From ENGLAND,* from victorious EDWARD's court, Their lances in the rest, charged for the prize.

Here, among other pageants, and how oft

It met the eye, borne through the gazing crowd,
As if returning to console the least,

Instruct the greatest, did the Doge go round;
Now in a chair of state, now on his bier.

They were his first appearance, and his last.
The sea, that emblem of uncertainty,

Changed not so fast for many and many an age,
As this small spot. To-day 'twas full of masks;†
And lo, the madness of the Carnival,

The monk, the nun, the holy legate masked!
To-morrow came the scaffold and the wheel;

*

"Recenti victoriâ exultantes," says Petrarch: alluding, no doubt, to the favourable issue of the war in France. This festival began on the 4th of August, 1364.

+ Among those the most followed, there was always a mask in a magnificent habit, relating marvellous adventures, and calling himself Messer Marco Millioni. Millioni was the name given by his fellow-citizens in his life-time to the great traveller, Marco Polo. I have seen him so described,' says Ramusio, ' in the Records of the Republic; and his house has, from that time to this, been called La Corte del Millioni,' the palace of the rich man, the millionnaire. It is on the canal of S. Giovanni Chrisostomo; and, as long as he lived, was much resorted to by the curious and the learned.

And he died there by torch-light, bound and gagged,
Whose name and crime they knew not. Underneath
Where the Archangel, as alighted there,
Blesses the City from the topmost-tower,
His arms extended—there, in monstrous league,
Two phantom-shapes were sitting, side by side,
Or up, and, as in sport, chasing each other;
Horror and Mirth. Both vanished in one hour!
But Ocean only, when again he claims

His ancient rule, shall wash away their footsteps.
Enter the Palace by the marble stairs +
Down which the grizzly head of old FALIER

Rolled from the block. Pass onward thro' the hall,
Where, among those drawn in their ducal robes,
But one is wanting-where, thrown off in heat,
A brief inscription on the Doge's chair

Led to another on the wall as brief; ‡

"In atto di dar la benedittione," says Sansovino ; and performing the same office as the Triton on the tower of the winds at Athens.

Now called La Scala de' Giganti. The colossal statues were placed there in 1566.

Marin Faliero della bella moglie: altri la gode ed egli la mantiene.'

'Locus Marini Faletri decapitati pro criminibus.'

And thou wilt track them-wilt from rooms of state,
Where kings have feasted, and the festal song
Rung through the fretted roof, cedar and gold,
Step into darkness; and be told, "'Twas here,
Trusting, deceived, assembled but to die,

To take a long embrace and part again,
CARRARA

and his valiant sons were slain;

He first then they, whose only crime had been
Struggling to save their Father.- -Thro' that door,
So soon to cry, smiting his brow, 'I am lost!'
Was with all courtesy, all honour, shewn
The great and noble captain, CARMAGNOLA.†—
That deep descent (thou canst not yet discern
Aught as it is) leads to the dripping vaults

Under the flood, where light and warmth were never !
Leads to a covered Bridge, the Bridge of Sighs;

And to that fatal closet at the foot,

Lurking for prey, which, when a victim came,
Grew less and less, contracting to a span;

An iron door, urged onward by a screw,

Forcing out life.

* Francesco II.

-But let us to the roof,

"Il Conte, entrando in prigione, disse: Vedo bene ch' io

son morto, e trasse un grande sospiro."

M. SANUTO.

And, when thou hast surveyed the sea, the land,
Visit the narrow cells that cluster there,

As in a place of tombs. There burning suns,
Day after day, beat unrelentingly;

Turning all things to dust, and scorching up
The brain, till Reason fled, and the wild yell
And wilder laugh burst out on every side,
Answering each other as in mockery!

Few Houses of the size were better filled;
Though many came and left it in an hour.
'Most nights,' so said the good old Nicolo,
(For three-and-thirty years his uncle kept
The water-gate below, but seldom spoke,

Though much was on his mind,) 'most nights arrived The prison-boat, that boat with many oars,

And bore away as to the Lower World,

Disburdening in the Cànal ORFANO,*

That drowning-place, where never net was thrown,
Summer or Winter, death the penalty;
And where a secret, once deposited,

Lay till the waters should give up their dead.'
Yet what so gay as VENICE?+ Every gale

* A deep channel behind the island of S. Giorgio Maggiore.

How fares it with your world?' says his Highness the

Breathed music! and who flocked not, while she reigned,
To celebrate her Nuptials with the Sea;

To wear the mask, and mingle in the crowd
With Greek, Armenian, Persian-night and day
(There, and there only, did the hour stand still)
Pursuing thro' her thousand labyrinths
The Enchantress Pleasure; realizing dreams
The earliest, happiest-for a tale to catch
Credulous ears, and hold young hearts in chains,

Had only to begin, There lived in VENICE'

'Who were the Six we supped with Yesternight? ** 'Kings, one and all! Thou couldst not but remark The style and manner of the Six that served them.'

'Who answered me just now? + Who, when I said, ""Tis nine," turned round and said so solemnly,

66

'Signor, he died at nine!"-" "Twas the Armenian ; The mask that follows thee, go where thou wilt.'

'But who moves there, alone among them all?'

Devil to QUEVEDO, on their first interview in the lower regions. 'Do I prosper there?'' Much as usual, I believe.'-' But tell me truly. How is my good city of Venice? Flourishing?''More than ever.'-' Then I am under no apprehension. All must go well.'

* An allusion to the Supper in Candide: c. xxvi.

+ See Schiller's Ghost-seer, c. i.