robes of the senators and
high officials of the Republic, the imposing vestments of the old doge,
Cristofero Moro, as he sat in state upon his massive throne, and the
bewildering array of the seventy-two candidates for a king's choice.
Seventy-two, I say, but in all that company of puffed and powdered,
coifed and combed young ladies, standing tall and uncomfortable on
their ridiculously high-heeled shoes, one alone was simply dressed
and apparently unaffected by the gorgeousness of her companions, the
seventy-second and youngest of them all.

She was a girl of fourteen. Face and form were equally beautiful, and
a mass of "dark gold hair" crowned her "queenly head." While the other
girls appeared nervous or anxious, she seemed unconcerned, and her face
wore even a peculiar little smile, as if she were contrasting the poor
badgered young prince of St. Mark's Day with the present King of Cyprus
hunting for a bride. "Eh via!" she said to herself, "'t is almost as if
it were a revenge upon us for our former churlishness, that he thus now
puts us to shame."

The ambassador of Cyprus, swarthy of face and stately in bearing,
entered the great hall. With him came his attendant retinue of Cypriote
nobles. Kneeling before the doge, the ambassador presented the petition
of his master, the King of Cyprus, seeking alliance and friendship with
Venice.

"And the better to secure this and the more firmly to cement it,
Eccellenza," said the ambassador, "my lord and master the king doth
crave from your puissant state the hand, of some high-born damsel of the
Republic as that of his loving and acknowledged queen."

The old doge waved his hand toward the fair and anxious seventy-two.

"Behold, noble sir," he said, "the fairest and noblest of our maidens of
Venice. Let your eye seek among these a fitting bride for your lord, the
King of Cyprus, and it shall be our pleasure to give her to him in such
a manner as shall suit the power and dignity of the State of Venice."

Courteous and stately still, but with a shrewd and critical eye, the
ambassador of Cyprus slowly passed from candidate to candidate, with
here a pleasant word and there a look of admiration; to this one a
honeyed compliment upon her beauty, to that one a bit of praise for her
elegance of dress.

How oddly this all sounds to us with our modern ideas of propriety and
good taste! It seems a sort of Prize Girl Show, does it not? Or, it is
like a competitive examination fo