"Very well, my dear, it shall be as you wish, and now that I have it all straight in my old head, what pleases each of you best, what say you, shall I begin the story?"
"Si! Si!" they cried in unison, settling back against the wall, anxious not to lose a single syllable.
"It was in the time of the Doge, Enrico Dandolo," he began, bending a questioning look at his eager listeners; "of course, you know that in the long ago, Venice was ruled by men who bore the title of Doge?"
The children nodded assent, and he went on, impressively:
"Dandolo was a great man. He was eighty years old at the time he came into the office, and blind, as well, but he was not too old to undertake mighty enterprises."
"When was it he lived?" asked Andrea meditatively.
"Oh, many, many years ago—I am inclined to think it must have been at least five or six hundred."
"Five or six hundred years ago!" repeated Andrea incredulously, his childish mind refusing to compass so great a lapse of time.
"Well—thereabouts," Paolo resumed, somewhat disturbed at the interruption; "it was in the time of the crusades. Have you ever heard of the crusades, my dear?" And he softly touched Maria's chin. Before she could reply, her brother put in, proudly, "I know, they were wars to rescue the holy lands from the—" he paused.
"Infidels," supplied Paolo approvingly. "That's right." And any one seeing the old man would surely have thought that he had himself fought against the infidels, such fire shot from his eyes, and so tense became his muscles. "It was in the Fourth Crusade that Venice played so mighty a part."