being hanged,
that in this way our laws may be maintained and our privileges
preserved. Moreover, I will give any further information of the same
kind which your Magnificence may desire. At Murano, in the house of
Angelo Beroviero, my father, this third day of July, in the year of the
Salvation of the World fourteen hundred and seventy, Giovanni Beroviero,
the glass-maker."

Giovanni had taken a long time in the composition of this remarkable
document. He sat in his linen shirt and black hose, but he had paused
often to fan himself with a sheet of paper, and to wipe the perspiration
from his forehead, for although he was a lean man he suffered much from
the heat, owing to a weakness of his heart.

He folded the two sheets of his letter and tied them with a silk string,
of which he squeezed the knot into pasty red wax, which he worked with
his fingers, and upon this he pressed the iron seal of the guild, using
both his hands and standing up in order to add his weight to the
pressure. The missive was destined for the Podesta of Murano, which is
to say, for the Governor, who was a patrician of Venice and a most high
and mighty personage. Giovanni did not mean to trust to any messenger.
That very afternoon, when he had slept after dinner, and the sun was
low, he would have himself rowed to the Governor's house, and he would
deliver the letter himself, or if possible he would see the dignitary
and explain even more fully that Zorzi, called the Ballarin, was a liar,
a thief and an assassin. He felt a good deal of pride in what he had
written so carefully, and he was sure that his case was strong. In
another day or two, Zorzi would be gone for ever from Murano, Giovanni
would have the precious manuscript in his possession, and when old
Beroviero returned Giovanni would use the book as a weapon against his
father, who would be furiously angry to find his favourite assistant
gone. It was all very well planned, he thought, and was sure to succeed.
He would even take possession of the beautiful red glass, and of the
still more wonderful white glass which Zorzi had made for himself. By
the help of the book, he should soon be able to produce the same in his
own furnaces. The vision of a golden future opened before him. He would
outdo all the other glass-makers in every market, from Paris to Palermo,
from distant England to Egyptian Alexandria, wheresoever the vast trade
of Venice carried those huge bales of delicate glass, careful