Prescott journal. [volume] (Prescott, Wis.) 1861-1871, 1866-12-15
Venise-Graphie Description of the City

Correspondence of the New York Tribune.
Venice is collection of III islets,
divided 10y 149 canals, connected by
3S9 bridges, and pierced by 1850 in
finitely narrow and labyrinthine streets.
Almost every foot of the city is built
upon piles. Each of its Is, 600 houses
is washed by the sea-water, and of its
1901 people not ore ever rode upon
wheels down the mainland of this city.
Making a broad spiral ribon of blue
sea, thrice as wide as Broadway,
through the longest diameter of Ven
ice, passes the Grand Canal, the most
wonderful panorama in the world-in
no degree like the dull brick facing of
the Dutch and Flemish city canals, but
highway of marble palaces, into
which are burned the dyes of South
ern sun, and all the floridness of the
Goth blossoms in their architecture.
Three bridges only cross this Grand
Canal, two of them practical and mod
ern, the middle bridge, famed in all
lands, is the Rialto, high archway of
shops and multitudes, under which,
like docile crocodiles, gondolas shoot
their beaks of steel. Upon the surface
of this peopled archipelago there are
294 places or cdnapi. Most of them
were spaces to give some church per-
spective; but two thirds of the way
down the city where it narrows to
almost its smallest giTth, lies the only
square of greater length than sings
throw, the wondrous Piazza of San
Marco. The plaza is like nothing in
America. From the days of Petrarcb,
-,
is great obiong square, 600 feet long
by $50 feet wide, paved with hewn
blocks of marble, bordered on three
sides by a marble palace, faced with
long arkades, which show gilded cafes
and splendid shops of jewelry beneath
them; and on the third side, or rather,
at the head of it, the Cathedral of st.
Mark, the patron of Venice, rises; ven
cradle and plentiful of domes, the rich
est, if not the purest, religious editice
in the world. .'s+t@
Before its careeer the bronze houses
of st. Mark, part of the plumber of the
Crusades, and from the paved space be-
fore them, set aside, so as not to mar
the perspective, rises the great Cam
panile or bell tower, nearly thousand
years old, and to the hight of three hum
dred and fifty feet-about twice that, If
/ do not mistake, of Trinity church on
Broadway. A second tower near by
holds zodiacal clock, rung by Moorish
giants, and facing it from the opposite
corner of the piazza, reaches at right
angles quite down to the harbor side.
the piazetth of st. Mark, smaller area,
fanked with the Dodge's palace, grand
edifce, many hued, built ON pointed
arches and reachingon its further end
along the splendid quay. This piazetta
| is closed, almost at the waters edge,
by two granite columns, each of a
| single stone, crested, the one with
| a statue of st. George, the
other with a winged lion. Going down
between them, i'll times, the hoary Ad'
almirals have been escorted to THEN
gondolas, followed by the anxious
Doge, and sailed from the very shad
ows of these columns to fight out the
quarrel of the Republic on distant seas
Behind the ducal palace are the prisons
of the State, whose outlet is the famed
Bridge of Signs, of late the sepu cher:
OF the Italian patriots. From this ''Mo
10" OF State quay, the view is wonder
full of the domes and Companies Oh
three opposite islands, and the broad
blue paths of the canals, plowed Will
swift gondolas, Far down the island il
the arsenal, where the Venetians fitted
out their fleets, as Dante describes
/ them. He t
This is Venice, labrynth of islands
palaces, Churches founded by fugitivei
who grew up sea-dogs, and are now t.
be ushered into the first day of indie
pendence.