After this time he had his studio in a cell of the monastery of the Augustine friars attached to the Church of San Stefano, in Venice. During the next three years he was occupied with his Orpheus and a bust of the Doge Renier. At this time he studied entirely from nature; he devoted himself to the pursuit of anatomy, and after a time was accustomed to make dissections in order to sketch or model from important parts or some conformations that he desired in particular instances. In 1776 his Orpheus was finished and exhibited, and it chanced to be at the annual festival of the Ascension, when the opera of Orpheus was brought out in Venice. Canova was accustomed to say that the praise he then received was "that which made him a sculptor;" and so grateful was he for it that later, when he became Marquis of Ischia, he chose for his armorial ensigns the lyre and serpent which are the mythological symbols of Orpheus and Eurydice. The Senator Grimani ordered a copy of the Orpheus, and this was the first work of Canova in Carrara marble. He soon found his workshop too small, and removed to one in the street of San Maurizio, where he remained until he left his native country. His next work was a statue of AEsculapius, larger than life; a short time before his death, when he saw this statue, he sorrowfully declared that "his progress had by no means corresponded with the indications of excellence in this performance of his youth." About this time he executed an Apollo and Daphne which was never entirely finished, and when twenty-two years old he completed a group of Daedalus and Icarus for the Senator Pisani. This was intended for an exterior decoration of his palace; but when it was done Pisani considered it worthy of a place in his gallery, already famous on account of the painting of Darius and his Family, by Paul Veronese, and other fine works. This may be called Canova's last work in Venice, as he went to Rome soon after his twenty-third birthday. The Cavaliere Zuliani was then the representative of Venice in Rome, and Faliero gave Canova letters to him. Zuliani was an enlightened patron of art, and he received the young sculptor with great kindness, and soon arranged to have his model of Daedalus and Icarus exhibited to the best artists and judges of art in Rome. We can fancy the anxiety with which Canova went to this exhibition; but the praise which he there received secured for him a place among the artists then in Rome.