age is confined to the charmed limits of an inland
lake. At length the jutting headland of Pelestrina was reached. We broke
across the Porto di Chioggia, and saw Chioggia itself ahead--a huddled
mass of houses low upon the water. One by one, as we rowed steadily, the
fishing-boats passed by, emerging from their harbour for a twelve hours'
cruise upon the open sea. In a long line they came, with variegated
sails of orange, red, and saffron, curiously chequered at the corners,
and cantled with devices in contrasted tints. A little land-breeze
carried them forward. The lagoon reflected their deep colours till they
reached the port. Then, slightly swerving eastward on their course, but
still in single file, they took the sea and scattered, like beautiful
bright-plumaged birds, who from a streamlet float into a lake, and find
their way at large according as each wills.

The Signorino and Antonio, though want of wind obliged them to row the
whole way from Venice, had reached Chioggia an hour before, and stood
waiting to receive us on the quay. It is a quaint town this Chioggia,
which has always lived a separate life from that of Venice. Language
and race and customs have held the two populations apart from those
distant years when Genoa and the Republic of S. Mark fought their duel
to the death out in the Chioggian harbours, down to these days, when
your Venetian gondolier will tell you that the Chioggoto loves his pipe
more than his _donna_ or his wife. The main canal is lined with
substantial palaces, attesting to old wealth and comfort. But from
Chioggia, even more than from Venice, the tide of modern luxury and
traffic has retreated. The place is left to fishing folk and builders of
the fishing craft, whose wharves still form the liveliest quarter.
Wandering about its wide deserted courts and _calli_, we feel the spirit
of the decadent Venetian nobility. Passages from Goldoni's and
Casanova's Memoirs occur to our memory. It seems easy to realise what
they wrote about the dishevelled gaiety and lawless license of Chioggia
in the days of powder, sword-knot, and _soprani_. Baffo walks beside us
in hypocritical composure of bag-wig and senatorial dignity, whispering
unmentionable sonnets in his dialect of _Xe_ and _Ga_. Somehow or
another that last dotage of S. Mark's decrepitude is more recoverable by
our fancy than the heroism of Pisani in the fourteenth century.

From his prison in blockaded Venice the great admiral was se