I feel as one Who in the twilight stumbles among tombs, And cannot read the inscriptions carved upon them.
MICHAEL ANGELO.
I felt so once; but I have grown familiar With desolation, and it has become No more a pain to me, but a delight.
TITIAN.
I could not live here.

I must have the sea, And the sea-mist, with sunshine interwoven Like cloth of gold; must have beneath my windows The laughter of the waves, and at my door Their pattering footsteps, or I am not happy.
MICHAEL ANGELO.
Then tell me of your city in the sea, Paved with red basalt of the Paduan hills.
Tell me of art in Venice.

Three great names, Giorgione, Titian, and the Tintoretto, Illustrate your Venetian school, and send A challenge to the world.

The first is dead, But Tintoretto lives.
TITIAN.
And paints with fires Sudden and splendid, as the lightning paints The cloudy vault of heaven.
GIORGIO.
Does he still keep Above his door the arrogant inscription That once was painted there,--"The color of Titian, With the design of Michael Angelo"?
TITIAN.
Indeed, I know not.

'T was a foolish boast, And does no harm to any but himself.
Perhaps he has grown wiser.
MICHAEL ANGELO.
When you two Are gone, who is there that remains behind To seize the pencil falling from your fingers?
GIORGIO.
Oh there are many hands upraised already To clutch at such a prize, which hardly wait For death to loose your grasp,--a hundred of them; Schiavone, Bonifazio, Campagnola, Moretto, and Moroni; who can count them, Or measure their ambition?
TITIAN.
When we are gone The generation that comes after us Will have far other thoughts than ours.