Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1890-02-08

| wonder, Dy the way, what kind OF father
Shakespeare had. Judging by old Capulet. Bra
bantio, and one or two other specimens I
should conclude that the wool stapler, glover or
butcher of Standardization was not the most
indulgent or amiable Of parents. The Shaks-
pearean idea of paternal government is not
alluring.
We have been nearly two months in Venice.
and have seen the city under many and widely
different aspects. We have had days and
weeks of almost summer brightness, We have
had intervals of wind and rain and wintry
gloom. We have visited every nook and cor
ner OF the city, have seen every picture and
every shrine, have read and re-read, and in
some instances understood. our Ruskin. We
have explored the neighboring islands. we
have dawdled away sunny days on the Lido;
we know the Armenian convent by heart. and
Cyril has reproached me with having estab-
lished what he calls a system OF hirtage with
the dearest old monk in the world.
How full this region is of the memories OF
Byron, and how prodigious an influence poet
can exercise over the minds OF men when he
has been lying half a century in his grave. We
think and talk of Byron at every turn. In the
Doge's palace on the Bridge of Signs. on the
Lido, where he used to take his morning ride
on the staircase where Marine Faliero's noble
head rolled down the blood-stained marble to
testify for all time to the ingratitude of nations;
in the convent where he spent such happy, in
nocent hours learning the Armenian Ian
guage-everywhere one finds the traces of his
footsteps or the shadows which his genius
clothed with beauty.
Mother is growing tired of venice-no. that
is impossible. Nobody could ever weary of a
place SO full of loveliness-a place whose every
phase is poetry incarnate in marble. She is not
tired. but she begins to weary for home-the
familiar house and garden she loves well
where every room and every pathway and
flower bed are interviewer with the history of
her happy married life-the days before calam-
ity came upon us. 1 think can understand
her feelings almost as well as if we were in
deed what we have sometimes been taken to be
i think can read my mothers heart as well
as ii she were my sister.
believe she is happy with Uncle Ambrose:
believe that his society is as delightful to her
as it Is to me; that his chivalrous devotion
gratities her. as it would any woman upon
earth; believe that she is grateful to him and
fond of him. and that she has never repented
and ID never likely to repent her second mar
| riage. But. all the same, do know that her
heart goes back to the old love. found her a
few days ago sitting with my fathers photo
| graph on the table before her. She was sitting
looking at it with clasped hands and tears
streaming down her cheeks. She was so alb
sorbed in sad thoughts that she did not hear
me enter the room or leave it.
She was talking of River Lawn in the even
ing. and l fancied that her mind had been
dwelling OH the old happy days, and that even
in the midst of this beautiful city she felt sad
and lonely. She has seemed all at once to grow
languid and lstless, and to feel no more inter-
est IN scenes and buildings whose interest seems
| inexhaustble to me. / only hope she is not ill
1 have questioned her, but she assures me there
is nothing the matter. She never was in better
| health, but she is haunted by visions of the old
home where so much of her life has been spent
Il dreamt OF your fathers grave last night
Daisy" she said; Il dream of it SO often, SO
| often
1 could not tell her that I too had had my
| dreams, not of the grave, but Of my father
himself,horrible dreams sometimes, filled with
vague shapes and unknown faces. 1 had seen
my father struggling with his murderer. had
seen the cruel blow struck, but had never
| been able to remember the murderer's face
when awoke. though it seemed sometimes in
| my dream to be face we'll known to me-
| can see that Uncle Ambrose is perplexed
| and uneasy about my mother, and he too seems
to have become Indifferent to Titan and Paul
| Veronese.
| This being SO. am thrown upon Cyril for
society in my rambles and explorations. and he
| and 60 roaming about these delicious waters
in our gondola-our own gondola, built On pur-
pose for us, and to be sent to England after our
| return. How surprised Beatrice Reardon and
| all the rest of them will be TO see US in this
Notwithstanding boat with its swan-like
| prov and black curtains-a boat which seems
to have been designed only for mystery and
| romance.
My good old Berkshire nurse and maid.
| Martha Broomfieid, goes everywhere with me.
! as a kind of duenna and exists in a perpetual
| state OF wonder. l doubt if she is altogether
awakened to the loneliness of Venice: and in
| deed she told me the other day that she could
| not think much OF city which had not one
| good street In it. Milan, she admitted was
| hne town, bue Verona she considered "a
hole" and she considers Venice decidedly in
ferior to Henley.
Il like the Kialto bridge, Miss Daisy" she
| said, because there's bit of life there with
the shops and the people, and like the shops
| in st. Marks square, though i should like
! them better If the shop keepers didn't stand at
/ their doors and tout for customers, which is an
| annoyance when one wants to look at thir rs in
| peace and hasn't no thought of buying any,
thing. But even that isn't up to the Paller-
royal in Paris"
1t will be seen, therefore, that, Broomfield's
tastes are entirely modern. Poor soul, she is
80 patient and SO good tempered in going about
with me to churches and odd out-of-.he-way
corners that havnt the faintest interest for her
She stands smiling blandly at the pictures and
statues while Cyril and l are deep in our guild.
| books or our Ruskln, peering into every detail
| Cyril is capital He has ardent love of art,
and. indeed, he seems to like everything that
| like.
| We have long confidential talks about our
selves and other people, abou: the past and the
| future-how strange that one so rarely talks of
| the present-as we sit III our Condoa, iaZily
| gliding over the sunlit water scarcely con-
| sclous of the movement OF the boat. Some
| times we talk French. sometimes Italian IN
which l am anxious 20 attain facility. 1t is one
thing to be able to read Dante, fad, and an
other thing TO express ones own thoughts easily.
/ The language we talk makes very little differ
encc to Broomfeld who sits porting over her
! Daily Telegraph. or knitting one of those ever
lasting WOODEN comfortersN which she provides
! for her numerous nephews and nieces. Cyril
! and are as much by ourselves If Bloomfield
were one of those sculptured seraphim which
! the Israelites used to have in their houses to
represent the deity they worshiped.
Cyrirs Oxford days are over. He has taken
his degree, and has l believe done very we'll.
| though he has not swept the board, he tells me-
like Mr.. Gladstone Mr.. Goodwin Smith, as
he intended to do when he was at Winchester
| And now he has to think of what he shall do
with his life.
Il think L shall so to the Bar" he said. ''be-
cause man ought to have a profession Of
| some kind and L rather like the idea of the
| Bar-followed in due course by the Bench
And the Bar has advantages for a man who
does not want to be a slave in the golden years
OF youth. The Bar Is q profession in which q
man can take it easy"
am afraid Cyril has n slight inclination to
idleness-or rather, perhaps, that he has dis
| taste TOR any systematic and monotonous work
| He Is far too active and energetic to waste his
days i'll laZness, but he likes to occupy himself
according to the caprice of the hour: and then
no doubt he is Influenced by the knowledge
that his father is a rich man and he an only
child.
We were talking the other day about Uncle
Ambroses fortune and his almost eccentric in
difference to wealth, which would have been
| such a delightful surprise to most men in his