I looked proudly at her as she walked by my side. It is not the custom to offer one's arm to a lady in Venice, but simply to support her by grasping her elbow as you go up and down the white marble stairways which confront you whenever you cross a canal. Juliette was so graceful and lithe in all her movements that I took a childish delight in feeling her lean gently on my hand as we crossed the bridges. Everybody turned to look at her, and the women, who never take pleasure in another woman's beauty, observed with interest, at all events, the refinement of her dress and her bearing, which they would have been glad to copy. It seems to me that I can still see Juliette's costume and her graceful figure. She wore a gown of violet velvet with an ermine boa and small muff. Her white satin hat framed her face, which was still pale, but so exquisitely beautiful that, despite seven or eight years of fatigue and mental unhappiness, no one thought her more than eighteen. She wore violet silk stockings, so transparent that one could see through them the alabaster whiteness of her flesh. When she had passed and her face could no longer be seen, people followed with their eyes her tiny feet, so rare in Italy. I was happy to have her thus admired; I told her so, and she smiled at me with a sweet, affectionate expression. God! how happy I was! A gayly-decorated boat, filled with maskers and musicians, was coming along the Giudecca canal. I suggested to Juliette that we take a gondola and row near to it, to see the costumes. She assented. Several parties followed our example, and we soon found ourselves entangled in a group of gondolas and skiffs which, with ourselves, accompanied the decorated vessel and seemed to serve as an escort to it. [Illustration: _THE MEETING ON THE CANAL._ _A gayly-decorated boat filled with maskers and musicians was coming along the Giudecca Canal. I suggested to Juliette that we take a gondola and row near to it, to see the costumes. She assented._]