Part 23

The correspondence between the external and the interior spectacle once discovered, my enjoyment found itself unspeakably multiplied. The crowd of imperishable forms that peoples its churches and palaces seemed from these latter to answer the harmony of daylight with a chord so deep and powerful that it soon became dominant. And--because the light of Heaven alternates with shadows, but the light of Art lasts in the human soul and cannot be extinguished--when the miracle of the hour ceased to cover all those things, my spirit felt itself alone and ecstatic among the splendours of an ideal autumn.

GABRIELE D’ANNUNZIO.

FROM A VENETIAN BALCONY

High-tide at Venice; warm wind driving in from the sea. Hark! the cry of the gulls as they flit o’er the wide canal, Flit and circle and skim, and dip in their savage glee, Striking the lead-coloured waves that scatter tempestual, Striking with sharp white wing like a flail, gorging their prey: _Frutto di mare_, fruit of the ocean, drift of the way.

Hither and thither wend other wild birds in the storm-- Gondolas black as the swift that floats o’er an autumn sky-- Gondolas silent and shadowy, wondrously slender of form-- Gliding in close-measured rhythm down where the barges lie, Under the glimmering bridges, and near to the palace walls That frown in a gloomy dusk, as the sea-mist gathers and falls.

Now, with a burst of voices, clang the _Salute’s_ bells, From yonder tower-lofts straining, heav’n high as they may go. Again, to our fretful world, surely the _Angelus_ tells Patience for need and pain, and solace and calm for woe. As I listen the peal dies out--alas, and alas! alas! But from over the pallid sunset the heavy storm-clouds pass.

O weird sea-birds, as ye utter your hoarse and discordant cry, Do ye wot of the north, and the hearts that are watching your ominous course? Or is it enough for ye, birds, as gyrating and slanting ye fly, To ride the broad Adriatic, and drink of her glamour and force, Regardless that realms beyond realms, as waves upon waves, in unrest, Look up for the message of love that God’s angel brings to the blest?

LADY LINDSAY.

AUTUMN IN VENICE

It is now late in October. The days are short but luminous still when the mists do not drift in from the lagoons of the Lido, or from the marshes of the low-lying lands beyond Mestre and Fucina. Boats still come in with rosy sunrise reflection shed on their orange sails, and take their loads of autumn apples and pears and walnuts to the fruit-market above Rialto. But soon, very soon, it will be winter, and the gondolas will glide by with closed felze, and the water will be a troubled waste between the city and the Lido, and men will hurry with muffled heads over the square of Saint Mark when the Alpine wind blows, and the strange big ships creep on their piloted course tediously and timidly through the snowstorms to their anchorage in the wide Giudecca.

OUIDA.

VENICE AT TWILIGHT

O for the autumn, and twilight and dream, Where still waters gleam.

O for sky-distances, fading in blue, With Venice in view.

O for the opal of cloud and lagoon, With night-shadows strewn.

Palaces, blue-green, and hushed as in sleep, Keep watch o’er the deep.

O for the autumn, and Venice aglow, Where silken winds blow.

Like a chrysanthemum droops the fair town As Night cometh down,

Crushing those petals of watery bloom In tenderest gloom.

O at this hour, when Venice is blest, May I, to my breast,

Gather one petal of delicate hue-- To bring, Love--to you!

HÉLÈNE VACARESCO. _Translated by Fred. G. Bowles_

ALL SOULS’ DAY AT VENICE

They had put a bridge of boats from the northernmost quay of Venice to the cemetery island. A dense crowd, coming and going across it, black over the black anchored barges, each two with their yard of pale water between their tarred hulls. And, as we draw near, as we go beneath, the seeming silence turns into a murmur, and a rumble.

For this one day in all the year the cemetery island is bridged on to the islands of the living. This is no mere coincidence, but a real symbol.

The cloisters and the gardens are full as for a fair, crowds coming and going, buying tapers, lighting them at the glittering wax-lights before the chapel, bringing a few flowers.... Surely for these poor folk there is a reality, if only a negative one, in this suspending of the labour, cares, the empty grind of life; and their hour of watching by the dead may be, in some way deeper than words can say, an hour of communing with the eternities.

While thus the cemetery was given up to the living and to the long dead, the scarcely dead, the real dead, were arriving here and there with the real mourners. I noted a mound of fresh earth, with the ritual trowel sticking in it, a couple of surpliced and shaven Franciscans reciting the prayers to a few blear, red-eyed people (a nun among them); all these new-comers and their ministering clergy seeming a little scared by intruding their own dead man or woman into this great public feast of those who have long passed beyond. And the crowd, on its side, looked surprised at this new and definite reality of loss in the midst of its vaguer mournings; this man or woman, only just dead, carried in among those shadowy memories.

Very touching also were the little framed photographs, clean and evidently taken off some poor table or wall, and hung on the cross for the afternoon; the dead pauper having his effigy also on his grave, like the rich man among his marble, if only for those few hours.

As we got back into the gondola the crowd was streaming only one way along the black bridge; away from the cemetery, back into life.

VERNON LEE.

VENICE IN WINTER

In Venice only the melancholy drenching rain of a winter’s day brings rest to the eye, when water meets water, and sky is washed into sea and the city lies soaking and dripping between two floods. But soon the wind shifts to the north-east, out breaks the sun again, and all Venice is instantly in a glare of light and colour and startling distinctness, like the sails and rigging of a ship at sea on a clear day.

FRANCIS MARION CRAWFORD.

VENICE: THE END OF WINTER

There is joy in the heart of each Venetian when the end of winter is reached at last, and once more are visible, lying like pearls on the spring-blue ocean, the islands of Murano and Malamocco. They have long been veiled from view by opal mists, sometimes but half obscured and lying like a ghostly mirage in the distance. But now they stand out like bright and beautiful cameos, glistening white on a surface of blue. Tower and wall and roof, washed clean and new by the refreshing winter mists, stand ready to receive the sunlight. For these sun-loving and warmth-loving people the year should be always summer! This first bright burst of warm sunshine has set the spirit of cheer in the heart of each gondolier as he stands by his own favourite _traghetto_, furbishing up his gondola and preparing for the coming glorious seasons of spring and summer in Venice! He smiles and jokes again; he shouts once more in his old way to his brother gondolier across the opposite shore--_É primavera! é primavera!_

ENRICO ALBINI.

VENICE OF THE PAST

Dim phantoms of banners for conquest unfurl’d, Of brows bright with diamonds, of bosoms empearl’d, Of Venice, the mistress and Queen of the world; Of argosies laden with damask and gold, Of tributes barbaric from kingdoms grown old; Of spousals fantastic and rings in the tide Of Venice the bridegroom, and Ocean the bride. CHARLES MACKAY.

Venice ... a ghost upon the sands of the sea, so weak--so quiet,--so bereft of all but her loveliness, that we might well doubt, as we watched her faint reflection in the mirage of the lagoon, which was the City, and which the Shadow.... It would be difficult to overrate the value of the lessons which might be derived from a faithful study of the history of this strange and mighty city: a history which, in spite of the labour of countless chroniclers, remains in vague and disputable outline,--barred with brightness and shade, like the far-away edge of her own ocean, where the surf and the sandbank are mingled with the sky. JOHN RUSKIN.

In Venice ... one cannot think if not in images. They come to us from all quarters, in countless numbers, in endless variety, and they are more real, more living, than the people that elbow us in the narrow street. They let us bend down to scrutinize the depths of their lingering eyes, and we can divine the words they are going to say by the curves of their eloquent lips. GABRIELE D’ANNUNZIO.

THE ORIGIN OF VENICE

Venice, being a republic, which, both on account of its power and internal regulations, deserves to be celebrated above any principality of Italy.... I speak of their (the Venetians’) city from a remote period.... When Attila, king of the Huns, besieged Aquileia, the inhabitants, after defending themselves a long time, began to despair of effecting their safety, and fled for refuge to several uninhabited rocks, situate at the point of the Adriatic Sea, now called the Gulf of Venice, carrying with them whatever moveable property they possessed. The people of Padua, finding themselves in equal danger, and knowing that, having become master of Aquileia, Attila would next attack themselves, also removed with their most valuable property to a place on the same sea, called Rivo Alto, to which they brought their women, children, and aged persons, leaving the youth in Padua to assist in her defence. Besides these, the people of Monselice, with the inhabitants of the surrounding hills, driven by similar fears, fled to the same rocks. But after Attila had taken Aquileia, and destroyed Padua, Monselice, Vicenza, and Verona, the people of Padua and others who were powerful continued to inhabit the marshes about Rivo Alto; and in like manner all the people of the province anciently called Venetia, drived by the same events, became collected in these marshes. Thus, under the pressure of necessity, they left an agreeable and fertile country to occupy one sterile and unwholesome. However, in consequence of a great number of people being drawn together into a comparatively small space, in a short time they made those places not only habitable, but delightful; and having established among themselves laws and useful regulations, enjoyed themselves in security amid the devastations of Italy, and soon increased both in reputation and strength. For, besides the inhabitants already mentioned, many fled to these places from the cities of Lombardy, principally to escape from the cruelties of Clefis, king of the Lombards, which greatly tended to increase the numbers of the new city; and in the conventions which were made betwixt Pepin, king of France, and the emperor of Greece when the former, at the entreaty of the pope, came to drive the Lombards out of Italy, the duke of Benevenuto and the Venetians did not render obedience to either the one or the other, but alone enjoyed their liberty. As necessity had led them to dwell on sterile rocks, they were compelled to seek the means of subsistence elsewhere; and voyaging with their ships to every port of the ocean, their city became a depository for the various products of the world, and was itself filled with men of every nation.

For many years the Venetians sought no other dominion than that which tended to facilitate their commercial enterprises, and thus acquired many ports in Greece and Syria; and as the French had made frequent use of their ships in voyages to Asia, the island of Candia was assigned to them, in recompense for these services. Whilst they lived in this manner, their name spread terror over the seas, and was held in veneration throughout Italy. This was so completely the case, that they were generally chosen to arbitrate in controversies arising betwixt the states, as occurred in the difference betwixt the Colleagues, on account of the cities they had divided amongst themselves; which being referred to the Venetians, they awarded Brescia and Bergamo to the Visconti. But when, in the course of time, urged by their eagerness for dominion, they had made themselves masters of Padua, Vicenza, Trevisa, and afterwards of Verona, Bergamo, and Brescia, with many cities in Romanga, and the kingdom of Naples, other nations were impressed with such an opinion of their power, that they were a terror, not only to the princes of Italy, but to the Ultramontane kings. These states entered into an alliance against them, and in one day wrested from them the provinces they had obtained with so much labour and expense; and although they have in latter times re-acquired some portions, still, possessing neither power nor reputation, like all the other Italian powers, they live at the mercy of others....

Amongst the great and wonderful institutions of the republics and principalities of antiquity that have now gone into disuse, was that by means of which towns and cities were from time to time established; and there is nothing more worthy the attention of a great prince, or of a well-regulated republic, or that confers so many advantages upon a province, as the settlement of new places, where men are drawn together for mutual accommodation and defence. This may easily be done, by sending people to reside in recently acquired or uninhabited countries. Besides causing the establishment of new cities, these removals render a conquered country more secure, and keep the inhabitants of a province properly distributed. Thus deriving the greatest attainable comfort, the inhabitants increase rapidly, are more prompt to attack others, and defend themselves with greater assurance. This custom, by the unwise practice of princes and republics, having gone into desuetude, the ruin and weakness of territories has followed; for this ordination is that by which alone empires are made secure, and countries become populated. Safety is the result of it; because the colony which a prince establishes in a newly acquired country is like a fortress and a guard, to keep the inhabitants in fidelity and obedience. Neither can a province be wholly occupied and preserve a proper distribution of its inhabitants without this regulation; for all districts are not equally healthy, and hence some will abound to overflowing, whilst others are void.... With cultivation the earth becomes fruitful, and the air is purified with fires--remedies which Nature cannot provide. The city of Venice proves the correctness of these remarks. Being placed in a marshy and unwholesome situation, it became healthy only by the number of industrious individuals who were drawn together.

NICCOLO MACHIAVELLI.

A PILGRIM’S DESCRIPTION OF VENICE

On Wednesday, the 21st of May [1494], I took one of the Milanese couriers to guide me about Venice, and went to the houses of the merchants for whom I had letters, and to each one I gave his own. Then, as I was afraid of not finding a place in the galley, I was immediately introduced to the Magnificent Don Agostino Contarini, a Venetian patrician and captain of the Jaffa galley--thus the galley is named which carries the pilgrims going to Jerusalem--and he ordered my name to be written in the Pilgrims’ Book. At this time I found that I had been in too great a hurry to leave home, and that I must wait several days before the departure of the said galley.

In order that the tediousness of waiting should not make me desire to turn back and do as the children of Israel did when they went into the Promised Land, I determined to examine carefully the city of Venice, about which so much has been said and written, not only by learned men, but also by great scholars, that it appears to me there is nothing left to say. And I did this solely to amuse myself during the time I had to spend in such a great port. I wanted to see everything it was possible for me to see; and I was aided continually by the company given me by the Magnificent Doctor and Cavalier, the Lord Tadiolo de Vicomercato, Ambassador to the aforesaid Signoria of Venice for our most illustrious Lord the Duke of Milan. I paid him a visit, as was my duty, as soon as I arrived, and from him, although I did not merit it, I received more than common attention.

Before going further, I must make excuses to the readers of this my itinerary, if it should seem to them that I have overpraised this city of Venice. What I write is not written to win the goodwill of the Venetians, but to set down the truth. And I declare that it is impossible to tell or write fully of the beauty, the magnificence or the wealth of the city of Venice. Something indeed can be told and written to pass the time as I do, but it will be incredible to anyone who has not seen the city.

I do not think there is any city to which Venice, the city founded on the sea, can be compared; nevertheless I appeal always to the judgment of every person who has been there some time. Although this city is built entirely in the water and the marshes, yet it appears to me that whoever desires to do so can go everywhere on foot, as it is well kept and clean. Anyone, however, who does not want to endure the fatigue can go by water, and will be entreated to do so, and it will cost him less than he would spend elsewhere for the hire of a horse. As to the size of the city, I may say that it is so large, that, after being there so many days as I was, I made but little acquaintance with the streets. I cannot give the dimensions of this city, for it appears to me not one city alone but several cities placed together.

I saw many beautiful palaces, beginning with the Palace of St. Mark, which is always inhabited by the Doge and his family. The façade of the said palace has been renovated in part with a great display of gold; and a new flight of steps is being built there--a stupendous and costly work--by which to ascend to the said palace from the side of the Church of St. Mark.... Besides the other notable things in the said palace, I saw a very long hall whose walls are painted very ornately. And there is painted the story how Frederick Barbarossa drove away Pope Alexander the Fourth, who fled in disguise to Venice, and was recognized in a monastery called the Monastery della Carità. The whole story is represented with such richness and naturalness in the figures that I think little could be added. The ceiling of the said hall is decorated with great gilded pictures. Seats are placed round the said hall, and in addition there are three rows of double seats, in the body of the hall, placed back to back. There are two magnificent gilded seats, one at each end of the said hall; I was told they were for seating the Doge, one for the winter and the other for the summer. In this hall sit the Great Council of all the gentlemen, who, it is said, are two thousand five hundred in number....

I will not attempt to describe the number of large and beautiful palaces splendidly decorated and furnished, worth, some a hundred, some fifty, some thirty thousand ducats, and the owners of the same, because it would be too hard an undertaking for me, and better suited to someone who had to remain a long time in the said city of Venice. On the Grand Canal there is the most remarkable beginning of a palace for the Sforza family, and for the honour of the Milanese I am very sorry it has not been finished. For after seeing the said foundations, I am sure that the palace would be very magnificent if it were completed.

The said city, although it is in the water, as I said, has so many beautiful piazzas, beginning with that of St. Mark, that they would suffice for any great city placed on the mainland. It is a marvel to see how long and spacious they are. I have observed that the said city is so well ordered and arranged, that however much it rains, there is never any mud.

Something may be said about the quantity of merchandise in the said city, although not nearly the whole truth, because it is inestimable. Indeed, it seems as if all the world flocks there, and that human beings have concentrated there all their force for trading....

As the day of our departure was drawing near, I determined to leave everything else and study the owners of the many beautiful things I have noted--that is, the Venetian gentlemen, who give themselves this title. I have considered the qualities of these Venetian gentlemen. For the most part they are tall, handsome men, astute and very subtle in their dealings, and whoever has to do business with them must keep his eyes and ears well open. They are proud--I think this is on account of their great dominions--and when a son is born to a Venetian gentleman they say to themselves, ‘A Lord is born into the world’ (_E le nato un Signore al Mondo_). They are frugal and very modest in their manner of living at home; outside the house they are very liberal.

The city of Venice preserves its ancient fashion of dress--which never changes--that is, a long garment of any colour that is preferred. No one would leave the house by day if he were not dressed in this long garment, and for the most part in black. They have so observed this custom, that the individuals of every nation in the world--which has a settlement in Venice--all adopt this style, from the greatest to the least, beginning with the gentlemen, down to the sailors and _galeotti_. Certainly it is a dress which inspires confidence, and is very dignified. The wearers all seem to be doctors in law, and if a man should appear out of the house without his toga, he would be thought mad....

When the Venetian gentlemen take office or go on some embassy, they wear very splendid garments; in truth, they could not be more magnificent. They are of scarlet, of velvet, of brocade, if the wearers hold high office; and all the linings of every kind are very costly.... The Venetian women, especially the pretty ones, try as much as possible in public to show their chests--I mean their breasts and shoulders--so much so, that several times when I saw them I marvelled that their clothes did not fall off their backs. Those who can afford it, and also those who cannot, dress very splendidly, and have magnificent jewels and pearls in the trimming round their collars. They wear many rings on their fingers, with great balass rubies, rubies and diamonds. I said also those who cannot afford it, because I was told that many of them hire these things. They paint their faces a great deal, and also the other parts they show, in order to appear more beautiful.... I thought it my duty to seek out the churches and monasteries and go and see the relics which are very numerous; and this seemed to me a meritorious work for a pilgrim who was awaiting the departure of the galley to go to the Holy Sepulchre--thus finishing the time as well as I could.

CANON PIETRO CASOLA. _‘Pilgrimage to Jerusalem in the Year 1494,’ Translated by M. Margaret Newett, B.A._

VENICE: SOME SIXTEENTH-CENTURY CHARACTERISTICS

I came to Venice at the time of a Faire, which lasted fourteene dayes, wherein I sawe very many, and faire shewes of wares. I came thither too short for the first passage, which went from Venice about the seventh or eighth of May, and with them about three score pilgrims, which shippe was cast away at a towne called Estria, two miles from Venice, and all the men in hers, saving thirtie, or thereabouts, lost.