hose which minister to the senses, had been committed to welcome
"La Regina de la Balla." Her _entree_ had been like a triumph; garlands
of flowers, bouquets, rich tapestries floating from balconies, gondolas
with bands of music; the civic authorities even, in robes of state, met
her as she entered; strangers flocked in crowds from the other cities of
the north, and even from parts beyond the Alps. The hotels were crammed
with visitors all eager to see one of whom every tongue was telling. A
guard of honor stood before the palace in which she resided,--as much
a measure of necessity to repel the pressure of the anxious crowd as it
was a mark of distinction.

The epidemic character of enthusiasm is well known. It is a fervor to
which none can remain insensible. Cashel was soon to experience this.
How could he preserve a cold indifference to the emotions which swayed
thousands around him? How maintain his calm amid that host, which
surged and fretted like the sea in a storm? La Ninetta was the one word
repeated on every side; even to have seen her once was a distinction,
and they who had already felt her fascinations were listened to as
oracles.

She was to give but three representations at Venice, and ere Cashel's
party had arrived all the tickets were already disposed of. By unceasing
efforts, and considerable bribery, they contrived at last to obtain
places for the first night, and early in the forenoon were admitted
among a privileged number to take their seats. They who were thus, at a
heavy cost, permitted to anticipate the general public, seemed--at least
to Cashel's eyes--to fill the house; and so, in the dim indistinctness,
they appeared. Wherever the eye turned, from the dark parterre below, to
the highest boxes above, seemed filled with people. There was something
almost solemn in that vast concourse, who sat subdued and silent in the
misty half light of the theatre. The intense anxiety of expectation,
the dreary gloom of the scene, contributed to spread a kind of awestruck
influence around, and brought up to Roland's memory a very different
place and occasion--when, himself the observed of all observers, he
stood in the felons' dock. Lost in the gloomy revery these sad thoughts
suggested, he took no note of time, nor marked the lagging hours which
stole heavily past.

Suddenly the full glare of light burst forth, and displayed the great
theatre crowded in every part. That glittering spectacle, into which
be