lay down and slept on the bare ground near the Church of S. Apollinare. When rested he wandered on until he was received in the monastery of the Carità, where he served six months as a common scullion. A Venetian who had been on a pilgrimage to Rome recognised him. The Doge was advised and the Pope led to the palace in great pomp. To this day near the Church of S. Apollinare an inscription marks the legendary spot where “Alexander III. reposed when fleeing from the violence of Frederick the Emperor.” Frederick then bade the Venetians, so runs the fable, deliver up the fugitive or he would plant his eagles in St Mark, where they had never been before. To which the Doge retorted that the Venetians would not wait for him, and on learning that a fleet of seventy-five ships under the Emperor’s son, Otho, was under sail for Venice, set forth with thirty-four galleys, attacked the imperial fleet, captured forty vessels, sunk two, and made Otho prisoner. In the great scene before St Mark’s the Emperor was imagined lying prostrate on the ground, the Pope placing his heel on the imperial neck and saying: “I will tread on the asp and on the basilisk.” To which the Emperor objected: “Not to thee but to Peter”; to be quickly answered by the Pope: “Both to me and to Peter.” [Illustration: THE PIAZZETTA AND COLUMN OF S. MARK.] [Illustration: COLUMNS OF SS. MARK AND THEODORE] The festival of La Sensa was celebrated during the Pope’s stay at Venice. The pontiff on that occasion handed a consecrated ring to the Doge saying: “Receive this as a pledge of the sovereignty which you and your successors shall have in perpetuity over the sea.” Henceforth the ceremony was held with added magnificence, and became the greatest of the many pageants for which Venice was so famous. On his gilded barge, the Bucintoro, commanded by three admirals and many captains of the fleet, and impelled by the arms of one hundred and sixty shipwrights from the arsenal, four to each oar, stood the Doge surrounded by the Patriarch and clergy, the great officers of state and the foreign ambassadors, the standard of St Mark waving over their heads. A great procession of gilded galleys and gondolas bright with flags followed the Doge to the island of St Helena where a collation of peeled chestnuts and red wine was offered by the Bishop of Castello and his clergy, while the Doge presented damask roses in a silver cup. One he took himself and distributed the others to his suite. The Bucintoro then swept through the Porto of the Lido into the open Adriatic. The patriarch blessed the ring and handed it to the Doge who cast it into the sea pronouncing the formula: “Sea, we wed thee in token of our true and perpetual dominion over thee.” From the musicians’ gallery on the barge rang out a joyous theme, and the Doge returned to the Molo after having heard mass at S. Nicolo. In the evening a banquet was given at the palace to the admirals and the hundred masters of the arsenal, the