outside of this stately fabric is painted by Giorgione da Castelfranco, and Titian himself.

Hence, I passed through the Mercera, one of the most delicious streets in the world for the sweetness of it, and is all the way on both sides tapestried as it were with cloth of gold, rich damasks and other silks, which the shops expose and hang before their houses from the first floor, and with that variety that for near half the year spent chiefly in this city, I hardly remember to have seen the same piece twice exposed; to this add the perfumes, apothecaries' shops, and the innumerable cages of nightingales which they keep, that entertain you with their melody from shop to shop, so that shutting your eyes, you would imagine yourself in the country, when indeed you are in the middle of the sea. It is almost as silent as the middle of a field, there being neither rattling of coaches nor trampling of horses. This street, paved with brick, and exceedingly clean, brought us through an arch into the famous piazza of St. Mark.

Over this porch stands that admirable clock, celebrated next to that of Strasburg for its many movements; amongst which, about twelve and six, which are their hours of Ave Maria, when all the town are on their knees, come forth the three Kings led by a star, and passing by the image of Christ in his Mother's arms, do their reverence, and enter into the clock by another door. At the top of this turret, another automaton strikes the quarters. An honest merchant told me that one day walking in the piazza, he saw the fellow who kept the clock struck with this hammer so forcibly, as he was stooping his head near the bell, to mend something amiss at the instant of striking, that being stunned, he reeled over the battlements, and broke his neck. The buildings in this piazza are all arched, on pillars, paved within with black and white polished marble, even to the shops, the rest of the fabric as stately as any in Europe, being not only marble, but the architecture is of the famous Sansovini, who lies buried in St. Jacomo, at the end of the piazza. The battlements of this noble range of building are railed with stone, and thick-set with excellent statues, which add a great ornaOne of the sides is yet much more Roman-like than the other which regards the sea, and where the church is placed. The other range is plainly Gothic: and so we en

ment.

tered into St. Mark's Church, before which stand two brass pedestals exquisitely cast and figured, which bear as many tall masts painted red, on which, upon great festivals, they hang flags and streamers. The church is also Gothic; yet for the preciousness of the materials, being of several rich marbles, abundance of porphyry, serpentine, &c., far exceeding any in Rome, St. Peter's hardly excepted. I much admired the spendid history of our blessed Saviour, composed all of mosaic over the facciata, below which and over the chief gates are cast four horses in copper as big as the life, the same that formerly were transported from Rome by Constantine to Byzantium, and thence by the Venetians hither.! They are supported by eight porphyry columns, of very great size and value. Being come into the Church, you see nothing, and tread on nothing, but what is precious. The floor is all inlaid with agates, lazulis, chalcedons, jaspers, porphyries, and other rich marbles, admirable also for the work; the walls sumptuously incrusted, and presenting to the imagination the shapes of men, birds, houses, flowers, and a thousand varieties. The roof is of most excellent mosaic; but what most persons admire is the new work of the emblematic tree at the other passage out of the church. In the midst of this rich volto rise five cupolas, the middle very large and sustained by thirty-six marble columns, eight of which are of precious marbles: under these cupolas is the high altar, on which is a reliquary of several sorts of jewels, engraven with figures, after the Greek manner, and set together with plates of pure gold. The altar is covered with a canopy of ophite, on which is sculptured the story of the Bible, and so on the pillars, which are of Parian marble, that support it. Behind these, are four other columns of transparent and true oriental alabaster, brought hither out of the mines of Solomon's Temple, as they report. There are many chapels and notable monuments of illustrious persons, dukes, cardinals, &c., as Zeno, J. Soranzi, and others: there is likewise a vast baptistery, of copper. Among other venerable relics is a stone, on which they say our blessed Lord stood preaching to those of Tyre and Sidon, and near the door is an image of Christ, much adorned, esteeming it very sacred, for that a rude fellow

They were taken away by Buonaparte to Paris; but in 1815, were sent back to Venice.

striking it, they say, there gushed out a torrent of blood. In one of the corners lies the body of St. Isidore, brought hither 500 years since from the island of Chios. A little farther, they show the picture of St. Dominic and Francis, affirmed to have been made by the Abbot Joachim (many years before any of them were born). Going out of the Church, they showed us the stone where Alexander III. trod on the neck of the Emperor Frederick Barbarossa, pronouncing that verse of the psalm, “super basiliscum," &c. The doors of the church are of massy copper. There are near 500 pillars in this building, most of them porphyry and serpentine, and brought chiefly from Athens, and other parts of Greece, formerly in their power. At the corner of the Church, are inserted into the main wall four figures, as big as life, cut in porphyry; which they say are the images of four brothers who poisoned one another, by which means were escheated to the Republic that vast treasury of relics now belonging to the Church. At the other entrance that looks towards the sea, stands in a small chapel that statue of our Lady, made (as they affirm) of the same stone, or rock, out of which Moses brought water to the murmuring Israelites at Horeb, or Meriba.

After all that is said, this church is, in my opinion, much too dark and dismal, and of heavy work; the fabric,—as is much of Venice, both for buildings and other fashions and circumstances, after the Greeks, their next neighbours.

The next day, by favour of the French ambassador, I had admittance with him to view the Reliquary, called here Tesoro di San Marco, which very few, even of travellers, are admitted to see. It is a large chamber full of presses. There are twelve breast-plates or pieces of pure golden armour, studded with precious stones, and as many crowns dedicated to St. Mark, by so many noble Venetians, who had recovered their wives taken at sea by the Saracens; many curious vases of agates; the cap, or coronet, of the Dukes of Venice, one of which had a ruby set on it, esteemed worth 200,000 crowns; two unicorns' horns; numerous vases and dishes of agate, set thick with precious stones and vast pearls; divers heads of Saints, enchased in gold; a small ampulla, or glass, with our Saviour's blood; a great morsel of the real cross; one of the nails; a thorn; a fragment of