You often say you envy me my strength, but you might be just as strong if you chose to work as I do.
Besides, it is delightful, when you are accustomed to it, to feel the gondola flying away under your stroke." "I prefer feeling it fly away under some one else's stroke, Francisco.
That is pleasant enough, I grant; but the very thought of working as you do throws me into a perspiration.

I should like to be as strong as you are, but to work as a gondolier is too high a price to pay for it." That evening, Francis crossed the lagoon in the gondola with Giuseppi, to inspect the boat he had heard of.

It was just what he wanted.

In appearance it differed in no way from an ordinary gondola, but it was a mere shell.

The timbers and planking were extremely light, and the weight of the boat was little more than a third of that of other craft.
She had been built like a working gondola, instead of in the form of those mostly used for racing, because her owner had intended, after the race was over, to plank her inside and strengthen her for everyday work.