We learn also from Sanudo that the Companions frequented the parlours of nunneries as well as the palaces of their noble relations and friends, and that in 1514, for instance, they played a comedy by Plautus in the convent of Santo Stefano. The Company of the ‘Sempiterni,’ the ‘Eternals,’ wished to give a performance of Pietro Aretino’s ‘Talanta’ in one of the monasteries, but this was more than the monks could endure, which will not surprise any one who has read Aretino’s works; they might as well have proposed to give one of Giordano Bruno’s obscene comedies; and perhaps they would, if he had then already lived and written. Refused by the monks, the Companions hired a part of an unfinished palace on the Canarregio for their performance. At first sight, what surprises us is the impunity enjoyed by these young gentlemen of pleasure, and we ask what the three ‘Wise Men on Blasphemy’ were doing. They were the Censors of the Republic, and it is amusing to note that they acted in regard to licensing plays precisely as the modern English government censorship does, for whereas they allowed a scandalous piece by Aretino to be performed unchallenged, they most strictly forbade the presentation of any biblical personage or subject on the stage. The stories of Judith, of Jephthah’s daughter, and of Samson were those of which the wise magistrates most particularly disapproved, I know not why. The first theatre Venice had was built by the Companions [Illustration: S. ZOBENIGO] in 1560 after the designs of Palladio, of wood, in the court of the monastery of the Carità, but after a few years it took fire, and the monastery itself was destroyed with it. I find that the Companions were great ‘racket’ players; but I apprehend that by ‘rackets’ the chroniclers intended to describe court tennis, which was played in Venice, whereas in most other Italian cities the game of ‘Pallone’ was the favourite, and has survived to our own time. It is played with a heavy ball which the player strikes with a sort of wooden glove, studded with blunt wooden pins and covering most of the forearm. To return to the question of the large freedom and impunity granted to the Club by the government, the reason of such license is not far to seek. Young men who spend their time in a ceaseless round of amusement do not plot to overthrow the government that tolerates them. The Signory, on the whole, protected the Companions even in their wildest excesses, and no doubt believed them to be much more useful members of society than they thought themselves, since their irrepressible gaiety and almost constant popularity helped to keep the people in a good humour in times of trouble and disturbance.