triumph, is here also--a yellowed parchment, carefully inclosed in the
little morocco case, securely screwed to the shelf beneath, and Marina
had been present when it was opened for some rare visitor. It was a
relic of those earlier days when there were no furnaces in Murano,
though many of the finest workers came from this island and belonged to
the corporation of the workers on Rialto, and it was almost a
prehistoric record of greatness.

Marina had left the table and gone to the cabinet; her father followed
her. "This I would show thee," he said, calling her attention to a
whimsical shape, blown and twisted almost into foam. "This Lorenzo Stino
brought me only yesterday; he is full of genius; I think none hath a
quicker hand, nor a more inventive faculty. I have watched him in his
working." He scanned her eagerly as he spoke.

"Yes, it is fanciful--wonderful," she added to please him, but without
warmth, while her eyes wandered over the shelves. "Oh, father, here are
some of the very mosaics that were made for San Marco; thou hast
forgotten!"

She lifted eagerly a small opaque basin of turquoise blue and held it
toward him; it contained a few bits of gold and silver enamel, the
earliest that had been made in Venice, bearing their ancient date.

"Thou askest more of Venice than I," he said, well pleased with her
enthusiasm; "but have a care lest they say I have not taught thee well,
or that I do not know my art, or that I claim too much. At the time of
the burning of San Marco these Mosaics for the restoration were from the
stabilimenti of the Republic on Rialto--so early it came to us, this
glorious art. And it was one Piero, a founder of our house, though the