a rush to the wine
shops ; and every one is shouting for nuovo da cinque
or nuovo da sei, for at that modest price of fifty or
sixty centesimi the litre you may drink the fresh
juice of the grape. Very good it is for a while ; but
it gradually falls away from its primal excellence,
and settles deeper and deeper into the depths of
watery sourness. It is to be noticed that the pro
fessed drinkers dislike the vino nostrano, the light
wine of the Veneto, and always call for the headier
foresto, the bacara of Brindisi and Bari. The men
rarely drink their wine at home. Each one has some
osteria which he frequents, where he meets his friends.

Home Life

221

transacts his business, makes appointments, and may
usually be found or heard of The habitues of the
place form a sort of club, and a tavemer's success
depends upon forming and keeping such a clientele.
This can be done onh' by supplying good and

¦4M'^^^^'

ALLA SPERANZA.

cheap wine, for nothing spreads faster in Venice than
the reputation of a wine-shop, or is more quickly
lost In the evening the wife stays at home, sewing
and chatting with her neighbours. I do not know

222 Home Life
why the women of the Venetian popolo have acquired
a reputation for a certain elasticity of morals. The
reputation is not deserved nor fairly based. The
costume of the city has always been in favour of a
quasi-Oriental treatment of women. The wife's place
is in-doors ; she has no business to be out at all with
out her husband or a very good reason. Even in her
own house she will not stay in the room where her
husband has his friends to supper unless there be
four or five other women to keep her company, in
which case they all sit together at the foot of the
table. If there are no other women present, the
wife will retire to the kitchen, and join in the con
versation, at the top of her voice, from that safe and
invisible retreat. For the rest, the women of the
quarter keep one another in order. Each one knows
very well that all her neighbours would be down
upon her, and that she dare hardly appear in the
streets if she made a notorious false step. So the
wife stays at home ; and, very likely, until her own
children begin to arrive, she will have her mother,
or her madonna, her mother-in-law, to look after, or
some old relation of her family or his. One of the
pleasantest traits in the Venetian character is their
affection for old people and babies. It is a beautiful
sight to see the tenderness with which these great
big fellows carry their infants in their arms. To their
coevals they are often harsh, unjust, ready to take
advantage, considering that these should be able to

Home Life 223
protect themseh'es ; but a child or an old person
rarely fails to receive respect and gentleness at their
hands. W^hen the first baby is bom, the compare de I'anelo
appears once more on the scene, and costume inter
venes again in full force. The groomsman is ex
pected to be godfather to the first child, or compare
de San Zuan, a relation than which there is none
more sacred in Venice. In the absence of the father
he is head of the house, or in case of the father's
death he is guardian of the children. Two compari
never pass one another without salute, nor should
they go by one another's doors without raising their
hat. As soon as the birth of his godchild, ox fiozzo,
is announced, the compare must send to the mother a
pound of meat, a fowl, and two eggs in a box. Then
the day for the baptism is settled. The baby is
swathed in bands of white linen ; round its neck
is fastened a charm ; and all over its swaddled feet
are pinned half moons, hearts, charms, and medals
of silver, to keep away the witch Pagana, who is
especially on the look-out for unbaptized infants.
The baby is laid on a long shallow tray and covered
over by a large glass case, which has blue silk
curtains round the outsidei In • this way the crea-
tura, as everybody calls it, is carried to church by
the midwife, accompanied by its father and its
santolo, or godfather. Out of three names the santolo
has the right to bestow two, and one is given by

2 24 Home Life
the Church. The Church always gives the same
names, John for boys, and Mary for girls ; so every
Venetian is either John or Mary, the reason being

GOSSIP AT THE WELL.

that those who bear these names are less exposed
to the power of the witches. If ihe santolo stumbles
in saying the Creed, then the child that is being

Home Life 225
baptized will be liable to see ghosts ; and so to avoid
such an accident, and also because the santolo rarely
knows the creed, both the priest and the midwife
prompt him, word for word. After the baptism there
is the usual rinfresco, when the compare de San Zuan
makes a present to the mother and to his godchild.
Then in the e\ening there is a small supper party
confined entirely to relations of the house.
It is a matter for wonder how any babies are
reared at all in Venice. The women are so utterly
ignorant of the plainest rules, so devoid of the
commonest sense, so jealous of their husband's in
terference, and so sceptical about the parish doctor,
that infant mortality is appallingly high. Many a
man will tell you that he has eight or ten children ;
but on inquiry it will turn out that only four or five
are living. It seems that quite a half of those that
are born die in infancy ; and a wife lays her account
to lose her first three or four ; she informs you quite
calmly that it is 'difficult' for them to live. Later
on she may become a trifle more careful and ex
perienced, but even so the waste of life is terrible
and the dangers that surround an infant immense.
If, however, a child does manage to survive black
coffee, sour wine, and raw apple, freely administered
during its first ten months, which inevitably result
in groppo, convulso, or riscaldamento — the three cate
gories under which most ailments fall in Venice, —
and escapes the lotions, concoctions, and prescriptions
P

2 26 Home Life
of the old crones of the quarter, it will probably grow
into a fine and healthy man, robust, sane, and happy,
thanks to its proved vitality and its resolution to live.
He shivers through the cold of winter, and runs about
half naked in summer, soaked in sunshine, until it
is time to go to school. Every child must go to
a government school, or bring a certificate to prove
that he is attending some other. Then in a few years
comes the ceremony of confirmation, or the cresema,
by the Patriarch in Saint Mark's, when the boy's
santolo presents him, and lays his hand on the lad's
shoulder while the sacred oil is administered. And
again there is a little supper, and party of family
friends. When the boy has reached fifteen, it is time that
he should choose a profession, and begin to help the
funds of the house. The father may by this time
have laid by a little store, though that is hardly
likely, for they are not a provident race. If they
have sufficient to see them through a year, most of
them think that they have done enough in the way of
prudence, and leave the subsequent years to take care
of themselves ; and by far the majority of gondoliers
live solely from hand to mouth, and from day to day,
without a single penny laid by against illness or old
age. Should a gondolier, however, be the owner of
some few hundred lire, we have seen how he disposes
of it — lending it out and banking among his brother
gondoliers. But if he be the master of a larger sum,

Home Life

227

it cannot be disposed of in this small way ; and
besides, he is sure to be unwilling to allow his neigh
bours to know that he has any money at all. So

A''

THE MURAZZI.

the lire are hidden away in some secret place in his
bedroom, along with his wife's chains and rings. I
knew one man who converted all his savings into ten-
centesimi pieces, or palanche, the most bulky copper

2 28 Home Life
coin he could find ; and^ kept as much as eight kilos
oi palanche under his mattress. His deHght was to
count first, and then verify by weighing, this immense
heap of penny pieces. If the son of the house escapes
conscription, and starts well in his business, he is
sure to dislike seeing all his gains taken from him
week by week. He will inevitably begin to desire a
home of his own ; he will soon enough find a morosa,
and that will lead him to set up for himself, and to
do as his father did before him. And so begins
again the quiet round of home Hfe among the people
of Venice.

POPULAR BELIEFS
The popular beliefs of any people are not easy to
discover. In so far as they are vital and real, they
are held almost unconsciously, and the people, if
pressed, hide them away from the inquisitive ; when
they cease to be vital they are soon forgotten. In
Venice the people are superstitious ; but their super
stitions have a character of their own ; they are
quaint, fanciful, or even ridiculous, rather than terrible.
That grim quality which distinguishes the popular
beliefs of the Highlands or the Southern slopes of the
Alps is, for the most part, absent. The landscape of
Venice is suave, and the Venetian temper is bright
and practical, and not deeply imaginative ; horrors
of actual life appeal to it and fascinate it, but horror
is never raised by the imagination into the region of
weird fancy which distinguishes Northern legendary
lore. The grim imaginative touch is foreign to the
Italian temper generally, and Venetian popular
beliefs share the common character which marks the
Italian treatment of the preternatural.
It is among the old women that these superstitions
chiefly survive ; it is they who keep up the tradition.229

230 Popular Beliefs
The men, owing to their practical habit of mind, and
also to their contact with life, are usually contempt
uously sceptical. It is curious to observe how the
old crones gathered round a doorstep in a Httle street,
foretelling some disaster or justifying one, will cease
to talk if a man pass by. In fact, the women Hke to
keep their knowledge on this subject as arcana, and
while all goes smoothly the men leave them alone ;
but some unexpected stroke of good or bad fortune
will fling the men back into the arms of superstition,
and then the women have their day.
Many Venetian superstitions are to be found among
the popular beliefs of other countries. Thirteen, for
example, the number of Judas, is always unlucky.
To spill salt is the sign of a quarrel, which must be
avoided, as in Scotland, by throwing a pinch over the
left shoulder. The moon, of course, is a potent
agency. Hair grows and falls with the waxing and
waning moon ; and to turn your money in your
pocket at the first quarter will make it increase during
that month ; but the custom of wishing when one
first sees the new moon is not among Venetian
superstitions. The common belief that the child who
handsels a font is doomed to misfortune is shared by
the Venetians. Marks on the finger-nails mean gifts,
as they do in Scotland. Those who have an M
clearly defined on the palms of their hands are safe
and lucky ; for it is the initial and the signature of
the Madonna. The dew-fall on a certain night confers

Popular Beliefs 231
beauty, and makes the hair grow fine and long ; but
the propitious time is not the first of May, as with
us, but the eve of Saint John. The Venetians have
this rhyme on the subject —
' " Anema mia da la zuca pelada,
Quando te cresserk quei bei capeli ? "
" La note de San Zuane a la rosada,
Anema mia de la zuca pelada." '
' " Soul of me with the shaven pate.
When will the hair grow, when will the hair grow ? "
" On the night of Saint John, when the dew falls late.
Soul of me with the shaven pate." ' ¦
The Venetians share with the Greeks the belief
that a child about to be born is physically modified
by the objects which its mother has constantly before
her eyes ; and hence the custom of painting the
ceilings of the bedroom with angels, and hanging
saints upon the walls, just as Greek mothers used to
keep little statues of the gods in their bedchambers.
This custom also is recorded in popular rhyme —
' Sia benedetta I'arte del pitore,
Ch'el m'k depento la camara mia ;
El m'k depento la camara e el leto.
El m'k depento un anzolo parfeto.'
' Now blessings on the painter's art,
'Who painted me my room to my own heart ;
¦Who painted me my bedroom and my bed ;
And a fair angel right above my head.'
A mother who dies within forty days of her child's
birth, completes the number of days that may be

232 Popular Behefs
wanting to make up the forty under the robe of the
Madonna ; and after that she goes to the place that
destiny has appointed for her.
On the subject of dreams the Venetians differ from
us. They do not hold that we recall ' those dreams
which come just ere the waking,' but rather that if
one awake from a dream and look out and see the
dawn, then one will never be able to remember that
dream again. Dreams are so important in the
conduct of life, and it is so dangerous to lose one,
that this belief may in part account for the universal
custom of sleeping with the outer shutters closed.
A curse has only a limited area of operation. The
Venetians say that a curse will go
' Three days one way, and three another.
And then recoil upon its author ; '
but, as every one has his evil hour in each day, if the
curse light on him in his evil hour it takes effect. A
blessing, on the other hand, has power to pierce
through seven walls and reach its object.
The omens of death are many and various. Any
cross of wood, or anything resembhng a cross, must
be avoided. The Venetians say misfortunes come
by threes to make a cross ; and I remember a
Venetian servant refusing to lay a dinner-table shaped
like a T ; and, on being pressed, he told me that a
cross was a call on Death. That shiver which we
know as gooseskin, the sign that some one is passing
over your grave, is, to the Venetians, the sweep of

Popular Beliefs 233
Death's wings about his work. To lean upon the
door with a hand on either lintel is to call Death in.
A guest who crumples the cloth before him at dinner
will never come again to that table. To say you are
content is a sign j-ou are ready to go ; and if the clock
strikes as one asks the hour, that is a death-knell.
Certain days have their peculiar superstitions. On
New Year's Day new ashes bring new luck, so the
first fire is lighted on a clean hearthstone. On that
day much depends upon the person whom you meet
first on going out ; a man or a humpback brings good
fortune for the year ; a woman or a lame person is an
omen of misfortune ; and a priest is the sign of death
within the year. On Epiphany the beasts talk, the
only day in the year that they can do so. In
Lombardy the belief obtains that on Christmas Eve
the cock cries, ' Christ is born.' The ox asks,
' Where ? ' The sheep replies, ' In Bethlehem, in
Bethlehem ; ' and the donkey says, ' Let 's go ! let 's
go ! let 's go ! ' The dew on Saint John's Eve is
precious ; and Holy Saturday is the most favourable
day for teaching babies to walk.
Animals and plants come in for their share of
popular beliefs, though only to a small extent, as
might be expected in Venice, where both are rare.
The scorpion is a beast of wisdom : and centipedes
bring good luck, as they do everywhere in Lombardy
and Piedmont. Black flies are adverse, and yellow
flies, by which are meant bees and wasps, are pro-

234 Popular Beliefs
pitious, and mean that the padrone is coming home.
Ants are the bringers of wealth. The oleander is
never lucky ; like the sage of the Bedfordshire
gardeners, when it begins to die the fortunes of the
house go with it. Rue, on the other hand, is a plant
of good fortune, and has not the sombre significance
it bears with us.
These are some of the lighter beliefs which He near
the surface of Venetian popular life. But under
these there exists a whole series of superstitions of a
graver kind, connected with ghosts, witches, and angels.
Even in this region, however, the Venetian imagination
never touches the truly grim and terrible ; it revolves
rather in the region of the fantastic and bizarre.
Those who have power to see ghosts are limited in
number ; they are the children whose godfathers
have stumbled over the Creed at their baptism ; but
precautions are taken to avoid this accident, and it
rarely occurs. The ghosts themselves, who have the
power 'to visit the glimpses of the moon,' are also
limited. They are those spirits who are in purgatory;
those in heaven or in hell are barred from all appear
ance on the earth. These limitations reduce Venetian
ghosts and ghost stories to very scanty numbers.
Yet the dread of ghosts is lively, and the Venetians
are scrupulous never to say anything that may offend
the dead. The belief prevails that on the vigil of All
Souls' the dead leave their graves in the island of San
Michele and cross the lagoon to the city. They pass

Popular Beliefs 235
in procession through every street, and as each ghost
arrives at his former home, he enters and seats him
self, unseen, by the kitchen fire. It is of the worst
possible luck for one who has the power to see ghosts
to be looking out of his window when the ghostly
train goes by. But the ghosts which most persistently
haunt the earth, are the spirits of those who have
hidden some treasure, and forgotten to tell their heir
before they died. Such ghosts are always long and
white. They appear at Avemaria, near the spot
where their treasure lies concealed. A great fortune
may fall to him who has the courage to question one
of these ghosts. You draw near to him, and ask him
what he wants ; then the ghost will sign you to go
first ; but you must reply, ' No ! go thou first.' Then
the ghost will lead you to the place where the treasure
is hidden, and point to it with his foot, and disappear.
Besides the ghosts of the dead, the Venetian spirit
world contains fays and goblins, fade and massarioli ;
neither are noxious, and confine their action to tricks
and pranks.
The belief in witches is still alive in Venice though
hidden away, and chiefly confined to women. In
most quarters of the city there are certain families
who have the reputation of being hereditary witches ;
and it is not uncommon for those who have been
robbed, or crossed in love, or have other cause for
hatred, to consult these witches to the undoing of
their enemy.

236 Popular Beliefs
October is the witches' favourite month ; and on
Thursday nights they comb their hair and preen
themselves, and Friday is their field-day. It is only
on Christmas-eve that new witches can be made.
The witches assemble in the house of their chief ; the
novice is introduced and placed before a looking-
glass ; then three words, which witches only know,
summons the demon and the pact is made and signed.
Once a witch always a witch. No witch can die
while pictures of the saints are on the wall. The
demon draws them away, but they cannot go until
the saints are turned with their face to the wall, and
then they die in peace. Their chief delight is to
make long journeys between midnight and cockcrow.
They unchain the gondolas and put to sea ; and
Alexandria is their favourite destination.
The methods of bewitching are many, and are
chiefly exercised upon children. If the witch Pagana
be really older than the Christian rite of baptism, she
has been completely modified by that ceremony ; she
is the witch that Hes in wait for children on the way
to the font, and tries to make them hers before
baptism, and while they are therefore pagans still.
Children may be spellbound by a look, by a kiss, by
fruit and sweetmeats, by bread and wine. But the
most effective and terrible way is this : the witch
procures the hair of the person to be bewitched, and
with this hair she binds a scorpion and buries it in a
pot full of sand, which must be covered with earth,

Popular Beliefs 237
and the spell pronounced ; as the scorpion slowly
dies so the be\\itched likewise. Or the witch may
take the heart of a fowl, and binding it round vvith
the lock of hair, she stabs it with needles and utters
her spell. Combing the hair plaj'S a large part in
Venetian witchcraft, as it does in witchcraft generally ;
and that is why combs are such an ill-omened present,
and why the mother will always gather up all her
children's hair when it is cut, that none of it may fall
into the witches' hands. Why combs should be of
such importance is not quite clear, unless it be owing
to their connection with hair. But hair has always
been considered as the repository of virtues and
powers, from the days of Samson and the sect of the
Nazarenes ; possibly because of its great electrical
vitality. There are various ways of escaping bewitchment.
Salt thrown after the witches makes them fly. A
cross on the doorstep will prevent their entering the
house ; and many Venetians mark a cross on the top
of their polenta before it leaves the pot, that witches
may have no power on it The names of John and
Mary are preservatives, as also the prayer of the
Magi. The sign of Solomon, a pentacle made thus,
¦^/V', when used with a certain spell, gives its creator
power over spirits, witches, storm, "and lightning.
But supposing these preservatives have failed, then
there is this method by which a child may be freed

238 Popular Beliefs
from the power of the witch : the clothes of the
bewitched are placed in a dry caldron over a fire ; as
the clothes consume, the witch is compelled to come
to the door and ask for salt, or water, or some such
thing ; if this be given her, then the spell is broken.
Besides ghosts and spirits, angels also, according to
Venetian superstition, visit our earth ; but children only
are able to see them. There is a class of angels, called
the angels of the hours, who carry up to heaven each
sixty minutes and all its actions, to be judged ; but
these no one can see, though some may hear the rustle
of their wings.
The Venetians are fond of stories and story-telling.
The fishermen of Chioggia, rowing home through the
summer night, beguile the way with endless tales of
Angelica, and Orlando, Astolfo and Ruggiero, and all
the pageantry of the Carolingian myth, and the Reali
di Francia. On summer afternoons in the public
gardens you will find groups of men lying prone upon
the ground, apparently asleep, but really listening to
an old man telling his story in their midst, and to
whom they will give two centesimi before they go.
For the most part these stories are legendary and
fantastic ; but there is one which has impressed itself
most deeply upon the popular imagination ; every
Venetian knows it, and it has become proverbial.
The story of the Morte Innocente, or the buon' anima
del fornaretto, the baker's boy of pious memory, as
he is always called, is a true story of the year 1 507.

Popular Beliefs 239
It happened thus : — In one of the narrow streets of
Venice two men met and quarrelled ; one drew a
dagger and stabbed the other to death ; he then fled,
and as he fled, he threw away first the dagger and
then the sheath. Presently a baker's boy came by,
and he, quite innocently, picked up the sheath and
went towards his home. As he was going the police
arrested him. They had found the murdered man
and the dagger. The sheath belonged to the dagger ;
so the baker's boy was tried, condemned, and
executed. Not until too late was his innocence
proved ; and the authorities could do nothing except
to place the two little lamps on the south-west side
of Saint Mark's Church, which burn there now, day
and night, in memory of the Morte Innocente ; and
the people firmly believe that this is the explanation
of those constant and mysterious lights. The story
of the baker's boy is always quoted as a warning
against too hasty judgment, and as a proof of the
fallible nature of evidence. A tragedy has been
based upon this episode, and may sometimes be seen
at the people's theatre ; it is called, ' The Venetian
Baker Boy,' but this is almost the only tragic story
which is common among the people. For the most
part they delight either in grisly horrors of actual
life, or else in pure romances, to which they will
listen for hours together with a satisfaction which
neither familiarity nor wearisome lengthiness have
any power to abate.

POPULAR POETRYi
There is a marked difference between the popular
poetry of the north and that of the south. In the
north the imagination of the people takes a narrative
form, and runs into legends, as in our own border
minstrelsy, or in the great Germanic cycles of the
Carolingian or Nibelungen legends, which are sus
tained, dramatic, and created by an inspiration that
is external to the poet. But the popular poems of
the south are chiefly occupied with the expression
of purely personal emotions, love, hatred, remorse, or
piety ; they are brief, condensed, and concern the
singer only. They are the songs of a people who
have never had a feudal system, with its passions of
kinship and of loyalty to a chief — who have never
felt that they were natives of one country in whose
history each has his part to take. It is the poetry of
individuals, not the poetry of the tribe, or clan, or
nation. This is the characteristic of Italian popular
poetry, including the popular poetry of Venice.
1 The renderings of the popular songs which I have attempted in
this paper are not intended as literal but as ' impressional translations.'
They aim at giving, as far as I have been able, my impression of the
author's mood, rather than at reproducing his actual words.
240

Popular Poetry 241
What are the qualities, then, which constitute the
charm of this Italian popular poetry, as distinguished
from the poetry of culture ; which render it fascinating
and delightful in spite of absent art? This kind of
poetry is, above everything, direct, simple, and true
to the inspiration which created it ; it is amateur, not
professional. Like lover's messages scribbled upon
a wall, these popular songs are genuine heartbursts
of emotion, with all the passion of their creator quick
and burning in them. The inspiration which dictated
them comes pure and native, unsupported by artifice ;
and when that inspiration ceases the song ceases
along with it, for the poet of the people does not
write for writing's sake, but only as an outlet for
superabundant feeling. Art is not an end for him ;
expression is. In the poetry of culture the germinal
emotion is also present, but it is taken and spread out,
placed in various aspects, artfully manipulated, sus
tained by passages that are not inspired, and which
are valuable only as a background to the truly
emotional lines. In the poetry of the people the
germinal emotion is thrust out and left ; for the
author's object was not to produce a work of art, but
to obtain relief from overmastering sensibility. The
poet of the people creates the gem ; the poet of
culture creates the gem and sets it There is no
fatigue of art, on the one hand ; but on the other,
there is no sustention. The living phrases, charged
with all the passion of a human heart, fall like
Q

242 Popular Poetry
thunder drops, large and solitary upOn the pavement.
The emotion crowded into a single Hne of a people's
poet would often suffice to carry a poet of culture
through a whole poem. But the uncultured singer
is content when he has discharged his soul ; when the
inspiration fails him he hurries anyhow to a close,
careless of bathos and indifferent to finish. And so
Italian popular poetry must chiefly be a poetry of
inspired lines and phrases, and nothing more. These
lines are an end in themselves to the people's poet,
discharging his pent-up emotion ; to the poet of
culture they would not be ends in themselves, but
rather parent lines for continuous poems whose goal
would be artistic perfection. This is the charm of
this popular poetry, that there you find direct,
spontaneous, undiluted passion, showing itself for
what it is worth and nothing more ; concealing none
of its force, nor pretending to more power than it
possesses. Italian popular poetry being of this nature, we
should expect to find its poems brief and almost
epigrammatically pointed ; for the poet is limited by
the strength and endurance of his emotion, and writes
only while that lasts. In the popular poetry of
Venice this condition of brevity is fulfilled. The
Venetians, sharing with all other Italians the form-
giving instinct of their race, have preserved a mould
or type for the expression of their emotions, brief but
adequate. This original type, common to the poetry

Popular Poetry 243
of Sicily, Tuscany, and North Italy, is the villotta,
or quatrain. But though the villotta is the parent
mould for the popular songs of Italy, it has received
different treatment in each of its domiciles. In
Tuscany a coda, or ripresa, of indefinite length and
usually constructed in couplets, is often added ; while
in Venice the quatrain has been preserved without
additions, for the most part. It is possible that the
exigencies of the Venetian music, to which the
villotte were sung, compelled this rigidity of the
ancient form ; whereas the Tuscan chaunt may have
allowed the villotta to be supplemented by a coda.
However that may be, the vast majority of Venetian
poems are villotte, quatrains with three lines rhyming
and one — either the second or the third — dumb.
This is the true form of the villotta ; but it is not
rigidly maintained ; and we occasionally find the
quatrain composed of two couplets. If the poet's
emotion is powerful enough to exceed the limit of
four lines, another quatrain is added, and the two are
frequently constmcted like the opening quatrains of
a sonnet. There is some reason to suppose that the
villotta is a native of Firuli, or La Patria, as it used
to be called by the dwellers in the lagoons ; but it
spread throughout Italy, and became thoroughly
domiciled in Venice in its present form. The villotta
is intended to be sung in company as the guests sit
round the table after supper. One begins, sings a
whole quatrain, and then his next neighbour takes

244 Popular Poetry
the singing up ; and so the song passes round the
table, each one singing a different quatrain, though
the tune never varies. The tune is a sort of long,
slow chaunt, like that one hears sung by the peasants
among the olive groves of Tuscany.
Not only does the popular poetry of Venice share
its form with that of Tuscany and Sicily, but many
of the poems themselves are common to the other two
poetic centres, though it is almost impossible to state
their actual birthplace with any certainty. It must
be said at once that the popular poetry of Venice is
inferior to that of Tuscany or Sicily. The Venetian is
not so deeply passionate as the Tuscan ; his songs are
therefore less sustained, briefer in quantity, often less
condensed in emotion. But some of the Hues created
and formed by the passion of the singer possess a
breadth and suavity which could not well be matched
outside Venetia. This line, for instance, may be
quoted — ' O mariner, o zoventu del mare.'
Or this— ' Belo xh el mar, e bela la marina.'
Or this— ' La gran bela presenza, e'l gran bel tratto,'
which has the width and sweep of Tintoret's manner,
and recalls some splendid portrait of the Venetian
school, Gattamelata perhaps, or Giorgione's knight
in armour of our National Gallery. This is a sadder

Popular Poetry 245
and a graver song, the first line of which reminds one
of Leopardi's famous phrase —
' Piangi, che ben hai donde,'
and is quite as fine in expression.
' Sospira, cuore, che ragion tu hai.
Aver I'amante e no vederlo mai !
El sospirar vien dal ben volere :
Desiderar e no poder avere.'
' Sigh, heart of mine, good cause hast thou to sigh ;
To love thy love and have him never nigh^
The source of sighs is love, the heart oppressing.
Desiring to possess and ne'er possessing.'
This is a good instance of the inevitable inequality of
a popular poerri, owing to its absolute dependence on
emotion, and to the absence of art. There can be no
comparison between the first and last lines and the
two middle lines of this quatrain. On the whole,
however, the Venetian popular poems are less deeply
felt than the Tuscan. There is a touch of practicality
about them and common sense ; but they are seldom
grim or gloomy :' thos,e qualities are foreign to the
Venetian temper. The pain and melancholy of love
rarely find expression ; and the passion is treated in
a far lighter and gayer spirit than in Tuscany. The
common burden of the unfortunate lover is, if not this
one then another. As in their popular beliefs, so in
their popular poems the Venetians show a fancy that
is gentle, gay, and quaint, as in the following : —

246 Popular Poetry
' El mio moroso ga de nome Piero,
Quelo de le tre rose su'l capelo ;
Una per mi una anca per elo,
Una per la belezza del capelo.'
' My lover's name is Piero, that is he
Who wears upon his hat the roses three ;
There's one for me, and one for him.
And one to make the hat look trim.'
Or else utterly fantastic, as in this —
' In mezo al mare ghe xh 'na fontana :
Chi beve de quel aqua se inamora.
El mio moroso ghe n'k bevuo un goto,
E per amor el xh deboto morto.'
' In the mid sea there is a fountain welling ;
And whoso drinks thereof is made Love's prey ;
My love hath drunk one glass, his thirst compeUing,
And straight, for love, to death he pines away.'
There is a whole series of these fantastic villotte
beginning, ' In mezo al mar ; ' their recurrence shows
how the sea affects the Venetian fancy, not by its
beauty, but as the home of strange things that could
not be on land. Here is another which has a touch'
of grimness in its hatred :
' In mezo al mar ghe xh un camin che fuma,
Drento ghe xh el mio ben che se consuma.
El se consuma I'anima e anca el corpo :
L'6 visto vivo e lo v6i vedar morto.'
' A smoking chimney stands in the mid seas.
And there within my love is punished ;
His soul and body waste by slow degrees ;
I 've seen him living, and would see him dead.'
The field covered by the popular poetry of the

Popular Poetry 247
Venetians is not a wide one. The Laments, which
in Lombardy and Tuscany contain the larger part of
the historical allusions, are wanting in Venetian
poetry. The sole historical reference is to the Turk,
and the dread that he may one day be at ' the two
towers ' of the Lido port. And this is not peculiar to
Venice, but is to be found in Sicilian poetry as well.
The Turk was apparently used as a bugbear to
frighten children, much as the French were at the
time when they threatened England, or the Russians
during the Crimean War. Nor do the Venetians
appear to feel all the beauty of their home. The
sea has little charm for them ; perhaps they know it
and its perils too intimately. However that may be,
the sea awakens strange and fantastic thoughts, but
seldom any delight in its beauty. Yet the Venetians
are fully alive to the other great element in the land
scape of their lagoons. The sky and all its manifold
transformations, the straggle of the winds, the mass
ing, and bursting of storm-clouds, the rainbow, the
moon and stars, appeal to their fancy ; and when they
speak of these operations of nature, their language
is the language of imagination. The perpetual
straggle between the scirocco and the tramontana
is an airy battle, with the whole heavens as the field
of war. The fate of the clouds arouses pity, driven
from the sea to the mountains that will not receive
them. The rainbow is a bridge built by a master
hand ; the moon, an immortal wanderer ' viaggia

248 Popular Poetry
sempre h no riposa mai.' The stars are bei segreti,
beautiful secrets ; the pole-star is the type of con
stancy and the sailor's hope.
' Tutte le stele prende el so camino,
La tramontana no se move mai :
E se la tramontana se movesse,
Bravo quel mariner che naveghesse.'
' Of all the stars each single one
Doth take its wonted way ;
The northern star 'tis that alone
Bums steadfastly alway.
And if the northern star begins
To wander like its peers.
Brave mariner is he who wins
The port, and homeward steers.'
Many of the songs contain proverbs, and are of
a gnomic character ; as this —
' L'amor xh fato per chi lo sa fare.'
' Love is for the lover who knows how to make it.'
Or this fine idea —
' La note xh la mare dei pensieri.'
' Night is the mother of thoughts.'
Or this— ' La legna verde no fark mai bampa.'
' Green wood will never blaze.'
Or this, on the power of Time —
' Col tempo i muri e marmori se spezza ;
Col tempo i cuori amanti se rinova ;
Col tempo le montagne riva al basso ;
Col tempo vinser6 quel cuor de sasso.'

Popular Poetry 249
' O time will wear the hardest stone,
And time will heal the hearts of lovers ;
And time will bow the mountains down.
And melt the heart that cold breast covers.'
Others embody the advice of old women to young ;
and among these we find the perennial, ' Gather ye
rosebuds while ye may,' clothed thus in Venetian
form — ' Maridite, maridite, donzela,
Che dona maridada h sempre bela :
Maridite finchfe la fogia fe verde,
Peichfe la zoventu presto se perde.'
' Marry ye, marry ye, while ye may.
The lass that is wedded is fair alway ;
Marry ye, then, while the leaves are green.
For the flower of youth soon withers, I ween.'
Or this against women's perfidy —
' No te fidar de I'albaro che piega,
Nfe de la dona quando la te giura.
La te impromete, e po la te denega ;
No te fidar de I'albaro che piega.'
' Trust not the mast that bends ;
Trust not a woman's oath ;
She '11 swear to you, and there it ends ;
Trust not the mast that bends.'
Or this, that beauty is of no avail against an adverse
fate— ' La bela se confida su le belezze,
Cossa val esser bela e no aver grazia .''
Cossa esser bela e aver le bionde drezze
Co s'fe soto'l destin dela disgrazia.'

250 Popular Poetry
' The fair one fears not fate, for she is fair ;
'What worth 's in beauty if we be not happy ?
¦What worth 's in beauty or in golden hair.
If fate decrees our destiny unhappy ? '
Or this, a warning against love in a vacuum, the amor
di sogno, so perilous to imaginative temperaments —
' La bruta cosa, inamorarse sole !
Perchfe la fantasia va tropo in alto ;
E la va in alto, che la riva al sole :
La bruta cosa, inamorarse sole.'
' To love unto one's self alone
Is folly, rest assured ;
For fancy, if it once hath flown,
Can be no more immured ;
Nor of its plumes a single one
Be plucked to stay its flight ;
It wings its way into the sun.
Is burned, and then good-night.'
This poetry of the Venetian people is full of
references to the popular Hfe. The factions of the
Nicolotti and the Castellani have each their songs in
praise of themselves and disparagement of their foes.
The profession of baker is in favour with the women,
for the wife of a baker will never want bread ; the
calling of sailor or fisherman is in disfavour, for
they never stay at home ; the gondoliers apparently
son tutti traditori, are all of them traitors ; a verdict
which sounds like a too hasty generalisation from a
special case. These pictures of calle-life are vivid and
true ; the girl, for instance, thanks the stonemason who
made the window whence she can see her lover —

Popular Poetry 251
' Sia benedetta Parte de Matio 1
M'k fato 'na finestra a modo mio ;
No'l me'l'k fata nh alta, nh bassa,
Che vedo lo mio ben quando ch'el pass.'
' Now blessings on Matteo's kindly art !
He's made a window after my own heart ;
He has not made it me too low nor high.
And so I see my love when he goes by.'
Or else she hears his footsteps below in the street
at night — they sound so loud between the narrow
walls — and recognises therh —
' Se quel che passa fusse l'amor mio,
Certo che a la finestra me traria ;
Se'l fosse un zovenoto che me amasse,
Dal caminar mi lo conossaria.
' Oh ! an he were my true love,
That 's passing down the street,
I 'd hasten to the window.
His eyes with mine to greet.
Oh ! an he be my own lad,
I love before them all,
I '11 know 'mid a hundred, by
His musical footfall.'
The windows are favourite places for love con
ferences ; and so the lover below in the street at
night says, ' Deh ! vieni alla finestra.'
' Butite a la finestra, a la finestra ;
Se ti h in camisa, meti la traversa ;
M elite el fazzoleto su le spale,
Che I'aria de la note te fa male.'
' Come to the window, come, my love.
But wrap thy shawl around thee.
Close to thy breast, my darling, lest
The air of night should wound thee.'

252 Popular Poetry
The girl has to stay at home, threading Murano
beads, while her lover goes to sea —
' El mio moroso da Ionian ch'el sia,
Lu xh in mar e mi so a casa mia ;
E lu xh in mar, ch'el spiega le vele,
E mi so a casa, che impiro le perle.'
' How far away 's my love from me ;
I stay at home, he sails the sea.
He sails the sea, his sails are spread,
I stay at home the beads to thread.'
From her window she sees him sail —
' Me trago sui balcon, vedo Venezia,
E vedo lo mio ben che fa partenza ;
Me trago sui balcon, vedo lo mare,
E vede lo mio ben a navegare.'
' My window ledge hangs high above.
All Venice lies below ;
I see my dear, my only love,
Set sail and seaward go.
I lean upon the window sill.
The sea spreads far away ;
I watch the lad who loves me still
Steer bravely on his way.'
She calls a blessing on the boat —
' Sia benedetto I'albaro e I'antena,
La barca del mio ben e chi la mena ;
E chi la mena e la sa ben menare ;
La barca del mio ben sa navegare.'
' Now blessings on the yards and mast ;
The boat my love 's aboard, O,
With swelling sail and sheet hauled fast.
He 's lord of all aboard, O.'

Popular Poetry 253
She begs him to send a message from Malamocco
just before he leaves the lagoon and puts to sea ; and
she asks the sailor that she meets for news of him.
He is afraid that she will not marry a sailor ; but he
has painted her picture upon his sail :
' Sei nata bela e no te posso amare ;
L'arte del mariner me meto a fare.
Depenzar mi te voi su le mie vele,
E in alto mare te vogio portare.
I me dirk, che insegna la xh questa ?
Amor de dona me la fa portare,
Amor de dona e amor de donzela ;
Altra non amo se non amo quela.'
' Yea, thou art fair ; and yet how can I love thee ?
A sailor I must be ; that will not move thee ;
Not though I paint thy form upon my canvas.
And sail the open seas with thee above me.
They'll say to me. What ensign dost thou carry
This is love's ensign ; and 'tis love obeying
I sail the sea, my own true love displaying ;
This is the lass I love and long to marry.'
Then she sees him sailing home again —
' Me buto a lo balcon, vedo che piove,
¦Vedo I'amante mio spiegar le vele,
Spiegar le vele per intrar in porto :
Xh vento da garbin, no da scirocco,'
' I lean upon the window ledge,
And watch the rain come down ;
I see my love who hath my pledge
Spread sail towards the town ;
Spread sail ; the lad who loves me best.
To make the harbour's mouth ;
The wind that blows is from the west ;
It is not from the south.'

2 54 Popular Poetry
It is the whole story of a love affair ; and the
directness and simplicity of the matter, the remark
about the winds in the last lines, for example, heighten
the realism, until we feel that this is a piece of actual
life set out before us ; and the verses with their
na'ive directness of statement reach the level of true
poetry. Love IS the general theme of these Venetian poems.
And for the most part love with the Venetians is
light, joyous, and gay ; a matter for laughter and
sorig ; not striking any dangerously deep roots, and
breaking few hearts ; arousing rage and furious
jealousy, on the one hand, or a delirium of pleasure
on the other, for a moment ; both moods passing
quickly by, like the thunderstorms that are driven
across the lagoons. And so the two notes of melan
choly and of devotion, which occur so frequently in
Tuscan song, find only rare expression in the poetry
of the Venetian people ; and when they do, they are,
as often as not, interrupted by some fantastical touch,
which leaves the reader in doubt as to the author's
seriousness. For instance —
' 'Volume ben, che saro sempre vostro,
Sino che durerk I'aria del cielo ;
Sino che durerk pena e I'ingiostro
¦Volume ben, che saro sempre vostro.'
' Love me but well, I will be thine for ever ;
As long as shall endure the winds of heaven ;
While pen and ink endure I '11 leave thee never ;
Love me but well ; I will be thine for ever.'

Popular Poetry 255
Sometimes, however, a higher tone of passion runs
through the poem ; as in the following, which recalls
Metastasio's lovely line, ' Ah ! no ; si gran duolo "non
darle per me ' —
' Bela, co' moro, lasso testamento
Che a la mia morte no impissfe la lume ;
No vogio pianto, nh meno lamento ;
Bela, co' moro, lasso testamento.'
' My dearest, when I die this Will I '11 leave thee ;
Light thou no torches for the death of me ;
I would not have thee weep for me, nor grieve thee ;
My dearest, when I die this Will I '11 leave thee.'
Or this, a prayer for release from love that will survive
the loss of the beloved — ^
' Oh Dio del siel, cavemelo dal cuore,
Che de li oci miei I'avfe cavato ;
Fh che mi no ghe porta tanto amore.
Come che go porta per lo passato.'
' Oh God, I pray Thee take him from my heart,
Since from these eyes he 's gone for evermore ;
And grant me, tha,t it be no more my part
To bear the weight of love that erst I bore.'
But such gravity and depth of emotion are not
common. In Venice it would seem that the women fall in
love with the men. The finest of these poems are
almost invariably from the woman to the man. The
women give the men no good character for faith
fulness, nor do they ever believe in the depth of their
affection. And the songs of the men are too often

256 Popular Poetry
marked by a conceit, a brutality and directness of
desire which indicate nothing more than a passing
fancy, quickly exhausted and flung aside. For in
stance, a woman sings, 'Let's contend no more, love.'
' 'Vustu che femo pase, anema mia ?
Ti che ti gha le ciave del cuor mio ;
Ti ga le ciave che verze e che sera ;
Femo pase, el mio ben, e no piu guerra.'
' Let us make peace, love, for love's sake ;
It is not mine to mar, or make.
Thou hast my heart, thou hast the key.
To ope or close as pleaseth thee.'
Or this— ' 'Uh tanto da lontan el mio amore !
A lu ghe pianze i oci, e a mi el cuore ;
A lu ghe pianze i oci, e tuti vede ;
A mi me pianze el cuore e niun me crede.'
' So far away, so far away.
So far away 's my love from me ;
The tears he weeps are from his eyes.
But mine are from the heart of me :
The tears he weeps are from his eyes.
Those every one may -see ;
My tears I weep from my heart's deep.
But none can see the heart of me.'
Or this, upon her love's return —
' In dove xestvi stk che ti h sta tanto,
O delicato fior del paradiso ?
Dopo che ti fe stk via go sempre pianto,
Dala mia boca no s'k visto un riso ;
Adesso che ti fe venuo io rido e canto.
Me par che s'abia verto el paradiso.'

Popular Poetry 257
' Where hast thou been so long away
Thou fairest flower of paradise ?
¦When thou wert gone I wept alway.
Nor laughter lit my lips nor eyes.
Now thou art come I sing and play.
And seem to be in paradise.'
The man sings —
' Sempre no ti avrk quatordese ani,
Sempre no ti avrk, quei bei colori,
Sempre no ti avrk la bionda drezza,
Sempre no ti avrk chi te carezza.'
'Not always yours this fifteenth year.
Not always yours this bloom, my dear ;
Not always yours this golden tress
Nor one to kiss you and caress.'"
Or else in praise of his love, who is little —
' Tutele cose piccole xh bele,
Chi no me crede a mi, varda le stele ;
Tolfe I'esempio da lo zelsomino ;
L'odor I'h grando, e'l fior I'e piccinino.'
' All little things are pretty things ;
An you will not believe me.
The stars shall be a proof to me
And they can not deceive me.
And I will bring the jessamine.
If that you still will slight me ;
Its flower is small, but more than all
Its odours do delight me.'
Or this, which simply overflows with conceit —
' Co'passo per de quk, passo cantando,
Tute le bele core a la finestra ;
Una per una le se va digando,
Fusse mi in brazo de chi va cantando.'

258 Popular Poetry
'As I go down the street I go and sing.
And all fair lasses to the windows bring ;
And one by one they whisper, as they linger,
I would I were asleep beside that singer.'
The difference in the quality of the emotion is very
great. Sometimes, however, they are quits : as in
the following, where the man and the woman pay
one another a compliment as old as the days of
Philostratus, yet always fresh and sweet. He sings —
' Belina sei e'l ciel te benedissa,
Che in dove che ti passi I'erba nasse !
Dove ti passi ti I'erba ghe nasse
Co' xfe la primavera ghe fiorisse.'
' Yea, thou art fair ; I pray the heavens lo bless thee.
For where thy footsteps fall the grass is spread
In spring-tide verdure underneath thy tread.
As though the spring were born but to caress thee.'
And she replies —
' i. Nane belo per quel prk camina,
Dove ch'el ferma el pife I'erba inchina,
E la se inchina e la fa riverenza ;
Amarse de cuor e ghe vol pazienza.'
' 'Tis Nane brave and Nane fair.
That 's walking in yon field ;
And where he treads the grasses there
Bow down to him and yield.
They bow to greet his dearest feet.
And make him low obeisance.
The loving heart, it is its part
To watch and wait in patience.'
With the greatest lilt and good-humour, they make
a match of it, and face the world together for no

Popular Poetry 259
better reason than that both are dark, or both are
poor — ' Poveri tuti do femo I'amore.'
' And being singly poor, let 's make a couple.'
Sometimes the girl cannot make up her mind
which of two lovers she will choose, and so she plays
them both with compliments, but lets it be seen which
is her real love. This is a common theme in Tuscan
poetry, and is always sweet, and gracefully treated.
Here is one in its Venetian form —
' Bepi, te vogio ben ; Toni te amo ;
Bepi, te tengo serato nel peto ;
Toni, la note t'insogno e te ciamo ;
Bepi te vogio ben ; Toni te amo.'
' Bepi, I wish thee well ; but, Toni, I adore thee ;
Bepi, I hold thee locked within my heart ;
Toni, at night I dream of thee, implore thee ;
Bepi, I wish thee well ; but, Toni, I adore thee.'
Sometimes there is a note of regret that the heart
is already engaged and the lover has come too late ;
but that being the case it must be borne, as here —
' Vustu che te amo ? Ma no go piti cuore ;
Mi lo gaveva, e To donato via ;
E I'o donato al mio primo amore ;
¦Vustu che te amo .' Ma no go piii cuore.'
' And would'st thou have my love ? I have no heart.
I had it once : I 've given it all away.
My own first love hath ta'en it whole and part.
And would'st thou have my love ? I have no heart.'
It is the swallows in Venice that warn the lover
to be going, as they wheel about in the clear morning

26o Popular Poetry
air, chasing the mosquitoes, in the months of May
and June — ' O rondinela cagna e traditora,
M'avessistu lassk n'altra mez'ora !
E co'la rondinela scominzia a passare,
Svegite caro che giorno vol fare.'
' O swallow, swallow, O traitor swallow !
Could'st thou not leave me an hour's delight ?
Rouse thee my love, for the day must follow
Soon as the swallow hath taken its flight.'
The girl gives her lover the cong/ with fine pride and
spirit — ' I va digando che per mi morite ;
Ma sto peck su I'anima no'l vogio ;
Paron de far l'amor con chi volete.
La vostrk libertk no ve la togo.'
' They say you die for love of me ;
I would not have that sin upon my soul ;
Nay, you are free to choose, you are heart-whole ;
I do not rob you of your liberty.'
Or she laments her wasted time, wasted upon a hope
less love ; as here —
' Quel tempo che go perso a amarve voi,
L'avesse perso a dir tante orazione
Davanti Dio ghe n'avaria 'na parte,
E dalla mia mama una benedizione.'
' Had all the time and labour spent
On that vain quest, your love,
Been sole and only ever bent
On orisons above ;
With God I surely had obtain'd
A part and resting place.
And from my mother I had gain'd
Her blessing and her grace.'

Popular Poetry 261
The man is much more brutal. He simply an
nounces that the fantasia is over. Love is made
too easy for the men in Venice ; they are spoiled ;
and one is glad to find that they sometimes suffer,
though seldom, from unrequited love ; opposition and
difficulty occasionally raises the man's passion to a
higher level than the ordinary, as in these last villotte
which we shall quote : —
' Butite a la finestra per dolcezza,
E no vardar che mi sia un pover'omo ;
Che povertk no guasta gentilezza.'
' Lean out, my love : and hear my plaint.
Nor ever heed my poverty ;
For poverty can not attaint
The worth of true nobility.'
Or here, where he suffers —
' Tuta la note in leto me rameno.
Per ti mia bela no riposo mai ;
In fina le coverte che 6 nel leto
Le se lamenta che no dormo mai.'
' All night upon my bed alone
I weep, I sigh, I toss, I groan.
For thee, my love, my very own.
Until the sheets, so sore distrest.
Cry out 'gainst me ; I take no rest.'
Or here, where he cannot escape though he wishes
to do so — ' Oh Dio del siel ! oh quante volte el digo !
No te vogio piii ben, te voi lassare ;
Da un'altra parte me ne pento e digo ;
Fino alia morte mia te voi amare.'

262 Popular Poetry
' Oh God of heaven ! how many times I 've sworn
I love thee not all, I wish to leave thee ;
Straightway my heart repents, with anguish torn ;
I swear, till death I '11 love nor ever grieve thee.'
It would be easy to continue quoting from the
hundreds of villotte in the collections of Sig. Bernoni
and Sig. Dal Medico ; but those given will more than
suffice to indicate the character of these poems, which
really contain the life and the heart of the people, in
so far as it has found expression in verse.
Besides the villotte, there are several ballads, tragic
and comic, in Venetian dialect. If the tragic ballads
be in fact native to Venice, which is more than doubt
ful, they only serve to prove, by their great poverty
of imagination, how utterly incapable of conveying
the tragic touch the Venetian temper is. The comic
ballads are a degree more successful ; and one of
them is nothing other than a corrupt version of the
well-known Border ballad, ' Hame cam' our gude-
man at e'en.' But, here again, the Venetian is
immeasurably inferior to the Scotch.
During Lent it is not an uncommon practice for
a party of friends and their wives to meet at some
wine-shop and sing corrotti, or hymns about the
Passion. The tunes are Gregorian in character, and
a female voice takes the leading part ; the rest join
ing in the slow, grave chorus. The three most
popular corrotti are 'The Passion,' a dramatic account
of our Lord's death, with Mary as protagonist, and

Popular Poetry 263
a chorus of friends ; ' The Hours,' a narrative hymn
relating the same events ; and ' The Mysteries,' which
is obviously much more modem than the other two,
and bears the signs of a Jesuit origin.
These corrotti are in no way peculiar to Venice.
The custom of singing them in Lent is ancient and
common to other parts of Italy. The ballads are
of doubtful Venetian birth ; and the true popular
poetry of the Venetian people is to be found in the
villotte only.

A REGATTA AND ITS SEQUEL
Among a sea-dwelling people, regattas are sure to be
one of the most permanent and popular amusements.
And so, besides the great yearly regatta which is
chiefly interesting as a spectacle, private regattas,
arranged among the people themselves, where the
race is everything and the mere spectacle of little
account, frequently take place. And no sooner is a
match made up than the people become highly
excited ; the prospects of the race, and the qualities
of the rowers, are eagerly and ceaselessly canvassed,
and the names Nicolotto and Castellano appear, and
are bandied about across the tables of the wine-shops
where these matters are arranged and discussed.
These two names recall a very ancient and curious
portion of Venetian life, surviving, where all that
remains of antique Venetian custom alone survives,
among the people and the sea-going class.
The names Nicolotto and Castellano indicate two
factions which have divided the popolo — not the
aristocracy — of Venice since ever they had a history.
The names cannot be younger than the twelfth
century, and probably date much further back than

A Regatta and its Sequel 265
that; yet they exist with full life and meaning in
modern Venice, and waken her people to a pitch of
real enthusiasm. Popular tradition, which is very
likely correct, assigns the origin of these factions to
the jealousy which existed between two of the
federated townships of Venetia, Heraclea and Jesolo,
long before Rialto, or modern Venice, became the
capital of the lagoons. Heraclea was aristocratic,
while Jesolo was democratic ; and their mutual hatred
formed the nucleus for two hostile camps, whose
partisans included all the inhabitants of the seaboard.
They were continually at war with one another, till,
in a violent outburst of fury, Heraclea destroyed
Jesolo, and was itself destroyed by democratic Mala
mocco as an act of vengeance.
But the feud had taken root in the temper of the
people, and survived the destruction of its core ; and
when the Venetians were concentrated at Rialto they
still clung to their factions ; but they changed their
names from Heracleani and Jesolani, to Nicolotti and
Castellani, to mark the districts of the city where
each faction established itself The Nicolotti repre
sent the aristocratic faction of Heraclea, and style
themselves nobile to this day. The Castellani descend
from the democrats of Jesolo. Being now at closer
quarters inside the city, the factions became more
pronounced and antagonistic. They adopted dis
tinctive badges. The Nicolotti wear a black cap and
sash round the waist, the Castellani's colour is red.

266 A Regatta and its Sequel
The principal centres of the Castellan faction were,
and still are, at Castello near the public gardens, at
San Giovanni in Bragora behind the Riva, and at
San Gregorio on the other side of the Grand Canal ;
the islands also belong to them, while the mainlanders
wear the black. The Nicolotti hold the parts from
San Giovanni e Paolo to the railway station, and
back again on the other side of the Grand Canal to
San Gervasio e Protasio by the Belle Arti. At this
point the factions are conterminous, the Church of
San Trovaso, as the people call it, standing neutral
between the two.
San Trovaso has two doors, one opening towards
the quarter of the Nicolotti, and the other towards
that of the Castellani. If a Castellan baby is to be
baptized and the godfather chance to be a Nicolotto,
he will not leave the church by the same door as his
compare, but each goes out by the door belonging to
his faction. Matters were carried even further than
this ; and the faction to which a foreigner should
belong on arriving in Venice was determined for him
by the colour of that quarter where he first left his
boat Most of those who now visit Venice are Cas
tellani, and may wear the red. It was not impossible
to change factions if an accident of birthplace com
pelled you to wear a colour which proved distasteful.
The ceremony then performed was a sort of baptism.
The new-born Nicolotto or Castellano was required
to find two sponsors among the members of the
faction he wished to join ; and the gastaldo, or head

A Regatta and its Sequel 267
of the faction, baptized him solemnly into his new
creed. At one time the whole population of the
Giudecca changed sides in this way. They were
Castellani, but deserted to the Nicolotti, and to that
faction they now belong.
The Nicolotti always claimed to be the nobler
faction of the two ; they were officially recognised by
the Govemment, and elected their chief, or Gastaldo
Grande, with very considerable ceremony. In 1772,
there was printed in Venice a loose sheet, containing
an account of all the functions and ceremonies to be
used at the creation of the Gastaldo Grande of the
Nicolotti. The custom was most ancient, dating from
the year 1328, and it continued in vigour down to the
close of the Republic, after which time it fell into
disuse ; and though each gondolier will still be aware
whether he is Nicolotto or Castellano, yet neither of
the factions elect a chief as they used to do.
The ceremony of electing the Gastaldo Grande was
conducted in this way : — On the death of the gastaldo,
the most venerable ofthe Nicolotti sought an audience
of the Doge in council, and there informed him of
what had taken place, and begged permission to elect
a new gastaldo in room of the deceased. The Doge
granted this permission, and named one of his
secretaries who should preside at the election. The
day of the election was announced by three strokes
on the bell of San Nicol6, and all those who had a
right to vote assembled in the church. At the last
stroke came the ducal secretary, dressed in a purple

268 A Regatta and its Sequel
robe, with a purple stole upon his shoulders. The
secretary took his seat in the middle of the twelve
presidents who had been chosen the previous day to
carry out the ceremony. The secretary and the
presidents then proceeded to verify the right of all
those who claimed to vote. The rejected were desired
to withdraw, and the doors of the church were closed.
Those who were standing for the office retired into
the sacristy ; their names were taken down and read
aloud to the whole chapter. After this the aspirants
were called out, one by one, and, entering the pulpit,
each expressed his views upon the reforms required,
and explained the way in which he proposed to fill
the office. The candidates were then locked in the
sacristy again, and the chapter proceeded to ballot
for the names, after being addressed by the vicar of
the parish and the secretary of the Doge. As soon
as the votes had been counted, the twelve presidents
entered the sacristy and led out the man who had
been elected. They conducted him to the high altar,
and there, on his knees, he took the oath of allegiance,
placing his hand in that of the Doge's secretary.
Then the secretary took the standard of the Nicolotti,
and unfurling it, he gave it to the gastaldo, saying,
' We consign to you the standard of San Nicolo, in
the name of the most serene prince, and as proof that
you are chief Gastaldo and head of the people of San
Nicol6 and San Raffaele.' Then immediately all
sang the Te Deum, and at its close the doors were

A Regatta and its Sequel 269
thrown open, and, to the sound of bells, and cannon,
and shouts of the people, the new gastaldo passed in
procession out of the church.
At first the Government tolerated the constant
street fights which used to take place between Nicolotti
and Castellani, only confining them to a certain
portion of the year — from September to Christmas.
The favourite way in which the factions tested their
strength was for one party to occupy a bridge and
defy the other to force a passage. The battle was
waged with fists and sticks, and ended in broken
bones and duckings. These fights of the Nicolotti
and Castellani became one of the shows of Venice ;
and a special battle was arranged at the Ponte dei
Pugni, for the amusement of Henry III. of France, in
the year 1574. For the most part the play, though
rough, was good-humoured. But the temper of the
people was not always under control. The battle,
begun with fists and sticks, sometimes ended with
steel — as was the case in 1703, when many lives were
lost and the combatants were only separated by the
priests of Saint Barnabas, who carried the Host into
the middle of the milie. After this the Government
determined to put an end to these fights and to blot out
the memory ofthe two factions from among the people.
The authorities succeeded in crushing the street
encounters ; but all the rivalry of the factions was
concentrated upon the more harmless amusements of
the Regatta and Forze d'Ercole. This latter game

270 A Regatta and its Sequel
consisted in making human pyramids of various
fantastic shapes and names. One faction used to
challenge the other, and they were victors who could
build their pyramid highest and keep it going for
the longest time. In this the Castellani were the
superior. But the Forze d'Ercole has long since
disappeared ; the daughter of the last great player
is now an old woman of seventy-four. The regatta
alone remains, and upon it the people expend all
their undiminished enthusiasm for their faction, which
neither time nor repression seems able to extinguish.
Whenever a match is made the question is sure to
arise, who will win it — Castello or San Nicolo.
So it was upon the occasion of which I am going
to speak. A match had been arranged between two
famous champions. Zatta, the challenger, represented
the Nicolotti, while Domenico de Gasparis, commonly
called Fighetti, had the sympathy of all good Castel
lani. The course chosen was from the Lido to Fusina
and back again to San Giorgio Maggiore — a distance
of some twelve miles. The Nicolotti had won the
last regatta. There was, therefore, great excitement
on the present occasion. The match was to be rowed
in ordinary gondolas, and each champion chose his
second man to take the bow oar. The Castellani
undoubtedly had the prettier boat ; their crew showed
the finer form. But the Nicolotti were the stronger,
and were also credited with great lasting powers ; so
that they started favourites. The day before the

A Regatta and its Sequel 271
race both gondolas were carefully scraped and
cleaned. Under the stem-boards, where the hinder-
most rower stands, a hole was cut to let the air pass -
through, which would otherwise have checked the
gondola's speed. When these preparations were
finished, each boat was taken to the Custom-house
and weighed under the suspicious and watchful eyes
of many representatives of either party. They were
then tied to the posts of the nearest ferry, where they
remained all night under guard of one Nicolotto and
one Castellano.
Sunday moming was cold and grey. A raw wind
raffled the water, bringing with it a fine drizzle of
rain that soaked through coats and coverings. A
strong tide was ranning in from the sea, sweeping
round that magnificent curve by the public gardens,
racing past San Giorgio Maggiore and streaming
up the broad Giudecca Canal — precisely the course
the boats were to take ; excellent for going, but
promising a long and trying row against it, coming
back. The gondolas were moored by the familiar
Lido, and started at 7.25. Close by San Giorgio, a
favourite point of observation, the cold and stone-grey
water was dotted in black with craft of many builds,
chiefly filled with people of the people ; there was
hardly one signore to be seen. Presently comes the
thud of a gun, borne muffled and thick upon the
wind. There is an indistinguishable moving mass of
boats by the point of the gardens ; then, in six or

272 A Regatta and its Sequel
seven minutes, the race sweeps by. The Castellani
are leading, rowing in splendid style ; the Nicolotti
close behind, plodding heavily, but looking dangerous
in their evident strength; so essential for the ten
miles of windy watercourse before them. But the
Castellani are leading, so the red scarfs may chatter,
shout, and rejoice, while the black keep silence.
Then all the boats tum round and follow the race,
the men rowing with all their might, shouting, gibing,
screaming to each other — a mass of floating criticism,
crossing and recrossing like black shuttles on the
grey web of the water, yet with consummate skill
avoiding the slightest touch upon any neighbouring
boat And, looking back, the race and its following
is like a comet with a long black tail, taking the
curve of the canal by the Redentore. Venice lies on
either hand cold and grey ; while overhead a windy
wrack of clouds drives swift and watery from the sea
towards the mountains.
But the speed is too great to allow the spectators
to keep up with the race. At the end of the Giu
decca the crowd has shouted itself breathless. Most
of the boats lie-to, or are moored to the shore,
waiting till the race comes back. In a little more
than an hour there is a stir far away across the
lagoon, by the little island of Saint George-among-
the-Seaweed. Then the two white gondolas creep
into clearness. They have chosen different courses,
one on each side of the wide canal. The Castellani

A CHAMPION OAFSMAN.

A Regatta and its Sequel 275
are still ahead, but apparently losing ground, for
they have taken tlie line where the current of the
incoming tide flows strongest Each gondola urges
surely forward, followed by the boatmen of their
respective factions, shouting advice, objurgations,
entreaties, encouragement. The comet's tail, divided
now, and not in mass, streams down either side of
the Giudecca ; and the excitement grows intense,
for it is impossible to determine who is winning, the
space that separates the racers is too great. But
at length the facade of San Giorgio Maggiore is
reached. A cry of ' Bravo, Fighetti 1 ' is borne over
the water and caught up all round. To the delight
of the Castellani, their champion has won. Within
five minutes of the finish every boat of all the
throng has swiftly and mysteriously disappeared, each
about its daily business, leaving the broad and grey
lagoon fretted into tiny waves beneath a cold east
wind, and the signori just thinking of getting out of
bed. After the race was over, the Castellani knew where
to find Fighetti and his companion Fioravanti ; and
many of them hastened to pay their respects to the
champions. It was in a little wine-shop, behind the
public gardens, in the very heart of the Castellan
district, that the victors held their head-quarters.
The pavement on either side of the canal, and the
bridge that spanned it, were crowded with people —
men, women, and boys, in a state of frenzy over their

276 A Regatta and its Sequel
triumph. The front of the shop itself was decked
with branches of fig-tree, in graceful allusion to the
hero's name ; and right above the door hung the por
trait of Fighetti himself, embracing the flags he had
already won at the annual regattas. Inside, the
shop was filled by a noisy crowd of men, seated at
the wine-slopped tables, great jugs of red wine
standing before them, surrounded by a phalanx of
tumblers, for all who came in were supposed to drink
a health to the champions.
Every one was waiting to greet the victors, who
were up-stairs, changing and adorning themselves for
their triumph. Presently down they came — Fighetti
a huge, broad-shouldered man, tall, with black hair ;
and Fioravanti much shorter, but even more thickly
set than his companion. Then the crowd fell upon
them ; pressed round them ; fought to get near them ;
an arm drew them this way, another drew them that ;
each one anxious to get the first kiss of the men who
had wiped out the blemish on the Castellani's name.
At length the salutations were over ; and the heroes
— rather dishevelled, it is true, but smiling — settled
themselves to drink and discuss the race. A perfect
babel of criticism, of praise, blame, lecturing, advice,
was poured out on their devoted heads that bowed
beneath the storm, and took frequent refuge in the
wine-jug. Voices rose higher and shriller as one
tried to drown the other and obtain a hearing for his
all-important remarks ; and foreign ears found it time

A Regatta and its Sequel

277

to seek safety in flight ; but not until a feast in honour
of the victory had been arranged for an early day.
This festival was to take place, not at Castello, but
at San Gregorio, another stronghold of the Castellani ;

WlNE-MAKlNG.

and the men of Gregorio provided the entertainment,
which was to consist of a supper at eight, with music
and dancing to follow at midnight. The meeting-
place was a long Venetian chamber, with one window

278

A Regatta and its Sequel

overlooking the Ponte San Gregorio, one of those
rooms so common in Venetian houses — half passage,
half entrance
hall, with its roof
unceiled and the
great beams, or
travi, left ex
posed. Down
the middle of
this room ran
the table, laid
for forty guests ;
and under each
tumbler was a
fig leaf, to show
in whose honour
the feast was
held. At the
upper end hung
a trophy of flags,
little banners
with the word
' Sfida ' embroi
dered in their
centres, won by
the Signori Cas-
,tellani in races
other than the
annual one. The

FORZE D liRCOLE.

A Regatta and its Sequel 279
wall was covered with portraits of former winners,
lent by their families ; famous regattanti, some of
them in the dress of 1740, each clasping his bundle
of pennons — red, green, blue, or yellow, to mark the
place he had taken in the annual race ; Fighetti's
portrait in the middle of all, wreathed by a garland
of his eponymous fig-tree.
It is an ancient custom, which still survives, that
the victorious gondoliers of either faction should have
their portraits painted ; and it is a matter of rivalry
which party can display the more upon the occasion
of a triumph. Among the Archives of the Fari (Cod.
Miscel., No. 802) there exists a collection of books
which used to be kept by the champions of the red
or the black. These books contain rough portraits of
the winners in each regatta, year by year, whether
Nicolotto or Ceistellano ; and opposite each portrait
is the rower's baptismal certificate, his fede di nascitd,
copied from the parish registers, in proof that the
victor truly belonged to the faction which claimed
him. Without this fede di nascitd, the gastaldo of one
faction would never allow the rival faction to display a
portrait. Appended to one of these pictures appears
the following note : ' This man was for a long time
illegally in the power of the Signori Castellani ; but
when the Signori Nicolotti had discovered the facts
of the case, through the many documents which they
possess, they carried him over to his true faction.'
Or again in the year 1784, 'The Signori Castellani

28o A Regatta and its Sequel
are not allowed to exhibit the portraits of the under
mentioned unless they can produce documents of a
validity recognised by the Signori Nicolotti.' The
feeling of jealousy upon these points is still keenly
alive between the factions. Once in a mixed com
pany I mentioned a fact that I had discovered at the
Frari, namely, that the Castellani had won many
more games at the Forze d'Ercole than the Nicolotti.
Instantly the room was in a blaze : Siornb, Siorsi,
and hotter words flying about ; a free fight seemed
imminent, when Antonio, with great presence of mind,
pulled off" his boots, showing a pair of red stockings,
and said, ' There are the best Castellani in the room ! '
These men are quick to anger and quick to forget ;
a laugh will get the better of them ; and this little
pleasantry soothed down tempers that had become
dangerously heated.
In this long room, decorated with leaves and por
traits, forty of the principal gondoliers of the quarter
assembled for supper about eight o'clock. Four
hours may seem a sufficiently long time for supping ;
but on occasions like the present the Venetians sup
at great length, and leave a good three-quarters of an
hour between each course. During these intervals
cigars are lighted, and the guests move about the
room, paying visits to such friends as sit out of ear
shot ; or some one with a favourite voice, will, after
a little coaxing, oblige the company with a song,
' Bella, tu dormi,' or ' Lei non m'amava, no ! ' So the

A Regatta and its Sequel 281
supper and the evening \\'ear away through the
orthodox number and quality of dishes, which are as
unalterable as the laws of the Medes and Persians.
On such a night as this, when all the guests are men,
the wine is not brought up in measures, but in one of
those tubs, containing forty litres, vvhich the whole
sale merchants use ; it enters the room in triumph
suspended by a pole from the shoulders of two men ;
and its advent is hailed with shouts. As the room
grows hot, jackets are abandoned, and the table looks
more lively in colour from its setting of brilliant flannel
shirts and crimson sashes, which everybody wears.
At length the supper comes to a close. The music
arrives ; and the tables are cleared away, the whole
floor swept and the dancing begins. The Venetian
people are passionately fond of waltzing ; it seems as
though they could never have enough of their slow
and long Italian waltz. From the first note of the
music to the very last they abandon themselves to
the ecstasy of the movement with a rapture that
sometimes breaks into song ; and as they hear the
musicians flagging, they call to them a lungo, a lungo.
But it would require lungs of brass and wrists of
bronze to play until a gondolier was tired.
As one comes away from the hot and lighted room,
leaving the dancers still unsatisfied, a full moon is riding
in the heavens ; the walls of Venice look singularly
white and distinct, the water of the canals shines like
silver ; the shadow and the moonlight divide the quiet
streets ; the calles are all cool, silent, and deserted.

A RHAPSODY OF VENICE:
'MI CHIAMA IL MARE'
I
' Il mare lo chiama ' (the sea is calling), said Antonio,
as the Brenta bore our light boat fast down the
stream from Padua to the sea. The sea was calling
the river and us back to its breast; and we went
gladly. The day before, we had rowed from Venice to
Padua, slowly and toilfully against the current ; pass
ing the ruined villa of Malcontenta ; passing Oriago
and Mira ; passing Dolo, with its tall campanile ;
passing Stra and the Pisani's Villa, now a royal
lodge ; the long water-plants, lilies and ranunculus,
tangled the oars ; the glossy violet-winged swallows
darted about the bow. Venice lay behind us, but
her voice was in our ears, calling as she always calls
to those who turn away from her. We slept in
Padua, and trod its narrow and arcaded streets, and
strolled about Saint Anthony's church, with its silent,
cloistered gardens and its Oriental groups of minarets
and domes ; and now the brown floods of the Brenta
were bearing us away to Brondolo and the sea. The
reaches opened out before us ; broad water avenues
282

'Mi chiama il Marej' 283
stretching continually on, mile upon mile ; either
bank bordered with an undergrowth of wood just
bursting into bud ; here and there a clump of poplars,
voiceful with nightingales. Absolute silence over the
water levels, save for the song of the birds and the
regular splash of the oars. So we rowed on in silence.
Each comer that was gained and turned showed us
the Brenta making some new stretch for home. Then
Brondolo at last ; and through the lock we went, with
a crowd of Chioggian market-boats, that jostled each
other and us, while the men who lay on the top of
the cabbage piles smoked with the deliberate passion
of the Chiozzotto for his pipe, and chaffed good-
humouredly. The gates were opened and we passed into the sea.
There was ' a breath of Venice in the breeze ; ' the
odour of the lagoons, clear and pungent ; a scent that
seems to penetrate the very heart, and charms it to
surrender. The evening wind sprang up behind, and
we set our sail and prow for Venice, twenty-five miles
away across the pearly grey lagoon. On and on we
sailed while the day faded about us, deepening slowly
into night A fiery sunset flamed itself to death
behind the Euganean Hills. The expanse of water
quickened from grey to crimson, to gold, to orange,
to pale burnished copper, dimpled and shadowed by
the tiny waves, to purple as the night came down :
then all this glory of colour withdrew once more
into the pervasive pearly grey, as the last light died

284 ''Mi chiama il Mare'
in the western heavens, and darkness stole silently
over the waters.
On and on as the darkness falls around us ; dark
ness, but not obscurity, for the sky is luminous,
holding the day suspended in its blue — blue that is
too deep to be visible but yet is felt The breeze
comes fainter and fainter as the evening wears. Our
sail is only filled and little more. In the far east,
above the hills of Friuli, the clouds are banked and
ready for a storm. Already the lightning flickers
and illumines, like some alabaster vase, the wizard
domes of white cloud masonry. Expanse, variety,
and change unceasing, silence and solitude, the sea
and sky, are all your own. So on, past Pelestrina,
Porto Secco, San Pietro; past the great mouth of
the Malamoccan port, with the three lanterns flash
ing alternate stars, in silence ; for Antonio's stories
have died away with the breeze ; his laughing lips
are silent ; he lies in the stern full length, his arm
across the tiller and his hair, massive and black,
against the pale transparent green of the western
sky. One great white sail steals noiselessly upon
us, goes with us for a space, then as persistently
draws away and fades into the night, lost in the
levels of the grey lagoons — a phantom ship with
never a voice on board.
At Malamocco the glare of Venice begins to burn
upon the water. Three more landmarks to be passed
— Poveglia, San Spirito, and San Clemente — and we

' Mi chiama il Mare ' 285 '
are at home. So on, tardily on, till from the canal of
the Graces we glide gently round the corner by San
Giorgio, with its deep-red bricks and ghostly white
fagade. Then all the piazza lamps swim slowly into
view ; and make a broad and golden path to us across
the waves. The flames burn steadily below, ordered
in threes ; the rosy front of the ducal palace takes
all their warmth. The bell-tower looms large and
alone, with light about its middle girth ; but higher,
its pyramid point is faintly discerned in the upper
sky. The Great Bear seems balanced on his tail,
shooting his arc of stars far into the heavens from
the head of the golden angel on the campanile's top.
On towards the light, and life, and stir, we glide. A
voice comes floating along the waters, the throbbing
chord of a violin and perche tradirmi dying slowly
up the Grand Canal. II
// mare ci chiama (the sea is calling), I felt when
we stood at the base of Queen Catherine's ruined
tower in Asolo, and gazed across the boundless,
solemn, silent plain to that pale thread of grey upon
the horizon, Venice and the lagoon.
We had come that morning from Bassano, where
the Brenta bursts from the jaws of a narrow gorge.
Green, impetuous, musical, it swirls away under a
quaint old wooden bridge, down to the plain and

2 86 'Mi chiama il Mare'
the sea. We left Bassano, with its ivy-mantled keep,
its bastions, and circling outer walls where lovers'
messages are scribbled in red —
'Addio, addio, Bassano
Addio mia bella e mille bacci.'
The hills went with us all the way to Asolo. In
the fields were poppies and blue cornflowers, while
the ditches by the road-side were filled with forget-
me-not and the golden-headed fleur-de-lys. Over
every wall hung tangles of roses running wild — 'it
was roses, roses all the way,' mixed with acacia
bloom, some clusters pure and creamy white, others,
the younger ones, faintly blushing into pink. Through
chestnut and acacia woods, the road wound up to
Asolo, perched high upon a spur of some sharp-
pointed hills, the final episode of the great Alps
before they sink to rest for ever in the plain.
We entered the town by a narrow gateway^ and
toiled up a steep and paven street to the inn. Copper
lids, polished bright, decorated the walls of. a curious
old kitchen, low-roofed, with two wooden pillars sup
porting the beams ; and from the various corners of
the room — for there were many — winding staircases
seemed to lead vaguely to chambers above. A huge
square fireplace, round. which one might walk or sit,
occupied a recess, and its wide-mouthed, pendant
chimney caught all the smoke from the logs that
burned upon the hearthstone. The hostess was a

'Ml chiama il Mare' 287
prim, handsome, faded old lady ; and her son waited
on the guests, a young man about two-and-twenty,
with large melancholy eyes. He looked as though
he had a story.
The castle of Asolo is a square of enormously solid
masonry, built of the native stone, a fine oolite that
keeps its edge after all these centuries. Here it was
that the dethroned Queen of Cyprus came to spend
the last years of her life, amid platonic discussions
on the nature of love, and placid enjoyment of her
parks and woods. From the main tower run flanking
battlements, enclosing what was once a garden, and
may be called so still, for the fecundity of this land
is inexhaustible. On the walls of the keep, snap
dragon, children of Israel and creeping plants have
taken root, and one rich fig-tree comes bursting out
of a crevice ; it seems to have drawn much of its
substance from the solid masonry to which it clings,
so strong, so sharp and decided is its growth.
Towards the mountains all the country is billowy
and clad with trees ; wave upon wave the hills swell
up, until the great chain of the Julian Alps is reached.
In a cleft of these hills lies Possagno, and Canova's
Ionic temple gleams white and clear. Farther to the
east is the gorge where the Piave comes through,
bearing the wood from Cadore and Titian's country
and all the region of the Dolomites. Right below
the tower lies Asolo itself, with its campanile, piazza,
and sculptured fountain and trough, which Queen

288 'Mi chiama il Mare'
Catherine bequeathed to the town. A bright, sunny
little place, full of Hfe and joyousness ; a contrast to
that vast and sombre plain which lay spread out
before us, untree'd and chequered in patches of green
and brown, over whose surface floated the silent
shadows of the clouds, the only moving thing in all
that limitless expanse. And leaning over the wall,
our hearts and eyes were drawn through the distance
and the haze down to Venice and her grey lagoon.
So we took our carriage again, and drove by Villa
Maser, with its insignificant fagade and frescoes too
frigid even for the summer heats, across the plain to
Treviso and the rapid, rushing Sile, transparent, swift,
and green. Then the train bore us to Mestre and
the Austrian railway bridge, and there came the
rapturous delight and quickening of the breeze that
blew to us, salt and free, from the lagoon.
Ill
And what does Venice look like from her highest
point of vantage, the campanile's top ? It is thither
that one must go if one would grasp the singular
situation of this city in the sea. Towards the Adriatic
the sky is clear, and the waves are breaking on the
Lido shore, a long thread of white next to the yellow
sand, parting it from the blue. The slanting evening
sunlight falls on the tower of Malamocco and the
solitary sanitorium of Poveglia. If we carry the eye

'Mi chiama il Mare' 289
along, far in the east the line of the Istrian coast,
faint and hardly discernible, hangs low upon the
horizon, beyond which lies Dalmatia, a land rich in
historical memories, full of suggestions, populous with
cities whose names are seductive — Cattaro, Ragusa,
Zara, Sebenico, Salona, Spalato, the last home of the
great Illyrian emperor, Diocletian. Nearer at hand,
the broad lagoon that laps San Giorgio, as it lies
asleep and basking in the sunlight, is all one sheet
of burnished silver. The deeper channels, where the
currents sweep along, are marked in tones of colder
white, and are defined by dotted lines of sable-pointed
piles. The mouth of the Grand Canal is crowded with
wine boats from Dalmatia, waiting to pay the customs
due upon their cargoes ; the long and graceful lines
of the Peninsular and Oriental steamer float buoyant
on the waters of Saint Mark's basin ; while out by
the public gardens one gorgeous sail of a fishing-boat
makes a point of vivid orange on the silver grey.
Exquisite curves of the sinuous waterway, that fill
the eye with delight while following them, and convey
a sensible rhythm to the blood ! But on the other
side, towards the north, there is a hand's breadth
of pale green sky, lucid above the mountains. Over
the intermediate space of plain hangs a heavy rain
cloud, incumbent upon Treviso and Conegliano,
darkly blue and thunderous in its hollows, but, where
it swells and billows, it is warmed now to purple
by the sunset that is burning away beyond the
T

290 ' Mi chiama il Mare '
Euganeans. Up into the green spring ghostly white
and spectral snow-peaks, far off", rigidly and coldly
defined, with no sunlight upon them ; chill and quiet
and clear, like frozen souls shut out from heaven and
hopeless. Between the eye and them fine misty veils
of rain showers sweep across the plain. Grey all
round upon the northern lagoons, and right below
the brown red roofs of Venice. Once again, change
and an endless variety, the spacious liberty of sea
and sky and land, the vision made master of earth
and air !
It is six o'clock, and the bells begin, one by one
in deliberate succession, tenor intruding on bass, and
also taking up both. Faster and louder swells" their
noise, till the whole peal are clashing and clamouring
together in rage. And the passion "of that brazen
clangour fastens upon the spirit, and bears it out on
pulsing wings that throb and thrill in the ambient
air. Out and away across the lagoon, high over the
needle point of San Giorgio's tower, beyond the Lido
to the sea that calls :
' E il naufragar la'h dolce in questo mare.'
But the bells subside ; their pealing falters sob by
sob, till the bass has swung to his final rest, and the
iron tongues are 'silent. The breeze blows clear and
sweet from the sea, scirocco that will freshen till
past midnight and bring the Chioggian fishermen
far upon their way ; the piazza lights up below ;

'Mi chiama il Mare 291
the chairs and tables are ranged in files before
Florian's ; the orchestra bangs its Verdi and pseudo-
Wagner to the sauntering crowd ; — and yet the breath
of Venice in the breeze stirs some unsatisfied longings,
I know not what : ' // mare mi chiama!

IV
It is not the place alone that makes this cry of
Venice, this fascination of the sea siren. It is the
place and the people, so wonderfully blent together ;
the one penetrating the other till Venice seems to
have acquired a human personality, and her people
some of the freedom, freshness, and variety of their
sea home.
' Signorino, will you sup with me ? ' It was an
invitation not to be refused, for it meant escape
from table-dhote and the horror of white-chokered
waiters. So one clear evening I crossed the ferry
by our Lady of the Lily, and threaded the narrow
calle on the further side of the Grand Canal, round
the corner by the fish-shop and along an old brick
wall with a garden beyond. Against this wall and
on the steps of the houses opposite women are sitting,
sewing or stringing beads and chattering, while the
children sprawl and quarrel in the Campiello a few
steps further on.
I found the door, and at the top of the little stair
case there was Antonio, his head fresh from a basin

292

Mi chiama il Mare '

of water, all his masses of hair tossed back and
dripping, like Bacchus stepped from Tintoret's love
liest picture, or Saint George
with never a dragon left to
conquer and slay ; a black and
white flannel shirt, a blue sash
round his waist, a towel in both
his hands, and his eyes laughing
out as he gives the last scrub
to his face. Then to supper ;
the table, with its spotless white
cloth, spread in the bedroom,
where there is just space for it
and no more. A woodcut of
BATHING. ' Titian's Assumption ' holds the
place of honour on the wall. On one side is
the huge walnut-wood bedstead, polished, broad,
magnificent, a family heirloom. The window is
thrown open as the sun sinks. This window looks
across the narrow calle, out upon a stretch of
greenery, the tops of the garden trees just level with
the sill ; two tall pyramids of cypress shooting up
into the limpid sky ; a wall trailing with ivy and
the pendent clusters of westeria, whose heavy scent
steals inward through the room. Two little girls at
the foot of the table, shy and whispering ; the wife,
wearing a fine gold chain about her throat where the
crimson handkerchief goes ; the baby in her arms,
with its ceaseless ' dammi ' and insatiable appetite ;

' Mi chiama il Mare ' 293
the eldest boy, grave and silent, W9rking steadily
through his r'is'i b'isi and his solid yellow slice of
smoking polenta. So supper goes on, with talk and
much laughter and running between the kitchen
and the bedroom. Antonio is both cook and host
to-night, and justly proud of his own performance.
The chatter dies away in the calle below ; the old
women take up their chairs and retire to their
houses, calling their children about them. The air
blows in, gentle, inviting, caressing, persistent, but
not rade. Presently a voice and a footstep breaks
the silence of the lane, and, ' There 's Checco below,'
says the wife. Antonio hails him from the upper
window, and in comes Francesco, an older gondo
lier, lame from an honourable wound received in
the war of liberation. A babel of greetings, some
show of reluctance, Antonio fetches another litre
of wine, and all set to work on the supper once
more. The evening wears away, till at length
Antonio suggests the gondola. And surely on
such a night as this the sea is calling, if it ever called,
out to the cool grey levels of the lagoon.
Out, then, through the small canals we pass, and
across the wide Giudecca space, where the Istrian
wood-boats are moored, their masts and rigging
rigidly black against the sky, a noble width of
water, with sparse-set lamps on either side defining
its curve. Then through the small canals once more,
till the limit of Venice is reached, and before us
T2

294 'Mi chiama il Mare '
Hes the lagoon. The gondola turns and keeps close
by the sweep of the Giudecca shore. Here it is all
broken and waste land, a narrow strip between the
houses and the sea ; grass and rubbishy masonry
piled high enough to hide all roofs save the dome
of the Redentore. You hardly guess a city but
for the dim. light staining the air above the piazza.
There is desolation in these ruinous sea-walls. The
place is like the debris of some great town, with the
last flicker of the flames that destroyed it dyeing the
air far off as they shiver to extinction.
But away to the right all is still and quiet across
the pearly water levels ; a mirror of unrippled
silver grey, where the planets sail slowly. The
islands and lidi loom dim in the distance. Out to
sea a faint haze broods on the horizon, veiling the
starlight ; but right overhead the skies are dark and
clear ; not blue, no colour, only radiantly dark. The
lamps of San Clemente burn Hke orange globes,
steady and luminous, through the grey. Not a hush,
not a breath, not a sound save the slow and measured
splash of the oar behind. The sphere of Jupiter
hangs high in the heavens. Down upon the tiny
mortal who is sailing beneath his influence, he pours
some sense of that divine satisfaction, that immortal
completeness, which is his. But how to speak to this
great star ? You cannot. Yet look down ; he is close
beside you, just over the gunwale of the boat ; though
here on the water he is long and thin, drawn out.

' Mi chiama il Mare ' 295
restless, frayed, and flickering in the ripples from the
bow ; not the perfect round he hangs up there. Put
out your hand and take him up ! He is broken to
fragments and falls in dazzling diamond drops from
the finger tips.
Onward slowly, slowly floating onward. The
sharp, persistent steel prow seems making right for
Orion's belt, low down upon the water level, three
stars rising up from the lagoon, leaning a little to
one side like the line of a campanile on the main
land. The giant is prone on the horizon to-night,
and his dog, with the violet star for an eye, is not
up yet. The Pleiades hang tangled above him ; and
there is Aldebaran raging redly on the left, a fiery
point upon the dusky waters ; for only where the
gondola moves is there the least ripple or undula
tion visible. Lean back ! throw up your face to
the heavens ! The intense dark spaces are pulsing
with ecstasy. Rays flash from star to neighbouring
star, playing over depths for whose profundity
there is no gauge. Oh 1 holy, divine and omnipotent
mistress ! nature of the night as well as of the
moming, all thy large stars look down, calm and
unutterably pure, and draw our souls up to their
kindred fires.
Our giro is finished. Antonio has brought us back
to the Grand Canal. There is a serenade, with its
barge of many-coloured lights, moving slowly over
the waters, and the gondolas cluster around the

296 'Mi chiama il Mare'
musician's boat, Bellini's 'A te, o caro' filling the
air. We too halt, the fine steel point of our ferro
finding a resting-place for itself between two other
gondolas. The moon is rising ; and relieved against
its pale golden light, the dome of San Giorgio stands
out firm and dark in a halo of glory. The gondola
next to ours sways gently to the music, as the
gondolier, tall, erect, and exquisitely poised — a white
silhouette against the pale blue sky — unconsciously
obeys the rhythm of the song and of the sea. He is
part of both, he has risen and stands there as the
outcome of both, a creature of the sea, and of the
song. The passion of the music is compelling the
spirits of all who hear ; it seems to be penetrating the
very gondolas themselves, till I half expect that each
gondolier will lean towards his neighbour, circle his
waist and waltz away, gondola and all, down the
broad water avenue and out to sea.
It is the people and the place, the union and
interpenetration of the two, the sea life of these
dwellers in the city that is always 'just putting out
to sea,' which constitutes for many the peculiar and
enduring charm of Venice. The people and the
place so intimately intermingled through all their
long history, have grown into a single life charged
with the richness of sea-nature and the warmth of
human emotion. From both together escapes this
essence or soul of Venice which we would clasp with
all the ardour of a lover. Venice, her lagoons, her

' Mi chiama il Mare ' 297
seafaring folk, become the object of a passionate
idolatry which admits no other allegiance in the
hearts that have known its power. To leave her is a
sure regret ; to return a certain joy.
'O Venezia benedetta ! non ti voglio piu lasciar.'
'Farewell they may not who say farewell.' And
now from the top of Monte Generoso, across the
nearer slopes of green, where the cow-bells tinkle,
across the snow-besprinkled peaks, over the reaches
of Como and beyond the blue expanse of Garda,
there comes ' a breath of Venice on the breeze : ' il
mare mi chiama.

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