The central epoch of her life was past; the decay had already begun: I dated its commencement above (Ch. I., Vol. I.) from the death of Mocenigo. A year had not yet elapsed since that great Doge had been called to his account: his patriotism, always sincere, had been in this instance mistaken; in his zeal for the honor of future Venice, he had forgotten what was due to the Venice of long ago. A thousand palaces might be built upon her burdened islands, but none of them could take the place, or recall the memory, of that which was first built upon her unfrequented shore. It fell; and, as if it had been the talisman of her fortunes, the city never flourished again. SECTION XXVI. I have no intention of following out, in their intricate details, the operations which were begun under Foscari and continued under succeeding Doges till the palace assumed its present form, for I am not in this work concerned, except by occasional reference, with the architecture of the fifteenth century: but the main facts are the following. The palace of Ziani was destroyed; the existing facade to the Piazzetta built, so as both to continue and to resemble, in most particulars, the work of the Great Council Chamber. It was carried back from the Sea as far as the Judgment angle; beyond which is the Porta della Carta, begun in 1439, and finished in two years, under the Doge Foscari; [Footnote: "Tutte queste fatture si compirono sotto il dogade del Foscari, nel 1441."--_Pareri_, p. 131.] the interior buildings connected with it were added by the Doge Christopher Moro, (the Othello of Shakspeare) [Footnote: This identification has been accomplished, and I think conclusively, by my friend Mr. Rawdon Brown, who has devoted all the leisure which, during the last twenty years his manifold office of kindness to almost every English visitant of Venice have left him, in discovering and translating the passages of the Venetian records which bear upon English history and literature. I shall have occasion to take advantage hereafter of a portion of his labors, which I trust will shortly be made public.] in 1462.