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"Come hither, vecchio mio, and rest thine old bones; let the young one work for us both," the padrone commanded, as he flung himself down among the cushions. "Do they treat thee well at thy traghetto?" "Eccellenza, yes; but I am scarce older than the others; it is the young ones who make us trouble; they keep not the Mariegole, and it is only the old one may depend upon."
For centuries these confraternities of gondoliers who presided over the ferries, or traghetti, of Venice had been corporations, self-governing, with officers and endowments recognized by the Republic, and with a standard of gondolier morals admirably defined in their codes those "Mariegole" which were luxuriously bound and printed, with capitals of vermilion, a page here and there glowing like an illuminated missal with the legend of the patron saint of the traghetto, wherein one might read such admonitions as would make all men wiser.
For even those gondoliers who kept the mariegole were not precisely angels, and the part of their creed which they religiously upheld was a deathless antagonism to the rival faction which won more lamps and pretty gifts for the patron madonnas of the various traghetti than any other article of their faith.
It is interesting in the campo in these early days, before the effect of the government's measures for coercing the opinions of the populace is fully declared. "I am a good Catholic, most reverend father; I keep the mariegole; every year I go to confession," protests some sturdy gondolier, who has been made anxious by his womenfolk.
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