glorious company of artists at the Accademia, and in the Doges' Palace.
But Beechy did join in my admiration and respect (mingled with a kind of
wondering pity) for the noble army of marble lions in Venice.

Oh, those poor, splendid lions! How sad they look, how bitter is the
expression of their ponderous faces. Especially am I haunted by the
left-hand lion in the Piazza degli Lioni, hard by San Marco. What can
have happened to him, that he should be so despairing? Whatever it was,
he has never got over it, but has concentrated his whole being in one,
eight-century-long howl ever since. He is the most impressive of the
tribe; but there are many others, big and little, all gloomy, sitting
about in Piazzas, or exposed for sale in shops, or squatting on the
railings of balconies. When I think of that fair city in the sea, I
shall often want to run back and try to comfort some of those lions.

Beechy was with me in this; and as for Aunt Kathryn, even the flattering
attentions of the Corraminis did not please her more than our experience
at the antiquaries', which we owed to Mr. Barrymore.

We hadn't been in Venice for twenty-four hours before we saw that the
Chauffeulier knew the place almost as if he had been born there. He was
even well up in the queer, soft Venetian _patois_, with hardly a
consonant left in it, so well up that he announced himself capable of
bandying words and measuring swords with the curiosity-shop keepers, if
we liked to "collect anything."

At first Aunt Kathryn thought that she wouldn't bother; there would be
too much trouble with the custom house at home; but, when Beechy
happened to say what a rare thing a marble well-head or a garden statue
five hundred years old would be considered in Denver, she weakened, and
fell.

The idea popped into Beechy's head just as our gondola (it was towards
the end of our week in Venice) was gliding by a beautiful, shabby old
palace in a side canal.

A canopy of grape-vines, heavy with hanging clusters of emeralds and
here and there an amethyst, shadowed a carved water-gate. Under the
jade-green water gleamed the yellow marble of the steps, waving with
seaweed like mermaids' hair; and in the dim interior behind the open
doors there were vague gleams of gilded chairs, pale glints of statuary,
and rich streaks of colour made by priests' vestments or old altar
hangings.

"I don't believe even Mrs. Potter Adriance has got anything like this in
her house, though