the existence of that plebeian beverage, which
assuredly was never heard of in Venice in the days when he began his
career and formed his habitudes.

I am tempted to endeavor to give the reader some picture of the scene
on the piazza on a night when (as is the case almost every other
evening) a military band is playing in the middle of the open space,
and the cosmopolitan crowd is assembled in force--to describe the
wonderful surroundings of the scene, the charm of the quietude broken
by no sound of hoof or of wheel, the soft and tempered light, the gay
clatter, athwart which comes every fifteen minutes the solemn mellow
tone of the great clock of St. Mark with importunate warning that
another pleasant quarter of an hour has drifted away down the stream
of time. It is a scene that tempts the pen. But the well-dressed
portion of mankind is very similar in all countries and under all
circumstances, and perhaps my readers may be more interested in a few
traits of the popular life of Venice, which the magnificent Piazza
of St. Mark is not the best place for studying, for some of the
most characteristic phases of it are absolutely banished thence. The
strolling musician or singer, who may be heard every night in other
parts of the city, never plies his trade on the piazza. Mendicancy,
which is more rife at Venice, I am sorry to say, than in any other
Italian city, except perhaps Naples, is not tolerated on the piazza.

But if we wish for a good specimen of the truly popular life of
Venice, it will not be necessary to wander far from the great centre
of the piazza. Coming down the Piazzetta, or Little Piazza, which
opens out of the great square at one end, and abuts on the open lagoon
opposite the island of St. George at the other, and turning round the
corner of the ducal palace, we cross the bridge over the canal, which
above our heads is bridged by the "Bridge of Sighs," with its "palace
and a prison on each hand," as Byron sings, and find ourselves on the
"Riva dei Schiavoni"--the quay at which the Slavonic vessels arrived,
and arrive still. The quay is a very broad one, by far the broadest in
Venice, paved with flagstones, and teeming with every characteristic
form of Venetian life from early morning till late into the night.
There are two or three hotels frequented by foreigners on the Riva,
for the situation facing the open lagoon is an exceptionally good one;
and there are three or four caffes at which the cosmopoli