United States or Turks and Caicos Islands ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
With the pope's encouragement, the League of Cambray was formed in 1508 for the express purpose of destroying one of the most important Italian states. The Empire, France, Spain, and the pope were to divide among them Venice's possessions on the mainland.
Venice has no aristocratic quarter as other cities have. The poor establish themselves either in a palace or as near it as possible. I have referred to the girls in their black shawls or scialli. They remain in the memory as one of Venice's most distinguished possessions.
But considering Venice's peculiar position with regard to the sea and her boasted dominion over it fish are very dear. Even more striking is the dearness of fruit, but this, I take it, is due to the distance that it must come, either by rail or water. No restaurant that I discovered as in the fair land of France and indeed elsewhere in Italy places wine or grapes free on the table.
They are as Italian to-day as when, a thousand years ago, they formed a part of Venice's far-flung skirmish line. These people are the Croats, a hardy, industrious agricultural people, generally illiterate, at least as I found them in Istria, and with few of the comforts and none of the culture which characterized the Latin communities on the coast.
Standing just inside the church and watching the people swarm in their hundreds for this pageantry, I was struck by the comparatively small number who made any entering salutation. No children did. Perhaps the raptest worshipper was one of Venice's many dwarfs, a tiny, alert man in blue linen with a fine eloquent face and a great mass of iron-grey hair.
These and much more make up the fearful picture of Venice's cold cruelty, as revealed to the author of "The Bravo" in authentic historical records. Gelsomina, the jailer's daughter, a sweet and delicately-drawn character, got her name and general character from real life.
How much dearer to me wert thou than the diadem of an empress, a vestal's fillet, the ropes of pearls twined among the jetty locks of Venice's loveliest patricians, or the richest head-dress of antique or modern art! Ah, but Madame Taverneau was handsome!
Word Of The Day