1 at a banquet, served with honour there, representing, in the eyes of all,
es not unwet, I ween, with grateful tears, ir lovely ancestors, the Brides of Venice.
ET us lift up the curtain, and observe
What passes in that chamber. Now a
And now a groan is heard. Then all is still.
venty are sitting as in judgment there;1 en who have served their country and grown grey governments and distant embassies,
en eminent alike in war and peace;
uch as in effigy shall long adorn
The walls of Venice-to shew what she was!
Their garb is black, and black the arras is,
nd sad the general aspect. Yet their looks
Are calm, are cheerful; nothing there like grief,
Fothing or harsh or cruel. Still that noise,
That low and dismal moaning.
A little to the left, sits one in crimson,
ra le prime dell' universo." It was there that the Christian held iscourse with the Jew; and Shylock refers to it, when he says,
"Signor Antonio, many a time and oft,
In the Rialto you have rated me-"
Andiamo a Rialto "-"L'ora di Rialto"-were on every tongue; ad continue so to the present day, as we learn from the comedies of doni, and particularly from his Mercanti.
There is a place adjoining, called Rialto Nuovo; and so called, yrding to Sansovino, "perchè fù fabbricato dopo il vecchio."
The Council of Ten and the Giunta, "nel quale," says Sanuto, messer lo doge." The Giunta at the first examination consisted en Patricians, at the last of twenty.
and the Tragedy of the Two Foscari were published, within a few days of each other, in November, 1821.
As if his tongue dropped honey; yet his glance
None can endure! He looks nor young nor old;
And at a tourney, where I sat and saw,
A very child (full threescore years are gone)
Borne on my father's shoulder thro' the crowd,
He looked not otherwise. Where'er he stops,
Tho' short the sojourn, on his chamber-wall,
Mid many a treasure gleaned from many a clime,
His portrait hangs-but none must notice it;
For Titian glows in every lineament,
(Where is it not inscribed, The work is his!)
And Titian died two hundred years ago."
-Such their discourse.
All nations met as on enchanted ground!
What tho' a strange mysterious Power was there,
Moving throughout, subtle, invisible,
And universal as the air they breathed;
A Power that never slumbered, nor forgave.
All eye, all ear, no where and every where,
Entering the closet and the sanctuary,
No place of refuge for the Doge himself;
Most present when least thought of-nothing dropt
In secret, when the heart was on the lips,
Nothing in feverish sleep, but instantly
Observed and judged
In casual converse, be it where it might,
The speaker lowered at once his eyes, his voice,
And pointed upward as to God in Heaven-
What tho' that Power was there, he who lived thus,
Pursuing Pleasure, lived as if it were not.
But let him in the midnight-air indulge
A word, a thought against the laws of Venice,
And in that hour he vanished from the earth!
OY, call the Gondola; the sun is
It came, and we embarked; but instantly,
As at the waving of a magic wand,
Though she had stept on board so light of foot,
So light of heart, laughing she knew not why,
Sleep overcame her; on my arm she slept.
From time to time I waked her; but the boat
Rocked her to sleep again. The moon was now
Rising full-orbed, but broken by a cloud.
The wind was hushed, and the sea mirror-like.
A single zephyr, as enamoured, played
With her loose tresses, and drew more and more
Her veil across her bosom. Long I lay
Contemplating that face so beautiful,
That rosy mouth, that cheek dimpled with smiles,
That neck but half-concealed, whiter than snow.
'Twas the sweet slumber of her early age.
I looked and looked, and felt a flush of joy
I would express but cannot. Oft I wished
Gently-by stealth-to drop asleep myself,
And to incline yet lower that sleep might come;
Oft closed my eyes as in forgetfulness.
"Twas all in vain. Love would not let me rest.
But how delightful when at length she waked!
When, her light hair adjusting, and her veil
So rudely scattered, she resumed her place
Beside me; and, as gaily as before,
Sitting unconsciously nearer and nearer,
Poured out her innocent mind!
Sung a Venetian; and his lay of love,1
Dangerous and sweet, charmed Venice. For myself.
(Less fortunate, if Love be Happiness)
No curtain drawn, no pulse beating alarm,
I went alone beneath the silent moon;
Thy Square, St. Mark, thy churches, palaces,
Glittering and frost-like, and, as day drew on,
Melting away, an emblem of themselves.
Those Porches passed, thro' which the water.
breeze
Plays, though no longer on the noble forms 2
That moved there, sable-vested-and the Quay,
Silent, grass-grown-adventurer-like I launched
Into the deep, ere long discovering
Isles such as cluster in the Southern seas,
All verdure. Every where, from bush and brake,
The musky odour of the serpents came;
Their slimy tract across the woodman's path
Bright in the moonshine; and, as round I went,
Dreaming of Greece, whither the waves were
gliding,
I listened to the venerable pines
Then in close converse, and, if right I guessed,
Delivering many a message to the Winds,
In secret, for their kindred on Mount Ida.3
Nor when again in Venice, when again"
In that strange place, so stirring and so still,
Where nothing comes to drown the human voice
But music, or the dashing of the tide,
Ceased I to wander. Now a Jessica
Sung to her lute, her signal as she sate
1 La Biondina in Gondoletta.
2 "C'était sous les portiques de Saint-Marc que les patriciens se réunissaient tous les jours. Le nom de cette promenade indiquait sa destination: on l'appellait il Broglio."-DARU.
3 For this thought I am indebted to some unpublished travels by the Author of Vathek.
t her half-open window. Then, methought, serenade broke silence, breathing hope
Thro' walls of stone, and torturing the proud heart
Of some Priuli. Once, we could not err,
It was before an old Palladian house,
As between night and day we floated by)
A Gondolier lay singing; and he sung,
As in the time when Venice was Herself,
Of Tancred and Erminia.1 On our oars
We rested; and the verse was verse divine !
We could not err-Perhaps he was the last-
For none took up the strain, none answered him ;
And, when he ceased, he left upon my ear
A something like the dying voice of Venice!
The moon went down; and nothing now was seen
Save where the lamp of a Madonna shone
Faintly-or heard, but when he spoke, who stood
Over the lantern at the prow and cried,
Turning the corner of some reverend pile,
Some school or hospital of old renown,
Tho' haply none were coming, none were near,
"Hasten or slacken."2 But at length Night fled;
And with her fled, scattering, the sons of Pleasure.
Star after star shot by, or, meteor-like,
Crossed me and vanished-lost at once among
Those hundred Isles that tower majestically,
That rise abruptly from the water-mark,
Not with rough crag, but marble, and the work
Of noblest architects. I lingered still;
1 Goldoni, describing his excursion with the Passalacqua, has left us a lively picture of this class of men.
"We were no sooner in the middle of that great lagoon which encircles the City, than our discreet Gondolier drew the curtain behind us, and let us float at the will of the waves.-At length night came on, and we could not tell where we were. 'What is the hour?' said 1 to the Gondolier.-'I cannot guess, Sir; but, if I am not mistaken, it is the lover's hour.'-'Let us go home,' I replied; and he turned the prow homeward, singing, as he rowed, the twenty-sixth strophe of the sixteenth canto of the Jerusalem Delivered."
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