eficial than that of
its opponents; but it remained an incalculable element in the
composition of human affairs, and one the more to be feared since, in
ceasing to have a material existence, it had acquired the dread
pervasiveness of an idea.

With the Epiphany the wild carnival-season set in. Nothing could surpass
the excesses of this mad time. All classes seemed bitten by the
tarantula of mirth, every gondola hid an intrigue, the patrician's
tabarro concealed a noble lady, the feminine hood and cloak a young
spark bent on mystification, the friar's habit a man of pleasure and the
nun's veil a lady of the town. The Piazza swarmed with merry-makers of
all degrees. The square itself was taken up by the booths of hucksters,
rope-dancers and astrologers, while promenaders in travesty thronged the
arcades, and the ladies of the nobility, in their white masks and black
zendaletti, surveyed the scene from the windows of the assembly-rooms in
the Procuratie, or, threading the crowd on the arms of their gallants,
visited the various peep-shows and flocked about the rhinoceros
exhibited in a great canvas tent in the Piazzetta. The characteristic
contrasts of Venetian life seemed to be emphasised by the vagaries of
the carnival, and Odo never ceased to be diverted by the sight of a long
line of masqueraders in every kind of comic disguise kneeling devoutly
before the brilliantly-lit shrine of the Virgin under the arches of the
Procuratie, while the friar who led their devotions interrupted his
litany whenever the quack on an adjoining platform began to bawl through
a tin trumpet the praise of his miraculous pills.

The mounting madness culminated on Giovedi Grasso, the last Thursday
before Lent, when the Piazzetta became the scene of ceremonies in which
the Doge himself took part. These opened with the decapitation of three
bulls: a rite said to commemorate some long-forgotten dispute between
the inveterate enemies, Venice and Aquileia. The bulls, preceded by
halberdiers and trumpeters, and surrounded by armed attendants, were led
in state before the ducal palace, and the executioner, practised in his
bloody work, struck off each head with a single stroke of his huge
sword. This slaughter was succeeded by pleasanter sights, such as the
famous Vola, or flight of a boy from the bell-tower of Saint Mark's to a
window of the palace, where he presented a nosegay to his Serenity and
was caught up again to his airy vaulting-ground. Aft