III. ST. JAMES OF THE DEEP STREAM 233

or the duplicate Danieli with the drawbridge,¹-or wherever else among the palaces of resuscitated Venice you abide, congratulatory modern ambassador to the Venetian Senate-please, to-day, walk through the Merceria, and through the Square of St. Bartholomew, where is the little octagon turret-chapel in the centre, for sale of news: and cross the Rialto-not in the middle of it, but on the righthand side, crossing from St. Mark’s. You will probably find it very dirty,-it may be, indecently dirty,-that is modern progress, and Mr. Buckle’s civilization;² rejoice in it with a thankful heart, and stay in it placidly, after crossing the height of the bridge, when you come down just on a level with the capitals of the first story of the black and white, all but ruined, Palace of the Camerlenghi; Treasurers of Venice, built for them when she began to feel anxious about her accounts. “Black and white,” I call it, because the dark lichens of age are yet on its marble-or, at least, were, in the winter of ’76-’77; it may be, even before these pages get printed, it will be scraped and re-gilt-or pulled down, to make a railroad station at the Rialto.³

32. Here standing, if with good eyes, or a good operaglass, you look back, up to the highest story of the blank and ugly building⁴ on the side of the canal you have just crossed from,-you will see between two of its higher windows, the remains of a fresco of a female figure. It is, so far as I know, the last vestige of the noble fresco painting of Venice on her outside walls;-Giorgione’s,-no less,-when Titian and he were house-painters,-the Sea-Queen so ranking them, for her pomp, in her proud days. Of this, and of the black and white palace, we will

¹ [The movable bridge across the Rio del Vin, uniting the Hôtel Danieli with its Dépendance, is now replaced by a permanent covered way.]

² [For other references to Buckle’s History of Civilisation, see Vol. XXII. p. 500 n.]

³ [The palace fortunately remains (1905).]

⁴ [The Fondaco dei Tedeschi, for which see Stones of Venice (Vol. X. p. 98, Vol. XI. pp. 29, 378), and Modern Painters (Vol. VII. p. 439 and n.). The fresco, referred to in the text here, is still visible, and is protected by a grating. It is not, however, of a female figure, but of a young warrior. Further up, on the same side of the Grand Canal, there are remains of frescoes on the palace next to the Rio della Maddalena.]

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