Arrival at Venice: The ubiquitous Gondola: The Grand Canal: The curious water ways: Our Hotel: A snap shot of a Gondola and its freight: St. Mark’s Cathedral: Its curious history: Its wonderful Tower, and its interior adornments.
I think it was the most thrilling moment of our tour, as our train left Mestra, and almost immediately we began crossing the long bridge (two-and-a-half miles long) which crosses the lagoon, we seem to be travelling right into the sea, the gentle ripple of the watery waves by moonlight as they extend on either side of the line, has a pleasing effect. The peculiar smell of the seaweed is strong in the air, and right ahead is Venice, of which some poet has sung:
“There is a glorious city in the sea, The sea is in the broad, the narrow streets Ebbing and flowing, and the salt seaweed Clings to the marble of her palaces. No track of men, no footsteps to and fro Lead to her gates! the path lies o’er the sea, Invisible: And from the land we went As to a floating city—steering in, And gliding up her streets as in a dream, So smoothly, silently—by many a dome Mosque-like, and many a stately portico The statues ranged along an azure sky, By many a pile, in more than Eastern pride, Of old the residence of merchant kings; The fronts of some, tho’ time hath shattered them, Still glowing with the richest hues of art, As though the wealth within them had run o’er.”
Our arrival at Venice was about eight o’clock in the evening, surely no time so fitting to be introduced to the fair Queen of the Adriatic. From the busy, bustling railway station we were concluded by a Fakena, who brought up our luggage to a gondola lying in the shimmering sea just outside. No cabs or ’bus as at other stations, the gondola seemed to be everywhere. As we stepped into our new found equipage we were entranced, imagination fails to picture a sight so bewitching. Lights in a thousand directions, gondolas passing and repassing as we sweep through the principal waterway, then turn sharp round a corner as our gondolier cries: “Stali priene gai e” as he passes others with most wonderful precision. We were thus conveyed to the door of the Grand Hotel Victoria, where for a short time we were to make our home. We found the house all we could desire, warm, clean sweet, and fitted up almost luxuriantly. To bed and a rest, and oh! how sweet after toil and travel. We were awake and out early to see the sights of this unique city. We opened our eyes on a lovely picture, soft, dreamy, beautiful. The water, dotted over in all directions, with this strange craft. It seems this is the only means of locomotion. No cabs, omnibuses, carts, or even a barrow. There is no animal in Venice larger than a dog. Here the universal bike cometh not. The fashionable or unfashionable motor neither puffs nor smells. The train must not approach nearer than the head of the Grand Canal. A horse would be as great a novelty in Venice, I should think, as a ship in full sail would be in Wheeler Gate, Nottingham. Right from the water’s edge at our hotel door, we could see gondolas gliding swiftly hither and thither. In Byron’s “Beppo” we find the following lines: