Peter the Hermit, out of its dark niche in the
Church of Santi Giovanni e Paolo. She gives a very good description of
Venetian life at the time, and much commends its family affection and
family life as being of a much less selfish nature than in England; as
she remarks truly, if a traveller gets into a vicious or unpleasant
set in any country, it would not do to judge all the rest of the
nation, by that standard--as she considered Shelley did when staying
in Venice with Byron. The want of good education in Italy at that time
she considers the cause of the ruling indolence, love-making with the
young and money-keeping with the elder being the chief occupation. She
gives a very good description of the noble families and their descent.
Many of the Italian palaces preserved their pictures, and in the
Palazzo Pisani Mary saw the Paul Veronese, now in the National
Gallery, of "The family of Darius at the feet of Alexander." Mary's
love of Venice grew, and she seems to have entertained serious ideas
of taking a palace and settling there; but all the fancies of
travellers are not realised. One moonlit evening she heard an old
gondoliere challenge a younger one to alternate with him the stanzas
of the _Gerusalemme_.
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