To taste in all their fulness his first impressions of Venice, the traveller should arrive there by sea, at mid-day, when the sun is high.... He who comes for the first time to Venice by this route realizes a dream—his only dream perhaps ever destined to be surpassed by the reality; and if he knows how to enjoy the things of Nature, if he can take delight in silver-grey and rose-coloured reflections in water, if he loves light and colour, the picturesque life of Italian squares and streets, the good humour of the people and their gentle speech, which seems like the twittering of birds, let him only allow himself to live for a little time under the sky of Venice, and he has before him a season of happiness without alloy.
CHARLES YRIARTE.
SAILING TOWARDS VENICE
To the sea, the wonderful sea!... To Venice, the strangely floating city, the queen of the Adriatic!... I knew perfectly that the north of Italy would present to me a new style of scenery. Venice itself was really so different to any other Italian city; a richly adorned bride for the mighty sea. The winged Venetian lion waved on the flag above me. The sails swelled in the wind, and concealed the coast from me. I sat upon the right side of the ship, and looked out across the blue, billowy sea; a young lad sat not far from me, and sang a Venetian song about the bliss of love and the shortness of life: ‘Kiss the red lips, on the morrow thou art with the dead; love whilst thy heart is young, and thy blood is fire and flame! Grey hairs are the flowers of death: then is the blood ice; then is the flame extinguished! Come into the light gondola! We sit concealed under its roof, we cover the windows, we close the door, nobody sees thee, love! We are rocked upon the waves; the waves embrace, and so do we. Love whilst youth is in thy blood. Age kills with frost and with snow!’
As he sang, he smiled and nodded to the others around him; and they sang in chorus, about kissing and loving while the heart was young. It was a merry song, very merry; and yet it sounded like a magical song of death in my heart.... My heart desired love: God had ordained it, who had implanted this feeling within me. I was still young, however: Venice was a gay city full of beautiful women. And what does the world give me for my virtue, thought I, for my childlike temper? Ridicule, and time brings bitterness and grey hairs. Thus thought I, and sang in chorus with the rest, of kissing and loving, while the heart was yet young....
The vessel flew onward to the north—to the rich Venice. In the morning hour, I discerned the white buildings and town of Venice, which seemed like a crowd of ships with outspread sails. To the left stretched itself the kingdom of Lombardy, with its flat coast: the Alps seemed like pale blue mist in the horizon. Here was the heaven wide. Here the half of the hemisphere could mirror itself in the heart.
In this sweet morning air ... I thought about the history of Venice, of the city’s wealth and pomp, its independence and supremacy; of the magnificent doges, and their marriage with the sea. We advanced nearer and nearer to the sea: I could already distinguish the individual houses across the lagoons.... The sun shone upon Venice: all the bells were ringing. I stepped down into the black gondola, and sailed up into the dead street, where everything was water, not a foot-breadth upon which to walk. Large buildings stood with open doors, and with steps down to the water; the water ran into the great doorways, like a canal; and the palace-court itself seemed only a four-cornered well, into which people could sail, but scarcely turn the gondola. The water had left its greenish slime upon the walls: the great marble palaces seemed as if sinking together: in the broad windows, rough boards were nailed up to the gilded, half-decayed beams. The proud giant-body seemed to be falling away piecemeal; the whole had an air of depression about it. The ringing of the bells ceased, not a sound, excepting the splash of the oars in the water, was to be heard, and I still saw not a human being. The magnificent Venice lay like a dead swan upon the waves.
We crossed about into the other streets; small narrow bridges of masonry hung over the canals; and I now saw people who skipped over me, in among the houses, and in among the walls even; for I saw no other streets than those in which the gondolas glided.
‘But where do the people walk?’ inquired I of my gondolier; and he pointed to small passages by the bridges, between the lofty houses. Neighbour could reach his hand to neighbour, from the sixth story across the street; three people could hardly pass each other below, where not a sunbeam found its way. Our gondola had passed on, and all was still as death.
HANS ANDERSEN.