IV. ST. THEODORE THE CHAIR-SELLER 245

effort, and speech-making, and fighting-human intelligence in the Arts has arrived, here in Venice, thus far. But having got so far, we shall come to something fresh soon! We have become distinctly representative again, you see; desiring to show, not a mere symbol of a living man, but the man himself, as truly as the poor stone-cutter can carve him. All bonds of tyrannous tradition broken;-the legend kept, in faith yet; but the symbol become natural; a real armed knight, the best he could form a notion of; curlyhaired and handsome; and, his also the boast of Dogberry, everything handsome about him.¹ Thus far has Venice got in her art schools of the early thirteenth century. I can date this sculpture to that time, pretty closely; earlier, it may be,-not later; see afterwards the notes closing this chapter.²

And now, if you so please, we will walk under the clock-tower, and down the Merceria, as straight as we can go. There is a little crook to the right, bringing us opposite St. Julian’s church (which, please, don’t stop to look at just now): then, sharply, to the left again, and we come to the Ponte de’ Baratteri,-“Rogue’s bridge”³-on which, as especially a grateful bridge to English business feelings, let us reverently pause. It has been widened lately,⁴ you observe,-the use of such bridge being greatly increased in these times; and in a convenient angle, out of passenger current (may you find such wayside withdrawal in true life!) you may stop to look back at the house immediately above the bridge.

48. In the wall of which you will see a horizontal panel of bas-relief, with two shields on each side, bearing six fleurs-de-lys.⁵ And this you need not, I suppose, look for

¹ [Much Ado about Nothing, Act iv. sc. 2.]

² [Below, p. 253.]

³ [The bridge, however, is named Ponte dei Baretteri, not from barattieri, but from bareteri (manufacturers of berretti). See G. Tassini, Curiosità Veneziane, Venezia, 1882, p. 58.]

⁴ [By a decree of the Senate, January 31, 1741.]

⁵ [This bas-relief, with its side panels (sculptured with the armorial shields of the Doge Pietro Ziani), was bought in 1884 for the South Kensington Museum for £152, 16s. 2d. (1884-Nos. 53, 53B). Plate LVII. here is a reproduction of the central design. It could be wished that the authorities of the Museum had

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