CHAPTER VII.
"The moon went down; and nothing now was seen Save where the lamp of a Madonna shone Faintly." ROGERS.
Just as the secret audiences of the Palazzo Gradenigo were ended, the great square of St.Mark began to lose a portion of its gaiety.

The cafes were now occupied by parties who had the means, and were in the humor, to put their indulgences to more substantial proof than the passing gibe or idle laugh; while those who were reluctantly compelled to turn their thoughts from the levities of the moment to the cares of the morrow, were departing in crowds to humble roofs and hard pillows.
There remained one of the latter class, however, who continued to occupy a spot near the junction of the two squares, as motionless as if his naked feet grew to the stone on which he stood.

It was Antonio.
The position of the fisherman brought the whole of his muscular form and bronzed features beneath the rays of the moon.

The dark, anxious, and stern eyes were fixed upon the mild orb, as if their owner sought to penetrate into another world, in quest of that peace which he had never known in this.

There was suffering in the expression of the weather-worn face; but it was the suffering of one whose native sensibilities had been a little deadened by too much familiarity with the lot of the feeble.