the drilled
members of the face he had scrutinized. "Will any of your party explain
the facts?"

The principal speaker among the fishermen willingly took on himself the
office, and, in the desultory manner of one of his habits, he acquainted
the Doge with the circumstances connected with the finding of the body.
When he had done, the prince again asked explanations, with his eye,
from the senator at his side, for he was ignorant whether the policy of
the state required an example, or simply a death."

"I see nothing in this, your highness," observed he of the council, "but
the chances of a fisherman. The unhappy old man has come to his end by
accident, and it would be charity to have a few masses said for his
soul."

"Noble senator!" exclaimed the fisherman, doubtingly, "St. Mark was
offended!"

"Rumor tells many idle tales of the pleasure and displeasure of St.
Mark, If we are to believe all that the wit of men can devise, in
affairs of this nature, the criminals are not drowned in the Lagunes,
but in the Canale Orfano."

"True, eccellenza, and we are forbidden to cast our nets there, on pain
of sleeping with the eels at its bottom."

"So much greater reason for believing that this old man hath died by
accident. Is there mark of violence on his body? for though the state
could scarcely occupy itself with such as he, some other might. Hath the
condition of the body been looked to?"

"Eccellenza, it was enough to cast one of his years into the centre of
the Lagunes. The stoutest arm in Venice could not save him."

"There may have been violence in some quarrel, and the proper authority
should be vigilant. Here is a Carmelite! Father, do you know aught of
this?"

The monk endeavored to answer, but his voice failed. He stared wildly
about him, for the whole scene resembled some frightful picture of the
imagination, and then folding his arms on his bosom, he appeared to
resume his prayers.

"Thou dost not answer, Friar?" observed the Doge, who had been as
effectually deceived, by the natural and indifferent manner of the
inquisitor, as any other of his auditors. "Where didst thou find this
body?"

Father Anselmo briefly explained the manner in which he had been pressed
into the service of the fishermen.

At the elbow of the prince there stood a young patrician, who, at the
moment, filled no other office in the state than such as belonged to his
birth. Deceived, like the others, by the manner of the only one