his design? I have seen none like it."

"Nay, not one; there will be nine hundred, for the decoration of a
mosque," and Girolamo's eyes sparkled with triumph. "It is not that it
is difficult," he explained, for Marina's eyes wandered from her
father's face to the design with some astonishment. "It is even simple
for us. But when the Levant sends to Venice for these sacred lamps for
her own temples it is her acknowledgment that we have surpassed our
teachers. It is a glory for us!"

"Father, I thought the glass of Venice was even all our own!" Marina
exclaimed in a tone of disappointment. "I knew not that our art had come
from the East to us. Some say that it was born here."

"Ay, some; but thou shouldst know the story of thy Venice better, my
daughter," Girolamo answered gravely, for to him every detail connected
with his art was of vital import. "There may be some who say this, but
not thou. In the time of Orseolo the mosaics were brought from the
Levant for our old San Marco. Thus came the knowledge to us in those
early days. But now there is no longer any country that shares it
equally with Venice, for elsewhere they know not the art in its
fineness. These, when they are finished, shall be sent as a gift from
the Republic; it is so written in this order from the Senate."

"When came it to thee?"

"To-day, with much ceremony, it was delivered into mine own hand by one
of the Secretaries of the Ten. For, see'st thou, Marina, it is a mark of
rare favor that they have trusted this parchment with me, and have not
brought me into their presence to make copy of it in the palace. If thou
couldst lend me thy deft fingers----"

"Surely," she answered, smiling up at him.

He was standing over her with one hand on her shoulder; he rested the
other lightly on her hair, looking down into her eyes for a moment with
a caress still and tender, after his own grave fashion. "It will be
safer so," he said, folding the parchment and the letters carefully and
locking them away in his cabinet. "And to-morrow, Marina--for they have
granted me but one day."

The chamber in which they sat was wainscoted with heavy carved woodwork
stained black, and every panel was a drawer with a curiously wrought
lock, containing some design or some order for the house of Magagnati;
and these archives were precious not only for the stabilimento and
Girolamo the master, but they would be treasured by the Republic as
state papers, representing the hig