88 HKOWX : 



such sufferers, were posted between the columns by the water- 

 side — at that time the place of public execution — and gave 

 encouragement, in no wise needed, to the rabble to come 

 underneath the cage and shout out their ribaldry. It would 

 almost seem as if men had improved a little since that time. 

 In 1496 the Church could no longer regard this thing as a pri- 

 vilege, and successfully used influences to have it abolished. 



The Campanile had another highly dignified function. At 

 the seasons when the swallows are passing there were posted 

 on the tower certain persons who launched forth upon the breeze 

 good store of little sheets of paper each with a small hole 

 punched through it. The swallows, for reasons better known 

 to themselves than to us, plunged after these flying leaves, 

 stuck their heads through the holes and were yoked to raiseiy 

 from that instant. They fell to the ground, of course ; they 

 were snapped up by the small boy of the period and suffered 

 the fate which they would suffer to-day under the same cir- 

 cumstances. 



Again and again we come back to it. Think of the hol- 

 lowness about the heart which must attack a \'enetian when 

 he does not see his Campanile ; or even suddenly rememliers 

 that it is no longer there. This noljle shaft was not the bell 

 tower of the Cathedral only. It bore up high al)o\-e every 

 other point what was to sound forth the signal for every public 

 movement of the government. I am careful in this matter to 

 say public. For you are not ignorant that five-sixths of what 

 the \>netian oligarchy did was done in deadly secrecy. So 

 when the Maggior Consiglio had passed a measure down to 

 the Council of Ten and their strengthless hands had let it fall 

 among the dreadful unknown Three, its fate was fixed. The 

 Marangona called the people together upon the Public Square 

 to the Arenga or Public Council. The measure was "pro- 

 posed " to them and if they did not give in their adhesion the 

 only difference made was that it was so much the worse for them. 



The Marangona was the biggest of the five bells in the 

 tower. It was rescued unbroken, and now has temporaiy but 



