During this conversation we had gone down the beautiful Brenta, leaving behind us many a noble garden, and many a noble palace, and casting a rapid glance at the populous and thriving hamlets, which lay along the banks. Several gondolas wound about the ship as soon as we had entered the lagunes. A Lombard, well acquainted with Venice, asked me to accompany him, that we might enter all the quicker, and escape the nuisance of the custom-house. Those who endeavoured to hold us back, he contrived to put off with a little drink-money, and so, in a cheerful sunset, we floated to the place of our destination.
[3] A "convention's dollar" is a dollar coined in consequence of an agreement made between several of the German states, in the year 1750, when the Viennese standard was adopted.—Trans.
Sept. 29 (Michaelmas-Day). Evening.
So much has already been told and printed about Venice, that I shall not be circumstantial in my description, but shall only say how it struck me. Now, in this instance again, that which makes the chief impression upon me, is the people,—a great mass, who live an involuntary existence determined by the changing circumstances of the moment.
It was for no idle fancy that this race fled to these islands; it was no mere whim which impelled those who followed to combine with them; necessity taught them to look for security in a highly disadvantageous situation, that afterwards became most advantageous, enduing them with talent, when the whole northern world was immersed in gloom. Their increase and their wealth were a necessary consequence. New dwellings arose close against dwellings, rocks took the place of sand and marsh, houses sought the sky, being forced like trees inclosed in a narrow compass, to seek in height what was denied them in breadth. Being niggards of every inch of ground, as having been from the very first compressed into a narrow compass, they allowed no more room for the streets than was just necessary to separate a row of houses from the one opposite, and to afford the citizens a narrow passage. Moreover, water supplied the place of street, square, and promenade. The Venetian was forced to become a new creature; and thus Venice can only be compared with itself. The large canal, winding like a serpent, yields to no street in the world, and nothing can be put by the side of the space in front of St. Mark's square—I mean that great mirror of water, which is encompassed by Venice Proper, in the form of a crescent. Across the watery surface you see to the left the island of St. Georgio Maggiore, to the right a little, further off the Guidecca and its canal, and still more distant the Dogana (Custom-house) and the entrance into the Canal Grande, where right before us two immense marble temples are glittering in the sunshine. All the views and prospects have been so often engraved, that my friends will have no difficulty in forming a clear idea of them.
Venice.
After dinner I hastened to fix my first impression of the whole, and without a guide, and merely observing the cardinal points, threw myself into the labyrinth of the city, which though everywhere intersected by larger or smaller canals, is again connected by bridges. The narrow and crowded appearance of the whole cannot be conceived by one who has not seen it. In most cases one can quite or nearly measure the breadth of the street, by stretching out one's arms, and in the narrowest, a person would scrape his elbows if he walked with his arms a-kimbo. Some streets, indeed, are wider, and here and there is a little square, but comparatively all may be called narrow.
I easily found the grand canal, and the principal bridge—the Rialto, which consists of a single arch of white marble. Looking down from this, one has a fine prospect,—the canal full of ships, which bring every necessary from the continent, and put in chiefly at this place to unload, while between them is a swarm of gondolas. To-day, especially, being Michaelmas, the view was wonderfully animated; but to give some notion of it, I must go back a little.
The two principal parts of Venice, which are divided by the grand canal, are connected by no other bridge than the Rialto, but several means of communication are provided, and the river is crossed in open boats at certain fixed points. To-day a very pretty effect was produced, by the number of well-dressed ladies, who, their features concealed beneath large black veils, were being ferried over in large parties at a time, in order to go to the church of the Archangel, whose festival was being solemnised. I left the bridge and went to one of the points of landing, to see the parties as they left the boats. I discovered some very fine forms and faces among them.