a daylight as
cheerful as need be upon the appointments of the elegant cabin, and upon
the good-natured face of the steward when he brought me the _caffe
_caffe latte_, and the buttered toast for my breakfast. He said,
"_Servitor suo!_" in a loud and comfortable voice, and I perceived the
absurdity of having thought that he was in any way related to the
Nightmare-Death-in-life-that-thicks-man's-blood-with-cold.

"This is not the regular Venice steamer, I suppose," I remarked to the
steward as he laid my breakfast in state upon the long table.

No. Properly, no boat should have left for Venice last night, which was
not one of the times of the tri-weekly departure. This was one of the
steamers of the line between Trieste and Alexandria, and it was going at
present to take on an extraordinary freight at Venice for Egypt. I had
been permitted to come on board because my driver said I had a return
ticket, and would go.

Ascending to the deck, I found nothing whatever mysterious in the
management of the steamer thus pressed for the first time, probably,
into the service of an American citizen. The captain met me with a bow
to the gangway; seamen were coiling wet ropes at different points, as
they always are; the mate was promenading the bridge, and taking the
rainy weather as it came, with his oil-cloth coat and hat on. The wheel
of the steamer was as usual chewing the sea, and finding it unpalatable,
and vainly expectorating.

We were in sight of the breakwater outside Malamocco, and a pilot-boat
was making us from the land. Even at this point the fortifications of
the Austrians began, and they multiplied as we drew near Venice, till we
entered the lagoon, and found it a nest of fortresses, one within
another.

Unhappily, the day being rainy, Venice did not spring resplendent from
the sea, as I had always read she would. She rose slowly and languidly
from the water,--not like a queen, but like the slovenly, heart-broken
old slave she was.

IV.

CANOVA'S BIRTHPLACE.

From Venice to the city of Vicenza by rail it is two hours, and thence
you must take a carriage if you would go to Bassano, which is an opulent
and busy little grain mart of some twelve thousand souls, about thirty
miles north of Venice, at the foot of the Alps. We reached the town at
nine o'clock. It was moonlight; and as we looked out we saw the quaint,
steep streets full of promenaders, and everybody in Bassano seemed to be
making love. Young girl