good actors, and all the while eat soberly, purchase no pictures, and leave to others the pleasures of the opera or the theatre. If you extol to a proprietor the beauty of his vine, ten to one if he does not keep you to dinner in order that you may taste his wine. We are unwilling, gentlemen, to bestow anything that costs money; let us then be lavish of our praise, since it costs nothing; whatever we may reap in exchange will be pure gain, as it will be obtained without outlay. Do you not understand that? I wish to prove to you that I do not praise the disbursements of others from a desire of imitating their example; far otherwise : : now, for instance, but half an hour ago, one of our neighbours begged permission for my daughter to accompany her to the theatre. I do not wish Luigia to see these mummers, for fear of her imbibing a taste for expensive enjoyments; so I proposed to the neighbour that I should be her companion instead of my daughter, because at my age the example would not be dangerous for me. However, the old lady preferred taking one of her gossips with her instead of me."

"Now I see my error," returned the president of the Taccagni, and beg to apologise to you for my previous remarks; but I regret that poor Luigia has not gone to the play: you have been too severe for her youth, Don Vitale."

"Not at all," grumbled the Signor Canapo, between the six teeth which still condescended to remain in his jaws. "Don Vitale has exercised his paternal authority prudently and well. For my part, I declare that if Luigia, amiable as she is, were to incur a taste for the theatre, and such like extravagancies, I would immediately break off our project of her marriage with my son for know, gentlemen, that my son, young Marcantonio Canapo, is still ignorant of what is an actor or a theatre."

"Come, come," observed the president, "your adventure of the lentil and the hat has made you misanthropical."

Zanetto, struck by a sudden thought, waited to hear no more, but departed as quickly as he could.

"Since Luigia," thought he, "languishes at home in silence and solitude, and since I am myself unable, for want of money, to go to the theatre, what better can I do than profit by her father's absence, and her own melancholy situation, and make love to this charming girl, now that the coast is clear, and when my attentions will be so welcome?"

Don Vitale Corvino, Prætor of his sestiere,* dwelt near the

* The Prætor fulfils the duties of a justice of the peace, and Venice is divided into six sestieri, or parishes.

church of St. Zacharius, in a street of about four feet in width, like many of the streets in Venice. The old miser had formerly known Zanetto's father, and the children had sometimes played together in their early years. But for some time back Don Vitale had been by no means anxious that a young man so handsome in person, and so badly off in the world as was our hero, should have constant access to his pretty daughter. Had this despotic father been able to dispose of the circulation of the streets, never would Zanetto have put foot in the parish of St. Zacharius. The only youthful countenance which the poor recluse, even as it was, could see from week's end to week's end, was that of Marcantonio Canapo, the worthy scion of the man with the lentil, as miserly as his honourable father, and very yellow in feature from the constant working by lamp light in the office of a rapacious lawyer. Marcantonio joined awkwardness to plainness of feature, and stupidity to awkwardness. In the mysteries of dancing, music, or flattery, or in fact of any of those little arts so pleasing to young girls, he was a perfect ignoramus. And yet for all that Luigia loved him a little, in all probability because she had just attained her sixteenth year, and with large melting eyes, a profusion of glossy hair, long enough to reach the earth as she stood erect, and, above all, Venetian blood flowing in the veins, a girl must absolutely love some one, or something. Several times had Zanetto ventured so far as to offer the holy water to Luigia on a Sunday in the church of St. Zacharius, and the pretty Venetian had on those occasions thanked him with a truly Adriatic glance; but with the Venetians absent lovers stand but a poor chance. The week is so long; and then a young girl must have some one to chat and flirt with; and so it was with the pretty Luigia; she chatted and flirted with Marcantonio, made fun of him before his face, called him blockhead, laughed heartily at his stupid replies, and finally ended by loving him a little simply for want of some worthier object on which to bestow her affections, and even beheld without much trepidation the epoch of marriage draw nigh.

On his arrival at St. Zacharius, Zanetto soon perceived poor Luigia seated in the first floor balcony of her father's house; her chin reclining within her left hand, her elbow supported by the iron rail, and her right arm hanging with that air of listlessness and ennui in which the deceiver recognizes the favourable moment for tempting a young girl. She was alone in the house, her mother having been long since dead, and her father

keeping no other servant save an old charwoman, who always returned home before the angelus sounded. Don Vitale fancied that a pretty girl was like a crown piece, always safer under lock and key. As soon as he stood beneath the balcony, Zanetto took off his hat, and making the Venetian salutation, said:

"Schiavo! beautiful Luigia; how is it that you are not tonight at San Salvatore, where the famous Sacchi is to improvise a new piece? All Venice will be there except you and me."

"Alas! Don Zanetto, my father will not let me go to the theatre; and the worst of the business is, that my future husband will not take me there either when I am his wife."

"Your father is a regular tyrant, and were I in your place, I would not have such a husband as that miserly Marcantonio. I cannot conceive why you let yourself be thus shut up as if in a prison, and worried in this way."

"Alas! what can I do, my good Zanetto?"

"Ah! Luigia, if you had not forgotten the time when you promised to be my wife, and when I swore to remain faithful to you!-but all has long since escaped your memory, I suppose ?"

"On the contrary, dear Zanetto, I remember it perfectly. It was upon a sand-heap where we used to play together. I was ten years old at least then, and you thirteen, if I recollect right. But for the last six years I have not seen you. Your father died a ruined man; mine has closed his doors upon you, and he never ceases dinning into my ears that you have not a halfpenny in the world, that you are a sad rake, and are now leading the life of a vagabond. A girl must marry as soon as she can. Marcantonio is ugly, rich, and avaricious. I would much prefer another husband, handsomer, more generous, and who would let me go to the play now and then; but where am I to find him?"

"Behold him here !" exclaimed Zanetto, striking his breast with the academical emphasis of his country. "Behold him here! I say, beautiful Luigia. I have never ceased loving you since the day of the sand-heap. Those who assert that my father ruined himself are right enough; but I shall prove to you that I am neither ugly nor avaricious like Marcantonio; and, moreover, far from not having a halfpenny in the world, being a sad rake, and leading the life of a vagabond, things are very different. See you that lantern that they are now lighting on board of that Turkish craft? Well, if you were to weave a

chaplet of all I possess in silver crowns, hard piastres, Spanish dollars, and golden sovereigns, your chaplet would reach far beyond this light; and more than that, if you will be my wife, I swear and promise in writing, or otherwise, to take you to the theatre at least once a week, under pain of separation. May I be drowned if I have lied in one syllable!"

"What! you are rich then, Zanetto !" cried the Venetian, her bright eyes shining like carbuncles. Speak at once to my father. Purchase a house, and make known what you are worth. We will be married, and you shall give me twenty ducats to purchase wax tapers, for I made a vow to St. Zacharius that if I married a handsome man I would burn sixty tapers of white wax to his honour, and I do not wish to fail in my oath. For Marcantonio, I would not have burned a candle-end !"

"You shall have your sixty tapers. But it is not a house that I intend to buy, it is a palace on the Grand Canal, and you shall have women servants to wait on you, as many cooks as you desire, and a band of hired musicians to play soft music during our repasts."

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Zanetto," replied the young girl, "I hope you are not laughing at me; oh! that would be dreadful, for I feel my head swimming. I no longer love Marcantonio, and I return to you with all my heart. Be sure you have a handsome coat for the wedding day. I should wish you to be as beautiful as the

sun."

"I shall have a coat of white silk, with a pink and gold fringe. As to your wedding dress, it shall efface in magnificence the gala mantle of the Dogeressa herself, unless, indeed, the silk merchants of the Merceria, have no more rich or splendid materials in their shops."

"Ah! how happy I am! Good, kind Zanetto, take this white handkerchief as a pledge of my faith; I am your wife. But fly! I see my father turning the corner of the quay. If you deceive me, I shall die of grief.”

"May St. John, my patron, break every bone in my body if I fail in my promise to you!"

Zanetto snatched up the handkerchief, covered it with kisses, and took to flight down a narrow lane. But scarcely was he alone, than he stopped to reflect on his position, justly terrified at the enormous falsehoods he had been pouring forth with such volubility for the last half-hour.

"Had I only chosen the purse of two thousand ducats," he reasoned with himself, "I could have purchased new clothes,

hired a gondola by the day, and have passed for a rich man ; but with this pretended talisman, what will become of me? Luigia herself would have discovered the imposture by the ragged state of my apparel, had it not been dusk. To-morrow, not seeing me return, she will comprehend my duplicity; she will despise me, and that rascally Marcantonio will be her husband. Ah! unhappy talisman! cursed Turk! unfortunate Zanetto !"

Giving vent to these and such like lamentations, our hero reached the Piazetta by a circuituous route; but scarcely had he arrived, when he perceived at about a boat's length from the landing place a gondola, in which was seated a Turk he quickly recognized Ali Mahamud, who was departing with his sack for the brigantine, which was riding at anchor in the offing.

"For pity's sake, Signor Merchant, stop!" cried Zanetto, at the top of his voice.

"What would you, my son ?" replied the Turk, the distance widening as he spoke between him and our hero.

"I wish to marry the beautiful Luigia. I am in love with her." "Write her a very tender letter, and seal it with your talisman," replied the Turk, still moving further from the shore.

"There is no need of a letter: Luigia loves me. It is money, much money that I require.'

"Have you not your seal?"

"I have promised my mistress a palace, domestics, cooks, embroidered silken dresses. I shall be dishonoured if I do not find all that."

"Well, use your seal," repeated the Turk, as he was borne still further from the quay.

"Ah, Signor Ali Mahamud," cried Zanetto, using his two hands as a speaking trumpet, "my betrothed's father is a miser; do not abandon me. From whom am I to demand this palace, these servants, these embroidered robes ?"

The Turk replied, crying out as loud as he could; but Zanetto could catch only these few unconnected words: "Rich merchants-bank-notary "—and fancying that he had lost all chance of success, he threw himself full length upon the ground before the Madonna of the gondoliers. After having knocked his brow sundry times against the earth, he remained at last motionless, sunk in the immensity of his grief and despair. Reflection, however, by degrees, came to his aid, and he fancied