Leaving the Piazzetta, and stepping into the gondola which has been waiting for us hard by, let us now go in search of other palaces; but let us not imagine that we are to see anything equal to the Ducal Palace. There is, it appears to me, a great gap between it and all other Venetian buildings; and yet all others seem to have been founded on it, or on the buildings out of which it grew. Their traceries, seldom absolutely alike, have still so much general similarity that at first one may well fancy that there is no variety at all; and, as I have before said, the general arrangement of their windows and doors is so nearly identical, that this impression is the more likely to grow upon the mind. We will not attempt to take the buildings as they come; but rather as we think of them, and to some extent in the order of their merit, let us note down a few of the glories of the domestic work of Venice. And first let us stop in this narrow canal, for we have by our side one of the most exquisite little pieces of detail in the whole city. It is an archway, simple and delicate in its proportions, lovely as it is simple, and appropriately placed hard by the bridge called “del Paradiso.” I trust that my sketch is clear enough to shew how pure and good the work is. The main points to be noted are the characteristic flatness of the details, and the line of dentil-moulding, which defines all the leading architectural features, originally invented for borders of incrustations at S. Mark’s, and here, as everywhere in Venice, used for decoration afterwards. The incrusted circles of marble on each side of the figure give great life to the spandrel beneath the arch, and the windows seen behind shew us a late example of the not unfrequent [Illustration: 29--ARCHWAY, PONTE DEL PARADISO, VENICE. Page 210] use of the semicircular and ogee arches together in the same window. Another precious fragment--the Palazzo San Giorgio, I believe--is reached from the land side by passing under an arch somewhat similar to that on the Ponte del Paradiso. This arch is turned between the upper stories of two houses at the end of a _calle_ properly yclept “dell’ arco detto bon,” and is finished with a steep gable. Beyond it is seen a fragment of wall veneered with marble, with the upper part of an early two-light window, and two circular medallions; and above this a piece of wall veneered in diamonds of red and white marble--so far as I know, a unique example of such a treatment. The window-head is of that earliest form of ogee, a circle just turned up to a point in the centre, which has so manifestly an Eastern origin, and which must not be confounded in date with our English ogee arches.