But to those protests and outcries the story-teller has many answers ready. In the first place, no one had even dreamt of the rights of men in 1376; and secondly, the trade in white slaves was almost as profitable to Venice then as it is in 1906 to certain great states the story-teller could name, with the advantage that there was no hypocritical secret about it, and that it was provided for in international treaties, in spite of the Pope, who said it was wrong; and thirdly, heroes are heroes for ever in respect of their heroic deeds, but in their daily lives they are very much like the other men of their class and time, as you will soon learn if you read the life of Bayard, 'without fear or reproach,' written by his Faithful Servitor; for the faithful one set down some doings of the virtuous knight which a modern biographer would have altogether left out, but which were no more a 'reproach' to a man in the year 1500, than getting drunk was a 'reproach' in 1700, or than stealing anything over a million is a 'reproach' to-day; fourthly and lastly, if Zeno had virtuously refused to buy a slave for Marco Pesaro, there would have been no story to tell, and this seems an excellent argument to the story-teller himself. Zeno's thoughts soon wandered from Pesaro and the letter, and followed the old thread of life in Venice, till it led his soul through the labyrinth of daily existence far out into the dreamland beyond; and the place of his dreams was a calm and resplendent water, where stately palaces rose through vapours of purple and gold against an evening sky. Over the lagoon came music of old chimes from San Giorgio, and the deeper bells of Venice answered back again; at the instant the sunset breeze floated off the land and breathed into the dyed sails of the Istrians without a sound, so that the boats began to move by magic, gliding out one by one with a soft, low rush, heard only for a moment, as of a woman's hand drawn across silk. The mere thought of Venice called up the vision of her before the inward eye of his heart; for he loved his native city better than he had ever loved any woman yet, and much better than his own life. When he could think of Venice, until the broad expanse of the lagoon seemed to spread itself over the deeper and darker waters of the Golden Horn, and when he could fancy himself at home, he was supremely and calmly happy, and would not have changed his dream for any reality except its own. CHAPTER II