VENICE IN THE EAST END. 249 



cause a sense of giddiness. It is so difficult to realize 

 so much mass — so much bulk — moving so swiftly, and 

 in so intertangled a manner; a mighty dance of 

 thousands of tons — gliding, slipping, drifting onwards, 

 yet without apparent effort. Thousands upon thou- 

 sands of tons go by like shadows, silently, as if the 

 ponderous hulls had no stability or weight; like a 

 dream they float past, solid and yet without reality. 

 It is a giddiness to watch them. 



This happens, not on one day only, not one tide, but 

 at every tide and every day the year through, year 

 after year. The bright summer sun glows upon it; 

 the red sun of the frosty hours of winter looks at it 

 from under the deepening canopy of vapour; the 

 blasts of the autumnal equinox howl over the vast 

 city and whistle shrilly in the rigging ; still at every 

 tide the world of ships moves out into the river. Why 

 does not a painter come here and place the real 

 romance of these things upon canvas, as Venice has 

 been placed ? Never twice alike, the changing 

 atmosphere is reflected in the hue of the varnished 

 masts, now gleaming, now dull, now dark. Till it has 

 been painted, and sung by poet, and described by 

 writers, nothing is human. Venice has been made 

 human by poet, painter, and dramatist, yet what was 

 Venice to this — this the Fact of our own day ? Two 

 of the caravels of the Doge's fleet, two of Othello's 

 strongest war-ships, could scarcely carry the mast of 

 my Australian clipper. At a guess it is four feet 

 through; it is of iron, tubular; there is room for a 

 winding spiral staircase within it ; as for its height, I 

 will not risk a guess at it. Could Othello's war-ships 



