rom immediately
below, the arch is noble; from any greater distance it is lost in the
over-structure, angle and curve conflicting.

Ruskin is very enthusiastic over the conceit which placed the Spirito
Santo on the keystone of the bridge, the flight, as he thinks, producing
an effect of lightness. He is pleased too with the two angels, and
especially that one on the right, whose foot is placed with horizontal
firmness. On each side of the bridge is a shrine.

Before this stone bridge was built in 1588 by Antonio da Ponte it had
wooden predecessors. Carpaccio's Santa Croce picture in the Accademia
shows us what the immediate forerunner of the present bridge was like.
It had a drawbridge in the middle to prevent pursuit that way during
brawls.

The first palace beyond the bridge, now a decaying congeries of offices,
has very rich decorative stone work, foliation and festoons. It was once
the head-quarters of the Camerlenghi, the procurators-fiscal of Venice.
Then come the long fruit and vegetable markets, and then the new fish
market, one of the most successful of new Venetian buildings, with its
springing arches below and its loggia above and its iron lamp at the
right corner and bronze fisherman at the left.

A fondamenta runs right away from the Rialto bridge to a point just
beyond the new fish market, with some nice houses on it, over shops, the
one on the left of the fish market having very charming windows. The
first palace of any importance is the dull red one on the other side of
the Calle dei Botteri, the Dona. Then a decayed palace and the Calle
del Campanile where the fondamenta ends. Here is the very attractive
Palazzo Morosini, or Brandolin, which dates from the fourteenth century.
Next is a dull house, and then a small one with little lions on the
balustrades, and then the Rio S. Cassiano. Next is a tiny and very
ancient palace with an inscription stating that the Venetian painter
Favretto worked there; then a calle, and the great pawnshop of Venice,
once the Palazzo Corner della Regina, is before us, with a number of its
own boats inside the handsome blue municipal posts with S. Mark's lion
on each. The Queen of Cyprus was born here; other proud and commanding
Corners were splendid here; and now it is a pawnshop!

The Calle della Regina, two rather nice, neglected houses (the little
pink one quite charming), and we come to the Rio Pesaro and the splendid
Palazzo Pesaro, one of the great works of Longhe