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. Everywhere, from bush and brake,
The musky odour of the serpents came;
Their slimy track 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

At her half-open window. Then, methought,

1 La Biondina in Gondoletta.

2 "C'était sous les portiques de Saint-Marc que les patriciens se réunissa les jours. Le nom de cette promenade indiquait sa destination; on 1 il Broglio."-DARU.

3 For this thought I am indebted to some unpublished travels by the Vathek.

So, nor long since, of love,1

VENICE. For myself,

ppiness,) ting alarm,

moon;

arches, palaces, s day drew on, emselves.

which the water-breeze noble forms?

-and the Quay,

-like I launched

thern seas,

1 bush and brake,

ts came;

odman's path as round I went,

he waves were gliding,

right I guessed, he Winds,

Mount IDA.3

hen again and so still, the human voice

tide,

SICA e sate

methought,

A 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. 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 see
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 picture of this class of men :

"We were no sooner in the middle of that great lagoon which e City, than our discreet Gondolier drew the curtain behind us, and le the will of the waves.-At length night came on, and we could not te were. What is the hour?' said I to the Gondolier.-'I cannot guess if I am not mistaken, it is the lover's hour.'-'Let us go home,' I r he turned the prow homeward, singing, as he rowed, the twenty-sixth str sixteenth canto of the Jerusalem Delivered."

Nor sought my threshold,' till the hour was come
And past, when, flitting home in the grey light,
The young BIANCA found her father's door,2
That door so often with a trembling hand,
So often-then so lately left ajar,

Shut; and, all terror, all perplexity,

Now by her lover urged, now by her love,
Fled o'er the waters to return no more.

1 At Venice, if you have la riva in casa, you step from your boat into th 2 Bianca Capello. It had been shut, if we may believe the novelist M by a baker's boy, as he passed by at daybreak; and in her despair she f her lover to Florence, where he fell by assassination. Her beauty, and 1 adventure as here related, her marriage afterwards with the Grand Duke, fatal banquet at which they were both poisoned by the Cardinal, his broth rendered her history a romance.

till the hour was come ome in the grey light, her father's door, trembling hand,

eft ajar, perplexity, How by her love,

urn no more.

assassination. Her beauty, and her lovefterwards with the Grand Duke, and that isoned by the Cardinal, his brother, have

IT was St. Mary's Eve, and all poured forth
For some great festival. The fisher came
From his green islet, bringing o'er the waves
His wife and little one; the husbandman
From the Firm Land, with many a friar and nun,
And village maiden, her first flight from home,
Crowding the common ferry. All arrived;
And in his straw the prisoner turned to hear,

1 This circumstance took place at Venice on the 1st of February, the ev feast of the Purification of the Virgin, A. D. 994, Pietro Candiano, Doge.