From Bologna the route lay through Ferrara and then to Pontelagoscuro on the river Po, where he was to take the courier boat for Venice, down the Po and through a canal. To add to the discomforts of this part of the trip it rained steadily for several days, and, on May 22, Morse paints this dreary picture:—
"When we waked this morning we found it still raining and, apparently, so to continue all day. The rainy day at a country inn, so exquisitely described by Irving in all its disagreeable features, is now before us. A solitary inn with nothing indoors to attract; cold and damp and dark. The prospect from the windows is a low muddy foreground, the north bank of the muddy Po; a pile of brushwood, a heap of offal, a melancholy group of cattle, who show no other signs of life than the occasional sly attack by one of them upon a poor, dripping, half-starved dog, who, with tail between his legs, now and then ventures near them to search for his miserable meal. Beyond, on the river, a few barks silently lying upon the stream, and on the opposite bank some buildings with a church and a campanile dimly seen through the mist. After coffee we were obliged to go to the dogana to see to the searching of all our trunks and luggage. The principals were present and we were not severely searched. A Frenchman, however, who had come on a little before us, was stripped to his skin, some papers were found upon him, and I understand he has made his escape and they are now searching for him….
"At 2.30, after having dined, we waded through the mud in a pelting rain to the dogana for our luggage, and, after getting completely wet, we embarked on board the courier boat, with a cabin seven feet long, six feet wide, and six high, into which six of us, having a gentleman from Trieste and his mother added to our number, were crowded, with no beds…. Rain, rain, rain!!! in torrents, cold and dreary through a perfectly flat country…. At ten o 'clock we arrived at a place called Cavanella, where is a locanda upon the canal which should have been open to receive us, but they were all asleep and no calling would rouse them. So we were obliged to go supperless to bed, and such abed! There being no room to spread mattresses for six in the cabin, three dirty mattresses, without sheets or blankets, were laid on the floor of the forward cabin (if it might so be called). This cabin was a hole down into which two or three steps led. We could not stand upright,—indeed, kneeling, our heads touched the top,—and when stretched at full length the tallest of us could touch with his head and feet from side to side. But, it being dreary and damp without and we being sleepy, we considered not the place, nor its inconveniences, nor its little pests which annoyed us all night, nor its vicinity to a magazine of cheese, with which the boat was laden and the odors from which assailed us. We lay down in our clothes and slept; the rain pattering above our heads only causing us to sleep the sounder."
Continuing their leisurely journey in this primitive manner, the rain finally ceasing, but the sky remaining overcast and the weather cold and wintry, they reached Chioggia, and "At 11.30, the towers and spires of Venice were seen at a distance before us rising from the sea." Venice, of course, was a delight to Morse's eye, but his nose was affected quite differently, for he says: "Those that have resided in Venice a long time say it is not an unhealthy place. I cannot believe it, for the odors from the canals cannot but produce illness of some kind. That which is constantly offensive to any of our organs of sense must affect them injuriously."
Several severe thunderstorms broke over the city while he was there, and one was said to be the worst which had been known within the memory of the oldest inhabitant. After describing it he adds: "I was at the Academy. The rain penetrated through the ceiling at the corner of the picture I was copying—'The Miracle of the Slave,' by Tintoret—and threatened injury to it, but happily it escaped."
On June 19, he thus moralizes: "The Piazza of St. Mark is the great place of resort, and on every evening, but especially on Sundays or festas, the arcades and cafés are crowded with elegantly dressed females and their gallants. Chairs are placed in great numbers under the awnings before the cafés. A people that have no homes, who are deprived from policy of that domestic and social intercourse which we enjoy, must have recourse to this empty, heartless enjoyment; an indolent enjoyment, when all their intercourse, too, is in public, surrounded by police agents and soldiers to prevent excess. Hallam, in his 'Middle Ages,' has this just reflection on the condition of this same city when under the Council of Ten: 'But how much more honorable are the wildest excesses of faction than the stillness and moral degradation of servitude.' Quiet is, indeed, obtained here, but at what immense expense! Expense of wealth, although excessive, is nothing compared with the expense of morality and of all intellectual exercise."
On June 23, he witnessed another thunderstorm from the Piazza of St.
Mark:—
"The lightning, flashing in the dark clouds that were gathering from the Tyrolese Alps, portended another storm which soon burst over us and hastened the conclusion of the music. The lightning was incessant. I stood at the corner of the piazza and watched the splendid effects of lights and darks, in a moment coming and in a moment gone, on the campanile and church of St. Mark's. It was most sublime. The gilt statue of the angel on the top of the campanile never looked so sublime, seeming to be enveloped in the glory of the vivid light, and, as the electric fluid flashed behind it from cloud to cloud incessantly, it seemed to go and come at the bidding of the angel."
This sounds almost like a prophetic vision, written by the pencil of the man who, in a few years from then, was to make the lightning go and come at his bidding.
"July 4. This anniversary of the day of our national birth found but two Americans in Venice. We met in the evening over a cup of coffee and thought and talked of the happiest of countries. We had no patriotic toasts, but the sentiments of our hearts were—'Peace be within thy walls and prosperity within thy palaces.' Never on any anniversary of our Independence have I felt so strongly the great reason I have for gratitude in having been born in such a country. When I think of the innumerable blessings we enjoy over every other country in the world, I am constrained to praise God who hath made us to differ, for 'He hath not dealt so with any nation, and as for his judgments, we have not known them.' While pestilence and famine and war surround me here in these devoted countries, I fix my thoughts on one bright spot on earth; truly (if our too ungrateful countrymen would but see it), truly a terrestrial paradise."