of the simple creature! Warm was the sympathy of the household." But the old well was far too deep to give up this heirloom and family treasure, which was gone beyond Gelsomina's tears to recover. Gelsomina would have followed her American friends north, but a portly, stately, dignified aunt "would not trust her so far from the orange-groves of Sorrento." When the hour of parting came, pretty Gelsomina received from her mistress a fine pair of new ear-rings, and tears of gratitude fell upon the trinkets as she kissed the hand of the giver. Her name and something of her sweet innocence and fidelity were given to the jailer's daughter of "The Bravo."
"The well is deep—far down they lie,
beneath the cold, blue water!
My ear-rings! my ear-rings!"
This book, one of Cooper's favorite works, was an artist's picture of Venice, and was written to martial music in Paris, in 1830, where Cooper arrived on the eve of a revolution, for a stay of three years. It was published by Lea and Carey, Philadelphia, in 1834, and did not find favor in America, but was much liked in Germany and
France. Prof. Brander Matthews writes:—"The scene in which Antonio, the old fisherman, is shrived by the Carmelite monk, in his boat, under the midnight moon upon the lagoon, is one of the finest in the whole range of literature in fiction."
Concerning the carrying off of the art treasures of Venice by the French, Cooper wrote: "One great picture escaped them; it stood in a dark chapel completely covered with dust and smoke. Within a few years some artist had the curiosity to examine this then unknown altarpiece. The picture was taken down, and being thoroughly cleaned, proved to be 'The Assumption'"—Titian's masterpiece, some think. It is now in the Academy of Fine Arts in Venice.