Antonio witnessed this movement in silent curiosity; but when he saw the gondoliers of the state lying on their oars, he glanced his eye again furtively in the direction of Jacopo, saw that all was safe, and faced his companion with confidence. The brightness of the moon enabled him to distinguish the dress and aspect of a bare-footed Carmelite. The latter seemed more confounded than his companion, by the rapidity of the movement, and the novelty of his situation. Notwithstanding his confusion, however, an evident look of wonder crossed his mortified features when he first beheld the humble condition, the thin and whitened locks, and the general air and bearing of the old man with whom he now found himself. "Who art thou?" escaped him, in the impulse of surprise. "Antonio of the Lamines! A fisherman that owes much to St. Anthony, for favors little deserved." "And why hath one like thee fallen beneath the Senate's displeasure?" "I am honest and ready to do justice to others. If that offend the great, they are men more to be pitied than envied." "The convicted are always more disposed to believe themselves unfortunate than guilty. The error is fatal, and it should be eradicated from the mind, lest it lead to death." "Go tell this to the patricians. They have need of plain counsel, and a warning from the church." "My son, there is pride and anger, and a perverse heart in thy replies. The sins of the senators--and as they are men, they are not without spot--can in no manner whiten thine own. Though an unjust sentence should condemn one to punishment, it leaves the offences against God in their native deformity. Men may pity him who hath wrongfully undergone the anger of the world, but the church will only pronounce pardon on him who confesseth his errors, with a sincere admission of their magnitude." "Have you come, father, to shrive a penitent?" "Such is my errand. I lament the occasion, and if what I fear be true, still more must I regret that one so aged should have brought his devoted head beneath the arm of justice." Antonio smiled, and again he bent his eyes along that dazzling streak of light which had swallowed up the gondola and the person of the Bravo. "Father," he said, when a long and earnest look was ended, "there can be little harm in speaking truth to one of thy holy office. They have told thee there was a criminal here in the Lagunes, who hath provoked the anger of St. Mark?" "Thou art right." "It is not easy to know when St. Mark is pleased, or when he is not," continued Antonio, plying his line with indifference, "for the very man he now seeks has he long tolerated; aye, even in presence of the Doge. The Senate hath its reasons which lie beyond the reach of the ignorant, but it would have been better for the soul of the poor youth, and more seemly for the Republic, had it turned a discouraging countenance on his deeds from the first." "Thou speakest of another! thou art not then the criminal they seek!"