This is the city of great doges hidden

In guarded offices and country places.

The city strives against the things forbidden

By the doges, on whose faces

The city at large never looks;

Doges who could accomplish if they would

In a month the city's beauty and good.

Yet this city in a hundred years has risen

Out of a haunt of foxes, wolves and rooks,

And breaks asunder now the bars of the prison