Thus runs the story of the old women; but there are other explanations of the name of this old house, which even now bears traces of its former beauty, though the whole edifice is going to wrack and ruin. A second {173} story is quite as gruesome as the first, since it says that here dead bodies were brought by medical students, and autopsies made before they were buried in San Michele, which is very near. This is the view adopted by J. A. Symonds, who says:-- "Yonder square white house, standing out to sea, fronting Murano and the Alps, they call the Casa degli Spiriti. No one cares to inhabit it; for here, in old days, it was the wont of the Venetians to lay their dead for a night's rest before their final journey to the graveyard of S. Michele. So many generations of dead folk had made that house their inn, that it is now no fitting house for living men." But a pleasanter explanation is, that long ago an artistic and literary society held its meetings here, and from the _beaux esprits_ who habitually gathered beneath its roof, it came to be called the Casa degli Spiriti. Perhaps the most amusing Venetian ghost-story is that of the parish priest of San Marcuola, who declared his disbelief in ghosts in a sermon, and exclaimed, "Where the dead are, there they stay!" This made the ghosts of those who had been buried in San Marcuola very indignant, and they revenged themselves by going at night, in a body, to the chamber of this priest, whom they dragged out of bed, tossed about, and soundly thrashed for the insult he had put on them. Meantime, while this story-telling has gone on, it has grown quite dark, and as we come into the canals, the calls, _Stalì_, _Premè_, are very frequent. These cries of the gondoliers are curiously startling, especially at night; but the celerity with which they are obeyed, and the narrow escapes from accidents, prove their usefulness. _Stalir_ means go to the right; _Premier_, go to the left; and _Sciar_, or _Siar_, means that the boat is to be stopped by turning the flat side of the oar against the current. Monckton Milnes prettily explains this in his verses:-- {174} "When along the light ripple the far serenade Has accosted the ear of each passionate maid, She may open the window that looks on the stream,-- She may smile on her pillow and blend it in dream; Half in words, half in music, it pierces the gloom, 'I am coming--stalì--but you know not for whom! Stalì--not for whom!' "Now the tones become clearer,--you hear more and more How the water divided returns on the oar,-- Does the prow of the gondola strike on the stair? Do the voices and instruments pause and prepare? Oh! they faint on the ear as the lamp on the view, 'I am passing--premè--but I stay not for you! Premè--not for you!'