ed presents from the Soldan of Egypt, from the Schah of the Indies
(query Grand Mogul), and from the King of Hungary: of these matters,
Dario's letters give many curious details. Then, in the _printed_
Malipiero Annals, page 136 (which err, I think, by a year), the
Secretary Dario's negotiations at the Porte are alluded to; and in date
of 1484 he is stated to have returned to Venice, having quarrelled with
the Venetian bailiff at Constantinople: the annalist adds, that
'Giovanni Dario was a native of Candia, and that the Republic was so
well satisfied with him for having concluded peace with Bajazet, that he
received, as a gift from his country, an estate at Noventa, in the
Paduan territory, worth 1500 ducats, and 600 ducats in cash for the
dower of one of his daughters.' These largesses probably enabled him to
build his house about the year 1486, and are doubtless hinted at in the
inscription, which I restored A.D. 1837; _it had no date_, and ran thus,
URBIS . GENIO . JOANNES . DARIVS. In the Venetian history of Paolo
Morosini, page 594, it is also mentioned, that Giovanni Dario was,
moreover, the Secretary who concluded the peace between Mahomet, the
conqueror of Constantinople, and Venice, A.D. 1478; but, unless he build
his house by proxy, that date has nothing to do with it; and in my mind,
the fact of the present, and the inscription, warrant one's dating it
1486, and not 1450.

"The Trevisan-Cappello House, in Canonica, was once the property (A.D.
1578) of a Venetian dame, fond of cray-fish, according to a letter of
hers in the archives, whereby she thanks one of her lovers for some
which he had sent her from Treviso to Florence, of which she was then
Grand Duchess. Her name has perhaps found its way into the English
annuals. Did you ever hear of Bianca Cappello? She bought that house of
the Trevisana family, by whom Selva (in Cicognara) and Fontana
(following Selva) say it was ordered of the Lombardi, at the
commencement of the sixteenth century: but the inscription on its
facade, thus,

SOLI | | HONOR. ET
DEO | | GLORIA.

reminding one both of the Dario House, and of the words NON NOBIS DOMINE
inscribed on the facade of the Loredano Vendramin Palace at S. Marcuola
(now the property of the Duchess of Berri), of which Selva found proof
in the Vendramin Archives that it was commenced by Sante Lombardo, A.D.
1481, is in favor of its being classed among the works of the fifteenth
century."

5. RENAI