86 BROWN : 



to speedily, extensively, thoroughly." This with the usual 

 result. It is common talk in Europe that these instances were 

 renewed at frequent intervals, and the somewhat dramatic inci- 

 dent is related that only forty-eight hours before the crash came 

 they were once more voiced. The fact is that there was no 

 guardian of any kind in the tower when it fell. So the crash 

 came and it would be interesting and entirely eas}' to know 

 how long it was before its thundering roar was heard round 

 the world. 



Not a waking man within five miles but must have won- 

 dered for an instant, and then felt a ghastly persuasion of 

 what it meant. 



Whoever reads of the sumptuosity and the squalor which 

 succeeded each other at the base of the tower as time rolled 

 on, will feed his mind upon what is as interesting as any novel. 

 The richness and the sordidness have both passed away these 

 many summers gone. But the Loggetta in which for ] 50 3'ears 

 the monthly lottery- has been publicly drawn was, as you maj- 

 see by looking at the picture, a very dream of architectural 

 beauty, and beyond reasonable doubt will be restored whole as 

 it was before, for the simple reason that its turn will come first. 

 The last drawing was photographed one day and eighteen 

 hours before the end came. 



The ver\' pigeons miss the bells of St. Mark. Of those five 

 bells there were two which for ages have rung, at one hundred 

 and twenty minutes after meridian, the dinner bell of these 

 well-known creatures. And now the birds have to know when 

 their soup is served as best they may. These pigeons carried 

 important information to the Doge Dandolo when he was besieg- 

 ing Candia in the thirteenth century ; they brought back news 

 of his success. Whereupon \'enice decreed that they should 

 be maintained from that time on at the public expense. They 

 are delightfully sentimental animals, but at the same time 

 intolerable nuisances. Buy a soldo of tares ; hold out a hand- 

 ful, and straightway find yourself covered, crawled over and 

 buffetted bv the wini>s of the dear, soft, greedv gluttons. 



