VENICE
On the following day we took the Venice express at nine o’clock in the
morning. Two Belgian members of the foreign missions travelled to Venice
with us. Colonel Theuniss and Major Havard proved very entertaining
companions, only their knowledge of Russia was sadly deficient. They
believed that wolves prowled in the streets of St. Petersburg in broad
daylight.
At eight o’clock in the evening we reached Venice and rolled slowly along
a narrow pier. At the railway-station a group of gondoliers rushed up to
us, offering their gondolas, just like cabmen. We stepped down into a
gondola lighted up by lanterns on bow and poop. The gondolier pushed off
from the steps and we silently glided along the Great Canal, surrounded
by side canals crossed by small private bridges. Venice is built on
piles, and stands upon many islands linked by bridges. At each crossing
of the aquatic streets our strong-lunged gondolier shouted _Gia-e!_ to
escape collision. He brought us to the Hotel Danielli where we passed a
sleepless night, not having followed the wise advice of the chambermaid,
who told us not to raise the mosquito-nets. We were thoroughly punished
for it, having been devoured by mosquitoes.
Lunch over, we went out for a walk along narrow little pathways leading
to the Piazza San Marco. After a stroll in the arcades of the Square, we
took a gondola for a sail on the Canale Grande. We glided smoothly on
the silent waves of the Adriatic, passing before grim old buildings. The
palaces in which Byron, Schiller and Lucrezia Borgia have dwelt are now
transformed into hotels. Venice, the town of legends and dreams, has very
unpleasant odours, and nearly all the windows are hung with a flutter of
drying sheets and towels, flapping in the air like old tattered flags.
On the following day we took the boat to Lido, a fashionable
sea-bathing-place, and returned to Venice just in time for the table
d’hôte. There was a great festival at night on the Canale Grande; all the
gondolas of Venice were on the water, lighted with coloured lanterns.
On the broadest part of the Canal they were tied one to the other thus
forming a large floating bridge, on the middle of which a group of
street-singers were giving a serenade. Our gondolier, at our request,
shouted out in a stentorian voice: _Funiculi, funicula_, and the singers
performed with great emphasis that popular song, after which they crossed
over from one gondola to the other, holding out their hats which were
soon amply filled. We gave all the change we had in our pockets.
We only remained two days at Venice, having had quite enough of that
aquatic town which does not suit my vivacious temperament.