by fate, and to that of the palaces, whose foundations their
waves undermine, and that if they have robbed the Grand Canal of
the supreme distinction of its tranquillity, so on the other hand
they have placed "rapid transit," in the New York phrase, in
everybody's reach, and enabled everybody--save indeed those who
wouldn't for the world--to rush about Venice as furiously as
people rush about New York. The suitability of this consummation
needn't be pointed out.

Even we ourselves, in the irresistible contagion, are going so
fast now that we have only time to note in how clever and costly
a fashion the Museo Civico, the old Fondaco dei Turchi, has been
reconstructed and restored. It is a glare of white marble
without, and a series of showy majestic halls within, where a
thousand curious mementos and relics of old Venice are gathered
and classified. Of its miscellaneous treasures I fear I may
perhaps frivolously prefer the series of its remarkable living
Longhis, an illustration of manners more copious than the
celebrated Carpaccio, the two ladies with their little animals
and their long sticks. Wonderful indeed today are the museums of
Italy, where the renovations and the belle ordonnance
speak of funds apparently unlimited, in spite of the fact that
the numerous custodians frankly look starved. What is the
pecuniary source of all this civic magnificence--it is shown in a
hundred other ways--and how do the Italian cities manage to
acquit themselves of expenses that would be formidable to
communities richer and doubtless less aesthetic? Who pays the
bills for the expressive statues alone, the general exuberance of
sculpture, with which every piazzetta of almost every
village is patriotically decorated? Let us not seek an answer to