climbing in terrace after
terrace to the villas and flower-gardens on the heights: nor was this
sense of our impudence lessened by reflecting that, once within the
mole, we had not a notion to which of the quays a fishing-boat ought
to steer to avoid suspicion. But here, again, fortune helped us.
To the right, at the extreme inner corner of the mole, I espied half
a dozen boats, not unlike our own, huddled close under a stone
stairway; and I had no sooner thrust down the helm than a man,
catching sight of us, came running along the mole to barter.

Marc'antonio's conduct of the ensuing bargain was nothing short of
masterly. The stranger--a fishmonger's runner--turned as he met us
and trotted alongside, shaping his hands like a trumpet and bawling
down his price. Marc'antonio, affecting a slight deafness, signalled
to him to bawl louder, hunched his shoulders, shook his head
vehemently, held up ten fingers, then eight, then (after a long and
passionate protest from above) eight again. By this time two other
traffickers had joined the contest, and with scarcely a word on his
side Marc'antonio kept them going, as a juggler plays with three
balls. Not until our boat's nose grated alongside the landing was
the bargain concluded, and the first runner, a bag of silver in his
fist, almost tumbled upon us down the slippery stairs in his hurry to
clinch it.

I stepped ashore and held out a hand to the Princess who, in her
character of _paesana_, very properly ignored it. Luckily the
courtesy escaped notice. Stephanu was making fast the boat; the
runner counting his coins into Marc'antonio's hand.

The Princess and I mounted the stairs and, after a pretence to loiter
and await our comrades, strolled off towards the city around the
circuit of the quay. We passed the great warehouses of the Porto
Franco, staring up at them, but impassively, in true country fashion,
and a little beyond them came to the entrance of a street which--for
it was strewn with cabbage leaves and other refuse--we judged to lead
to the vegetable market.

"Let us turn aside here," said the Princess. "I was brought up in a
cabbage-market, remember; and the smell may help to put me at my
ease."

Now along the quays we had met and passed but a few idlers, the hour
being early for business; but in the market, when we reached it, we
found a throng--citizens and citizens' wives and housekeepers, all
armed with baskets and chaffering around the stalls