he largest animals,
elephants, bears, and lions, to occupy a position so completely
insignificant, and to be expressed on so contemptible a scale,--not in a
bas-relief or pictorial piece of sculpture, but as independent figures.
The whole building is a most curious illustration of the appointed fate
of the Renaissance architects,--to caricature whatever they imitated,
and misapply whatever they learned.

25. ROMANIST DECORATION OF BASES.

I have spoken above (Appendix 12) of the way in which the Roman Catholic
priests everywhere suffer their churches to be desecrated. But the worst
instances I ever saw of sacrilege and brutality, daily permitted in the
face of all men, were the uses to which the noble base of St. Mark's was
put, when I was last in Venice. Portions of nearly all cathedrals may be
found abandoned to neglect; but this base of St. Mark's is in no obscure
position. Full fronting the western sun--crossing the whole breadth of
St. Mark's Place--the termination of the most noble square in the
world--the centre of the most noble city--its purple marbles were, in
the winter of 1849, the customary _gambling tables_ of the idle children
of Venice; and the parts which flank the Great Entrance, that very
entrance where "Barbarossa flung his mantle off," were the counters of a
common bazaar for children's toys, carts, dolls, and small pewter spoons
and dishes, German caricatures and books of the Opera, mixed with those
of the offices of religion; the caricatures being fastened with twine
round the porphyry shafts of the church. One Sunday, the 24th of
February, 1850, the book-stall being somewhat more richly laid out than
usual, I noted down the titles of a few of the books in the order in
which they lay, and I give them below. The irony conveyed by the
juxtaposition of the three in Italics appears too shrewd to be
accidental; but the fact was actually so.

Along the edge of the white plinth were a row of two kinds of books,

Officium Beatae Virg. M.; and Officium Hebdomadae sanctae, juxta Formam
Missalis et Breviarii Romani sub Urbano VIII. correcti.

Behind these lay, side by side, the following:

Don Desiderio. Dramma Giocoso per Musica.
Breve Esposizione della Carattere di vera Religione.

On the top of this latter, keeping its leaves open,

La Figlia del Reggimento. Melodramma comica.
_Carteggio di Madama la Marchesa di Pompadour, ossia
raccolta di Lettere scritte della Medesima._