e piazza SS. Apostoli would be
one of the least picturesque in Venice; to those, however, who seek it
on foot, it becomes geographically interesting from the extraordinary
involution of the alleys leading to it from the Rialto. In Venice, the
straight road is usually by water, and the long road by land; but the
difference of distance appears, in this case, altogether inexplicable.
Twenty or thirty strokes of the oar will bring a gondola from the foot
of the Rialto to that of the Ponte SS. Apostoli; but the unwise
pedestrian, who has not noticed the white clue beneath his feet,[87] may
think himself fortunate, if, after a quarter of an hour's wandering
among the houses behind the Fondaco de' Tedeschi, he finds himself
anywhere in the neighborhood of the point he seeks. With much patience,
however, and modest following of the guidance of the marble thread, he
will at last emerge over a steep bridge into the open space of the
Piazza, rendered cheerful in autumn by a perpetual market of
pomegranates, and purple gourds, like enormous black figs; while the
canal, at its extremity, is half-blocked up by barges laden with vast
baskets of grapes as black as charcoal, thatched over with their own
leaves.

Looking back, on the other side of this canal, he will see the windows
represented in Plate XV., which, with the arcade of pointed arches
beneath them, are the remains of the palace once belonging to the
unhappy doge, Marino Faliero.

The balcony is, of course, modern, and the series of windows has been of
greater extent, once terminated by a pilaster on the left hand, as well
as on the right; but the terminal arches have been walled up. What
remains, however, is enough, with its sculptured birds and dragons, to
give the reader a very distinct idea of the second order window in its
perfect form. The details of the capitals, and other minor portions, if
these interest him, he will find given in the final Appendix.

[Illustration: Plate XV.
WINDOWS OF THE SECOND ORDER.
CASA FALIER.]

Sec. XXXI. The advance of the Gothic spirit was, for a few years, checked
by this compromise between the round and pointed arch. The truce,
however, was at last broken, in consequence of the discovery that the
keystone would do duty quite as well in the form _b_ as in the form _a_,
Fig. XXX., and the substitution of _b_, at the head of the arch, gives
us the window of the third order, 3 _b_, 3 _d_, and 3 _e_, in Plat