And all those wonders of art, although wonders, if they perpetuate with an evil charm our servility, our degradation--oh! would it not be better for them to be sent to the infernal regions? However, be they precious or worthless works, the people were overturning them and throwing them out upon the pavement that night.
And the Patriarch? Woe to him if he had fallen into the hands of the enraged multitude!
But their sacred skin is dear to those descendants of the apostles! Champions of the faith they may be, but not martyrs. Of martyrdom those rosy-faced prelates wish to know nothing themselves if they can avoid it. His Eminence, at the first outbreak of popular indignation, had vanished, gaining, by a secret door, one of his gondolas, in which he escaped in safety.
In the mean time, the cry of the Recluse,
"_Morte a nessino!_" was taken up by the crowd, and at last reached the ears of the sackers of the Patriarch's palace.
That voice, ever trusted and respected by the people, calmed the anger of the passionate multitude, and in a few moments order and tranquillity were again re-established.
In the shameful times when the right of the "coscia" existed, princes had little necessity to woo a humble maiden, or to sue for her favor. At the present day things have assumed a different aspect. Although princes exist who possess as much pride of birth, or even more, than those of old days, still we see many obliged to conform to more moderate pretensions in matters of the heart, aspiring humbly to the favor of a plebeian divinity. Such were the thoughts of poor Prince T-.
He stood in the vestibule of the Zecchini Palace, admiring the throng of graceful visitors. In the crowded saloons it was difficult to do justice to the faces, and still less to the deportment of the ladies. From that part of the vestibule, on the first step, where the Roman prince had established himself, observation was easier.
Suddenly, from the midst of the crowd emerged, as if by destiny, one of those forms which, once seen, are reflected in the soul forever. Golden-brown eyes, hair, and eyelashes adorned a face which would have served Titian as a model of beauty--in a word, he saw the type of the Venetian ideal. The Prince, until then immovable in the crowd hurrying to and fro, was struck by a glance of those wonderful eyes, which seemed to look at every thing and every body, without for a moment fixing their glance on any.