By all the odds the most interesting figure there was that of a stout peasant serving-girl, dressed in a white knitted jacket, a crimson neckerchief, and a bright coloured gown, and wearing long dangling earrings of yellowest gold.

For hours this idle maiden balanced herself half over the balcony rail in perusal of the people under her, and I suspect made love at that distance, and in that constrained position, to some one in the crowd.

On another balcony a lady sat; at the window of still another house, a damsel now looked out upon the square, and now gave a glance into the room, in the evident direction of a mirror.

Venetian neighbours have the amiable custom of studying one another's features through opera-glasses; but I could not persuade myself to use this means of learning the mirror's response to the damsel's constant "Fair or not ?" being a believer in every woman's right to look well a little way off.

I shunned whatever trifling temptation there was in the case, and turned again to the campo beneath--to the placid dandies about the door of the cafe; to the tide of passers-by from the Merceria; the smooth shaven Venetians of other days, and the bearded Venetians of these; the dark-eyed white-faced Venetians, hooped in cruel disproportion to the narrow streets, but richly clad, and moving with southern grace; the files of heavily burdened soldiers; the little policemen loitering lazily about with their swords at their sides, and in their spotless Austrian uniforms." Having reached Goldoni's statue there are two courses open to us if we are in a mood for walking.