The Birmingham age-herald., 1918-04-28

difficulties First, in 1915, they were made from Venice while all the trans
 portation resources of Italy were be-
 ing used to mobilize and forward to
 the Isonzo front troops and war ma teriaLs. when the station at Mestre,
 three miles from Venice on the main land was overcrowded and little thought could be given to the hand
 ling of art works being rescued. Then the last art works were removed from the city during the thirteenth battle of the Isonzo when every effort was be-
 ing made to save the nation-not single city-when hundreds of thou sands of people were fleeing along the Venetian plains, when Venice itself was being evacuated. 1t was under these circumstances that many of the paintings, which two years before Otetti had had rolled upon wooden cases and stored in the city founda-
 tions. were at last removed. So jealous had been the Venetians of their treas ures that in many cases Mayor Gri- mani and the council had refused to let them depart One such case was that of the wonderful bronze horses winch arrived in Rome only last Jam uary, being taken to the Piazza ve- nezia, in the heart of the city and near the original arches for which they had been cast
 But after all it has been the city itself Which has been considered to count for most and on which has been lavished such great care to protect from enemy bombs. When I was there recently the place seemed lige one of those sleeping cities of the fairy tales, silent, still, ileless waiting for the wave of the magic wand to bring back the move ments Of life to her deserted streets to her boarded up palaces and churches
 waking across the great square of St Marks, named after the apostle whose body so long ago as the year S27 was brought and buried there by the power- 1ul men of the age, I was the sole per son In sight. Thanks to the labor begun by Ojetti thousands upon thousands of sacks of sand at present hide the ar chitectural lines. 1 counted 5000 such sacks protecting the Scala of the Giants in the Palazzo Ducale I counted 2O0O sacks and 56 mattresses about the monu- ment of Colleon. I counted POGO sacks protecting the single great portal of the treasury building. Other thousands of sacks with mattresses on top had been placed to shield the famous Campanile of St Marks, the bell tower that stood for Sw years and then fell in 1902. to be re- built later on. firmer foundations.
 Right here in the fragile foundations of Venice lies one of the chief obstacles to making her entirely safe. Because of the peculiar construction on piles of all her buildings, there is the constant fear that bomb striking given building might cause the collapse of the entire structure. So in addition to piling light mattresses and heavy sand sacks, month by month and year by year stout wooden beams and solid masonry supports have been slowly placed not only above ground but below the water to catch the shock of exploding shells.
 After all this work has been done, however, there remains the fact that in no way can this architecture, the chief treasure of Venice, be fully protected. Bronze horses, fine laces. wonders in gold. plate, paintings by Titan, Tintor- etto, the Veronese canvases, the mas terpieces of the Bellins may be re- moved. But the buildings and their painted walls and ceilings remain. al- ways the mark of the aerial vandal. casual glance at the wreck of the church of Santa Maria Formosa showed me how terribly effective became a bomb pierc- ing a roof and exploding within an in- terior.
 This spring, as sooA as the fcgs have cleared away, the daily attempts on Venice will be renewed, despite the fact that all the navy's arms within the city are of purely defensive nature. that her offensive arms have been care fully located outside the city so as not to give an excuse to the Austrians in carrying out their hateful end, in grati- lying their lust for useless destruction.