STILL WATERS 
193 
beautiful coloring and light though it have 
neither in itself. Even artificial waters, though 
they are usually dull and lifeless in body, are 
better than none at all. The formal beauty of 
the landscape-gardener is about them, but taken 
in connection with houses, trees, and skies, 
they may have a certain artistic charm. This 
charm is well shown in the pleasure-lakes of 
various European estates, and particularly in 
the canals of Venice. The canals were origi- 
nally the natural tide-ways between islands, 
and when the city was built the mud-banks 
formed the foundations for the houses, and 
the canals themselves became the water-streets 
of to-day. Not a place in Europe can show 
such beautiful and picturesque compositions as 
Venice. The color, light, and reflection of the 
city and its waters are world-famed. The 
Ducal Palace, St. Mark’s, the towers and domes 
and palaces that heave out of the blue-green 
tide, change their color fifty times a day with 
the changing of the sky; the swaying waters 
of the canals are tremulous with direct and re- 
flected light ; and the ships, sails, wharves, and 
bridges splash the horizon-line with countless 
patches of orange, blue, red, and yellow. And 
these are only the pronounced hues. From 
Venetian 
lagoons. 
The canals 
of Venice. 
