A GARDEN IN VENICE 



that sea and up the Adriatic it carried the moisture 

 by wind and sun evaporated north to the chain of 

 Alps that bound the Veneto. There condensing in 

 the cooler atmosphere, the vapour turned to rain — 

 the rain which once washed up the garden and now 

 fertilises it. This rain, where nothing in this world 

 stands still, had no sooner done its genial work on 

 mountain side and plain than it hastened to the 

 seas from whence it came. In its reasoned, if 

 reckless, haste it cut canals through the sleeping 

 mud, throwing up the displaced ooze on either 

 hand to dry and harden. On such soft stuff the 

 islands in time were formed where now stand 

 Venice and the Giudecca. 



This law or accident of Nature that in the first 

 ages made the islands now orders the weather of 

 our modern days. There are but four winds on 

 the Giudecca where the garden stands, though 

 the head of the Observatory may write the signs 

 of more ; but then, the Venetians say, he must 

 show something for his salario. First, the 

 Scirocco, that south wind from Africa that be- 

 comes south-east with the trend of the Adriatic ; 



