name, who had there rebuked the winds and commanded stillness to the
sea. And if the stranger would yet learn in what spirit it was that the
dominion of Venice was begun, and in what strength she went forth
conquering and to conquer, let him not seek to estimate the wealth of
her arsenals or number of her armies, nor look upon the pageantry of her
palaces, nor enter into the secrets of her councils; but let him ascend
the highest tier of the stern ledges that sweep round the altar of
Torcello, and then, looking as the pilot did of old along the marble
ribs of the goodly temple-ship, let him repeople its veined deck with
the shadows of its dead mariners, and strive to feel in himself the
strength of heart that was kindled within them, when first, after the
pillars of it had settled in the sand, and the roof of it had been
closed against the angry sky that was still reddened by the fires of
their homesteads,--first, within the shelter of its knitted walls,
amidst the murmur of the waste of waves and the beating of the wings of
the sea-birds round the rock that was strange to them,--rose that
ancient hymn, in the power of their gathered voices:

THE SEA IS HIS, AND HE MADE IT,
AND HIS HANDS PREPARED THE DRY LAND.




CHAPTER IV.

ST. MARK'S.


SECTION I. "And so Barnabas took Mark, and sailed unto Cyprus." If as