The groom of the chambers was called, the gondoliers were summoned, and
the ladies, cloaking and taking their masks, were quickly in the boat.
CHAPTER V.
"If your master
Would have a queen his beggar, you must tell him
That majesty, to keep decorum, must
No less beg than a kingdom."
ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA.
The silent movement of the hearse-like gondola soon brought the fair
Venetian and her female Mentor to the water-gate of the noble, who had
been intrusted by the Senate with the especial guardianship of the
person of the heiress. It was a residence of more than common gloom,
possessing all the solemn but stately magnificence which then
characterized the private dwellings of the patricians in that city of
riches and pride. Its magnitude and architecture, though rather less
imposing than those which distinguished the palace of the Donna
Violetta, placed it among the private edifices of the first order, and
all its external decorations showed it to be the habitation of one of
high importance. Within, the noiseless steps and the air of silent
distrust among the domestics, added to the gloomy grandeur of the
apartments, rendered the abode no bad type of the Republic itself.
As neither of his present visitors was a stranger beneath the roof of
the Signor Gradenigo--for so the proprietor of the palace was
called--they ascended its massive stairs, without pausing to consider
any of those novelties of construction that would attract the eye of one
unaccustomed to such a dwelling.
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