the Dark Ages had dried
up, and once more the green appeared. No wonder that, after so long and
deep submersion, the jubilant expectation of the race should, as with
Noah's sons, soar into Shinar aspiration.

In firm resolve, no man in Europe at that period went beyond Bannadonna.
Enriched through commerce with the Levant, the state in which he lived
voted to have the noblest Bell-Tower in Italy. His repute assigned him
to be architect.

Stone by stone, month by month, the tower rose. Higher, higher;
snail-like in pace, but torch or rocket in its pride.

After the masons would depart, the builder, standing alone upon its
ever-ascending summit, at close of every day, saw that he overtopped
still higher walls and trees. He would tarry till a late hour there,
wrapped in schemes of other and still loftier piles. Those who of
saints' days thronged the spot--hanging to the rude poles of
scaffolding, like sailors on yards, or bees on boughs, unmindful of lime
and dust, and falling chips of stone--their homage not the less
inspirited him to self-esteem.

At length the holiday of the Tower came. To the sound of viols, the
climax-stone slowly rose in air, and, amid the firing of ordnance, was
laid by Bannadonna's hands upon the final course. Then mounting it, he
stood erect, alone, with folded arms, gazing upon the white summits of
blue inland Alps, and whiter crests of bluer Alps off-shore--sights
invisible from the plain. Invisible, too, from thence was that eye he
turned below, when, like the cannon booms, came up to him the people's
combustions of applause.

That which stirred them so was, seeing with what serenity the builder
stood three hundred feet in air, upon an unrailed perch. This none but
he durst do. But his periodic standing upon the pile, in each stage of
its growth--such discipline had its last result.

Little remained now but the bells. These, in all respects, must
correspond with their receptacle.

The minor ones were prosperously cast. A highly enriched one followed,
of a singular make, intended for suspension in a manner before unknown.
The purpose of this bell, its rotary motion, and connection with the
clock-work, also executed at the time, will, in the sequel, receive
mention.

In the one erection, bell-tower and clock-tower were united, though,
before that period, such structures had commonly been built distinct; as
the Campanile and Torre del 'Orologio of St. Mark to this day attest.

But it w