But at evening, in the most populous quarters, and those least invaded by strangers, the most unusual Good Friday custom is seen. The people of the quarter conduct a unique service of song, quite independent of the Church and at their own cost. They agree to sing the Passion of Our Lord, for which they use a chant with twenty-four verses. The necessary means are furnished by subscriptions of money, oil, wine, or anything that may be used in the celebration. At one end of the _calle_ a shrine is erected representing a temple, each part of which--pillars, pediment, and so {89} on--is outlined by small lamps; while in the centre of the shrine there is a gas-jet with its paler light. A crowd gathers before the little temple waiting for the music to begin, while every window within hearing distance is open and filled with listeners, who meantime gossip with the people in the street. Somewhere in the _calle_ there is sure to be a Madonna and Infant Jesus, who have on this day been carefully cleaned and trimmed with wreaths of flowers, long sprays of graceful vines, and bits of ribbon. When the leader of the singers begins the chant, all other sounds are hushed. Even the children know that they must now be quiet. The key-note being thus given, other voices join in; and each verse requires about three minutes for its rendering, and between the verses there is a pause of five or six minutes, when the chatter of the men and women and the pranks of the children are resumed, until again cut short by the voice of the leader. This is repeated until the twenty-four verses of sombre chant are sung in a manner much resembling ordinary psalm-singing elsewhere. The music over, the evening ends, as do all Venetian celebrations, with a supper at the nearest wine-shop. This singular observance of a day so sadly solemn elsewhere makes a curious impression at first on strangers who witness it, and is perhaps the most characteristic of all the public customs that one can observe in Venice. {90} CHAPTER VI. GRADENIGO, TIEPOLO, AND THE COUNCIL OF TEN. A new era was inaugurated in Venice by the fall of Constantinople. Prosperous and powerful as the Republic had previously been, it now sprang, as if by magic, into a position of which her most ambitious and far-seeing statesmen could not have dreamed. A little more than a quarter of a century had elapsed since the visit of Pope Alexander, at which time sixty-five thousand was the highest estimate that could be made of her population; now, at the end of the Fourth Crusade, her nominal sovereignty embraced millions of souls, and the actual numbers within the borders of the Republic itself had vastly increased. The new territory and the various rights and privileges which she had acquired in the Lower Empire had largely increased her commerce and the sources of her wealth, and she hastened to make all these advantages permanent by a liberal and wise system of colonization.