The _forestieri_ season sets in earlier
in her case than in her sister cities. The real "Carnival de Venice"
is in August, September and October now-a-days, let the calendar say
what it may. Some flaunting of gaudy-colored calico, some dancing on
the Piazza of St. Mark, there may be on the eve of Lent in obedience
to old usages, but the dancing that really glads the Italian heart is
the dancing for which the _forestiere_ pays the piper, and the true
Lenten time is that when his beneficent presence is wanting.
Venice, then, has already brought her Carnival to a conclusion; and
it has been a splendid one. English, Americans, Germans, all came in
shoals--all thronged the galleries, the churches and the palaces in
the morning, sauntered or bathed on the outer shore of the Lido in the
afternoon, and met at Florian's in the evening. "What is Florian's?"
will be asked by those who have never been at Venice--by some such,
at least. For probably the fame of the celebrated _caffe_ may have
traveled across the Atlantic, just as many who have never crossed
it westward are no strangers to the name of Delmonico. Florian's,
however, in any case, deserves a word of recognition. It is the
principal, largest and most fashionable caffe on the Piazza di San
Marco. But the singular and curious specialty of the place is that it
has never been closed--no, not for five minutes--day or night, for
a period of more than a hundred and thirty years! Probably it is the
only human habitation of any sort on the face of the globe of which
that could be said.
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