first sight appear, is an
epitome of the changes of Venetian architecture from the tenth to the
nineteenth century. Its crypt, and the line of low arches which support
the screen, are apparently the earliest portions; the lower stories of
the main fabric are of the eleventh and twelfth centuries, with later
Gothic interpolations; the pinnacles are of the earliest fully developed
Venetian Gothic (fourteenth century); but one of them, that on the
projection at the eastern extremity of the Piazzetta de Leoni, is of far
finer, and probably earlier workmanship than all the rest. The southern
range of pinnacles is again inferior to the northern and western, and
visibly of later date. Then the screen, which most writers have
described as part of the original fabric, bears its date inscribed on
its architrave, 1394, and with it are associated a multitude of small
screens, balustrades, decorations of the interior building, and probably
the rose window of the south transept. Then come the interpolated
traceries of the front and sides; then the crocketings of the upper
arches, extravagances of the incipient Renaissance: and, finally, the
figures which carry the waterspouts on the north side--utterly barbarous
seventeenth or eighteenth century work--connect the whole with the
plastered restorations of the year 1844 and 1845. Most of the palaces in
Venice have sustained interpolations hardly less numerous; and those of
the Ducal Palace are so intricate, that a year's labor would probably be
insufficient altogether to disentangle and define them. I therefore gave
up all thoughts of obtaining a perfectly clear chronological view of the
early architecture; but the dates necessary to the main purposes of the
book the reader will find well established; and of the evidence brought
forward for those of less importance, he is himself to judge. Doubtful
estimates are never made grounds of argument; and the accuracy of the
account of the buildings themselves, for which alone I pledge myself,
is of course entirely independent of them.

In like manner, as the statements briefly made in the chapters on
construction involve questions so difficult and so general, that I
cannot hope that every expression referring to them will be found free
from error: and as the conclusions to which I have endeavored to lead
the reader are thrown into a form the validity of which depends on that
of each successive step, it might be argued, if fallacy or weakness
c