touches the soul and moves it to desire; it frets and tortures the
inexperienced heart like the promise of a coming bliss, mysterious but
not elusive. Everything in it is bright, and everything is wrapt in a
drowsy, tangible mist, as it were, of the hush of love; everything in
it is so silent, and everything in it is kindly; everything in it is
feminine, from its name upwards. It has well been given the name of
'the fair city.' Its masses of palaces and churches stand out light
and wonderful like the graceful dream of a young god; there is
something magical, something strange and bewitching in the
greenish-grey light and silken shimmer of the silent water of the
canals, in the noiseless gliding of the gondolas, in the absence of
the coarse din of a town, the coarse rattling, and crashing, and
uproar. 'Venice is dead, Venice is deserted,' her citizens will tell
you, but perhaps this last charm--the charm of decay--was not
vouchsafed her in the very heyday of the flower and majesty of her
beauty. He who has not seen her, knows her not; neither Canaletto nor
Guardi (to say nothing of later painters) has been able to convey the
silvery tenderness of the atmosphere, the horizon so close, yet so
elusive, the divine harmony of exquisite lines and melting colours.
One who has outlived his life, who has been crushed by it, should not
visit Venice; she will be cruel to him as the memory of unfulfilled
dreams of early days; but sweet to one whose strength is at its full,
who is conscious of happiness; let him bring his bliss under her
enchanted skies; and however bright it may be, Venice will make it
more golden with her unfading splendour.

The gondola in which Insarov and Elena were sitting passed _Riva dei
Schiavoni_, the palace of the Doges, and Piazzetta, and entered the
Grand Canal. On both sides stretched marble palaces; they seemed to
float softly by, scarcely letting the eye seize or absorb their