ough stricken in
years, was still so far kept fresh by the immortal youth of the wax
heads in his window as to have something beauish about him; or that,
just at the moment the Paronsina chanced to go into the campo alone, a
_leone_ from Florian's might not have been passing through it, when he
would certainly have looked boldly at her, perhaps spoken to her, and
possibly pounced at once upon her fluttering heart. So by day the
Paronsina rarely went out, and she never emerged unattended from the
silence and shadow of her grandfather's house.

If I were here telling a story of the Paronsina, or indeed any story at
all, I might suffer myself to enlarge somewhat upon the daily order of
her secluded life, and show how the seclusion of other Venetian girls
was the widest liberty as compared with hers; but I have no right to
play with the reader's patience in a performance that can promise no
excitement of incident, no charm of invention. Let him figure to
himself, if he will, the ancient and half-ruined palace in which the
notary dwelt, with a gallery running along one side of its inner court,
the slender pillars supporting upon the corroded sculpture of their
capitals a clinging vine, that dappled the floor with palpitant light
and shadow in the afternoon sun. The gate, whose exquisite Saracenic
arch grew into a carven flame, was surmounted by the armorial bearings
of a family that died of its sins against the Serenest Republic long
ago; the marble cistern which stood in the middle of the court had still
a ducal rose upon either of its four sides; and little lions of stone
perched upon the posts at the head of the marble stairway climbing to
the gallery, their fierce aspects worn smooth and amiable by the contact
of hands that for many ages had mouldered in tombs. Toward the canal
the palace windows had been immemorially bricked up for some reason or
caprice, and no morning sunlight, save such as shone from the bright
eyes of the Paronsina, ever looked into the dim halls. It was a fit
abode for such a man as the notary, exiled in the heart of his native
city, and it was not unfriendly in its influences to a quiet vegetation
like the signora's; but to the Paronsina it was sad as Venice itself,
where, in some moods, I have wondered that any sort of youth could have
the courage to exist. Nevertheless, the Paronsina had contrived to grow
up here a child of the gayest and archest spirit, and to lead a life of
due content, till a