There are many small boats always in view, their orange sails
patched with all sorts of emblems and designs in a still deeper
colour, and day before yesterday a large ship appeared at our
windows and attached itself to our very doorsteps, much to the
wrath of Salemina, who finds the poetry of existence much disturbed
under the new conditions. All is life and motion now. The men are
stripped naked to the waist, with bright handkerchiefs on their
heads, and, in many cases, others tied over their mouths. Each has
a thick wisp of short twine strings tucked into his waistband. The
bags are weighed by one, who takes out or puts in a shovelful of
grain, as the case may be. Then the carrier ties up his bag with
one of the twine strings, two other men lift it to his shoulder,
while a boy removes a pierced piece of copper from a long wire and
gives it to him, this copper being handed in turn to still another
man, who apparently keeps the account. This not uninteresting,
indeed, but sordid and monotonous operation began before eight
yesterday morning and even earlier to-day, obliging Salemina to
decline strawberries and eat her breakfast with her back to the
window.

This afternoon at four the injured lady departed on a tour in Miss
Palett's gondola. Miss Palett is a water-colourist who has lived
in Venice for five years and speaks the language "like a native."
(You are familiar with the phrase, and perhaps familiar, too, with
the native like whom they speak.)

Returning after tea, Salemina was observed to radiate a kind of
subdued triumph, which proved on investigation to be due to the
fact that she had met the comandante of the offending ship and that
he had gallantly promised to remove it without delay. I cannot