most delicious novelty which ever renews the youth and dazzles the eyes
of woman. As the mistress--the wife--she leans on another; from another
are reflected her happiness, her being,--as an orb that takes light from
its sun. But now, in turn, as the mother, she is raised from dependence
into power; it is another that leans on her,--a star has sprung into
space, to which she herself has become the sun!

A few days,--but they will be sweet through the sorrow! A few
days,--every hour of which seems an era to the infant, over whom bend
watchful the eyes and the heart. From its waking to its sleep, from
its sleep to its waking, is a revolution in Time. Every gesture to be
noted,--every smile to seem a new progress into the world it has come
to bless! Zanoni has gone,--the last dash of the oar is lost, the last
speck of the gondola has vanished from the ocean-streets of Venice! Her
infant is sleeping in the cradle at the mother's feet; and she thinks
through her tears what tales of the fairy-land, that spreads far and
wide, with a thousand wonders, in that narrow bed, she shall have to
tell the father! Smile on, weep on, young mother! Already the fairest
leaf in the wild volume is closed for thee, and the invisible finger
turns the page!

....

By the bridge of the Rialto stood two Venetians--ardent Republicans and
Democrats--looking to the Revolution of France as the earthquake which
must shatter their own expiring and vicious constitution, and give
equality of ranks and rights to Venice.

"Yes, Cottalto," said one; "my correspondent of Paris has promised to
elude all obstacles, and baffle all danger. He will arrange with us the
hour of revolt, when the legions of France shall be within hearing of
our guns. One day in this week, at this hour, he is to meet me here.
This is but the fourth day."

He had scarce said these words before a man, wrapped in his roquelaire,
emerging from one of the narrow streets to the left, halted opposite
the pair, and eying them for a few moments with an earnest scrutiny,
whispered, "Salut!"

"Et fraternite," answered the speaker.

"You, then, are the brave Dandolo with whom the Comite deputed me to
correspond? And this citizen--"

"Is Cottalto, whom my letters have so often mentioned." (I know not if
the author of the original MSS. designs, under these names, to introduce
the real Cottalto and the true Dandolo, who, in 1797, distinguished
themselves by their sympathy with the French