again. On one side stretches a row of rookeries--
a maze of hanging clothes, fish-nets, balconies hooded
by awnings and topped by nondescript chimneys of
all sizes and patterns, with here and there a dab
of vermilion and light red, the whole brilliant against
a china-blue sky. On the other runs the long brick
wall of the garden,--soggy, begrimed; streaked with
moss and lichen in bands of black-green and yellow
ochre, over which mass and sway the great sycamores
that Ziem loves, their lower branches interwoven
with zinnober cedars gleaming in spots where the prying
sun drips gold.

Only wide enough for a barca and two gondolas to
pass--this canal of mine. Only deep enough to let
a wine barge through; so narrow you must go all
the way back to the lagoon if you would turn your
gondola; so short you can row through it in five
minutes; every inch of its water surface part of
everything about it, so clear are the reflections; full
of moods, whims, and fancies, this wave space--one
moment in a broad laugh coquetting with a bit of
blue sky peeping from behind a cloud, its cheeks
dimpled with sly undercurrents, the next swept by
flurries of little winds, soft as the breath of a child
on a mirror; then, when aroused by a passing boat,
breaking out into ribbons of color--swirls of twisted
doorways, flags, awnings, flower-laden balconies,
black-shawled Venetian beauties all upside down, interwoven
with strips of turquoise sky and green