2, 3, 4: out come the Moorish figures at the gilt door on the left, wheel round the Madonna, and enter at the little door on the right, which closes after them. They no longer strike to chronicle the epochs of Venetian glory; but images do not grieve, else these ancient servitors would be too heavy at heart to lift their hammers. One of those pillars bears the Winged Lion of St. Mark, on the other stands St. Theodor, the former patron, with his crocodile. Over St. Marc's portal are the four bronze horses of Lysippus, once coated with gold; you see they have come back from the Louvre, and are as proud as ever, tossing their beautiful heads and lifting each a hoof, as who should say "Nothing was ever cast so faultless as we."

Crowds of pigeons are wheeling round the Piazza, enjoying the freedom ensured them by some noble lady, who left by will a dower for that end. But the swallows are less fortunate. What is that whirling down from the Campanile's balustrade ? it is a swallow in a poke: some wags above have been launching in mid-air pieces of card with a hole punched in the centre. The birds dash at them, gain a white collar, and are presently captured by the boys below.

In Venice the best way is to engage your gondola by the week, and a guide by the day; no city, with the exception of Rome, contains more that is worthy to be visited.

We have wandered over the Doge's Palace, and loitered up the Giants' Staircase, often turning round to gaze on Sansovino's beautiful Eve, which faces it; and have been "ciceroned" through the State Dungeons, and over the Bridge of Sighs, and have strayed along the Rialto, and handled the stump of the Bucentaur's mast in the recesses of the arsenal.

For one who has never seen them before, the paintings here possess an absorbing interest. In the "Belle Arti " you will find Titian's " Assumption," and his "Presentation of the Virgin." Among many wonderful productions, these two are perhaps his best; the apparent motion upwards communicated to the figure of the Madonna in the former is a triumph of the art. The "Presentation " is, however, a more pleasing picture, as I think everybody will agree.

This subject is surely more simple, more gracious, more really instructive than the endless tribe of "Assumptions of the Virgin," with which Roman

U

Catholic painters beguile the eyes and hearts of the members of that church. Here a real incident is portrayed, in the heaven-taught era of childhood, in the life of one whose riper age was fraught with the unspeakable blessing.

The "Miracle of the Slave," by Tintoretto; the Supper," by Paul Veronese (Calieri), and the Virgine col Putto" (with the date of 1487), by Giovanni Bellino, are very extraordinary works.

Tintoretto has given me new ideas of what may be done in colouring; his "Bacchus and Ariadne," in the Doge's Palace, is one of the cleverest pictures I ever saw; and the "Repose in Egypt," at the Scuola di S. Rocco, introduces as sweet a landscape as ever was designed.

In the Palazzo Manfrini are Titian's portrait of Ariosto; and his "Golden Age: " these are remarkable even here. The Ariosto is as well painted and as effective as the Cenci at Rome. It has the same peculiar power of rivetting the attention, and setting the fancy to work; a power which is, I think, confined to veritable portraits, and is rarely met with even in these. Doge Foscari's monument stands in the Church of the Frari. I thought this beautiful and appropriate: the females of his family

arc sculptured round the bier.

Canova is buried.

In this church

We have passed a delightful afternoon at the Armenian College, where many strangers resort, and where all should go who love to hear concerning a patriarchal faith and the simple customs of a blameless life from the lips of some who at once teach and practise.

I do not know why I should here deny myself the pleasure of mentioning by name one of the ordained professors in the society, -P. Grégorio Dr. Alepson. A conversation of two hours' duration, renewed on a subsequent day, left me with a very pleasing impression of this gentleman's manner of life and of his hopes and objects.

Though content and happy to live thus at San Lazzaro, I found him passionately attached to his own country; a country which he assured me far surpasses Italy in natural beauty.

On the whole, the impression left by this superb city is one of sadness. Her days are done, but it cannot be added that her fame is begun that chapter is closed. Lombardy is now an Austrian province; and the rule, though doubtless wise under the circumstances of Italy, is simply that of

mechanism, which of course never feels. I just now saw some of their recruiting officers, with Venetian soldiers newly pressed, weeping in the gondola. I thought of those beautiful lines in the "Madre Italiana: "

"Lo settimo è il suo figlio! — diman' vergognato,

Al cenno insolente d' estrano soldato

Coll' aquila in fronte vedrallo partir!"

The last of the Foscari, after long begging his bread on the quays and canals, is now applying for the place of porter at a private palace! Alas! what a wreck is this!

MILAN.

June.

HERE is Lombardy's capital; with the matchless Gothic cathedral, S. Ambrosio's basilica, the Cenacolo, the Brera gallery, and the Biblioteca,―besides five hundred other "lions," which we shall not tarry for.

Milan is, indeed, a noble city, worthy to queen it even over such fair towns as Verona, Vicenza, and Brescia, which all lay on the road from Padua