cries of "_Mi tiri zu! Mi tiri zu!_" (Take me down! Take me down!)
They ran ahead, and fell asleep again in our path, and round every corner
we came upon a sleeping boy; and, indeed, we never got out of that
atmosphere of slumber till we returned to the steamer for Venice, when
Chioggia shook off her drowsy stupor, and began to tempt us to throw soldi
into the water, to be dived for by her awakened children.



CHAPTER XIII.

THE ARMENIANS.


Among the pleasantest friends we made in Venice were the monks of the
Armenian Convent, whose cloistral buildings rise from the glassy lagoon,
upon the south of the city, near a mile away. This bulk

"Of mellow brick-work on an isle of bowers"

is walled in with solid masonry from the sea, and encloses a garden-court,
filled with all beautiful flowers, and with the memorable trees of the
East; while another garden encompasses the monastery itself, and yields
those honest fruits and vegetables which supply the wants of the well-
cared-for mortal part of the good brothers. The island is called San
Lazzaro, and the convent was established in 1717 by a learned and devoted
Armenian priest named Mechithar, from whom the present order of monks is
called Mechitharist. He was the first who formed the idea of educating a
class of priests to act as missionaries among the Armenian nation in the
East, and infuse into its civil and religious decay the life of European