A few yards through the cloister bring us to the church of Sta. Fosca. Here by the side of the Romanesque we have a capital example of a Byzantine plan, which seems to me to be of the greatest value in connection with the whole of the round-arched palaces of Venice of which so many remains still exist. Sta. Fosca is a square church with small projections on the north, south, and west sides, and a deeper projection for the altar on the east. There are three eastern apses, and the western side is screened by an open cloister, which is octagonal in plan. The square centre is domed on very simple pendentives, and the capitals are similar in character to those in the cathedral. The best detail is to be seen outside the east end, where there is some good arcading and an enriched band of chevron ornament, formed by recessing the brickwork, and a mixture of red and buff brickwork, which is very effective. The last time I was here, I found myself, in the middle of making a sketch of the west front of Sta. Fosca, suddenly struck by the strange likeness of its octagonal cloister to the most typical elevations of the Byzantine palaces in Venice. These always have a centre and wings divided by piers; and whilst the arches in the centre are of ordinary proportions, those in the wings are narrow and considerably stilted. In Sta. Fosca precisely the same effect is produced by the elevation of the three sides of the octagonal cloister, two of them being reduced in width and seeming to have narrow stilted arches, owing to their being canted and not seen in true elevation. I confess I could hardly help thinking that here I saw the accidental germ of an arrangement which, commenced in Romanesque or Byzantine buildings, was imitated in many of the finest of the Gothic palaces, and was revived with invariable persistency in the Renaissance. [Illustration: EAST END--STA. FOSCA, TORCELLO.] The return to Venice was more pleasant than the journey out had been. The water had risen enough to cover the mud everywhere, and now a vast expanse of apparent sea was lighted up by the hot sun, and in the far-off distance the horizon was lined with the long picturesque range of the Alps, tender and transparent in hue, and sweet reminders to the dwellers on this monotonous lagoon of the world which lay outside their boundaries in the far north. On the road we stopped at Mazzorbo, where there is a dated example of a Gothic doorway. This has a square-headed opening, and above this an ogee canopy or label over a figure of Our Lord, and some kneeling figures. The date inscribed on it is A.D. 1368.