406 ST. MARK’S, VENICE

the bright recess of your Piazzetta, by the pillars of Acre; looking sometimes to the glimmering mosaics in the vaults of the Church; sometimes to the Square, thinking of its immortal memories; sometimes to the Palace and the Sea.

No such scene existed elsewhere in Europe,-in the world; so bright, so magically visionary,-a temple radiant as the flowers of nature, venerable and enduring as her rocks, arched above the rugged pillars which then stood simply on the marble pavement, where the triumphant Venetian conquerors had set them.

I pass the same place now with averted eyes. There is only the ghost,-nay, the corpse,-of all that I so loved.

3. During thirty years of constant labour in our English schools of art, I have been striving to convince our students of the eternal difference between the sculpture of men who worked in the joy of their art, for the honour of their religion, and the mechanical labour of those who work, at the best, in imitation, and, too often, only for gain. In my own country, now given up wholly to the love of money, I do not wonder when I prevail little. But here in Venice your hearts are not yet hardened; above all, not the heart of the workman. The Venetian has still all the genius, the conscience, the ingenuity of his race; and a master who loved his men, and sought to develop their intelligence and to rouse their imagination, might be certain of rivalling, by their aid, the best art of former ages. And the chief purpose with which, twenty years ago, I undertook my task of the history of Venetian architecture was to show the dependence of its beauty on the happiness and fancy of the workman, and to show also that no architect could claim the title to authority of “magister” unless he himself wrought at the head of his men, Captain of manual skill, as the best knight is Captain of armies.

4. But the modern system of superintendence from a higher social position renders good work impossible; for, with double fatality, it places at the head of operations men unacquainted with the handling of the chisel, and sure to

[Version 0.04: March 2008]