Better be whelmed beneath the waves, and shun, Even in Destruction's depth, her foreign foes," From whom Submission wrings an infamous repose.

XIV.

In youth She was all glory, a new Tyre,

Her very by-word sprung from Victory,

The "Planter of the Lion," which through fire
And blood she bore o'er subject Earth and Sea;

i. Even in Destruction's heart

-[MS. M.]

since its annexation to Italy, in 1866, a revival of trade and the re-establishment of the arsenal have brought back a certain measure of prosperity.]

1. That is, the Lion of St. Mark, the standard of the republic, which is the origin of the word Pantaloon-Piantaleone, Pantaleon, Pantaloon.

[The Venetians were nicknamed Pantaloni. Byron, who seems to have relied on the authority of a Venetian glossary, assumes that the "by-word " may be traced to the patriotism of merchant-princes" who were reputed to hoist flags with the Venetian lion waving to the breeze on every rock and barren headland of Levantine waters" (Memoirs of Count Carlo Gozzi, translated by J. Addington Symonds, 1890, Introd. part ii. p. 44), and that in consequence of this spread-eagleism the Venetians were held up to scorn by their neighbours as "planters of the lion "-a reproach which conveyed a tribute to their prowess. A more probable explanation is that the "by-word," with its cognates "Pantaleone," the typical masque of Italian comedy-progenitor of our "Pantaloon;" and "pantaloni," "pantaloons," the typical Venetian costume -derive their origin from the baptismal name " Pantaleone," frequently given to Venetian children, in honour of St. Pantaleon of Nicomedia, physician and martyr, whose cult was much in vogue in Northern Italy, and especially in Venice, where his relics, which "coruscated with miracles," were the object of peculiar veneration.

St. Pantaleon was known to the Greek Church as Пavтeλehμwv, that is, the “all-pitiful ;" and in Latin his name is spelled Pantaleymon and Pantaleemon. Hagiologists seem to have been puzzled, but the compiler of the Acta Sanctorum,

Though making many slaves, Herself still free,
And Europe's bulwark 'gainst the Ottomite;1
Witness Troy's rival, Candia !2 Vouch it, ye
Immortal waves that saw Lepanto's fight! 3
For ye are names no Time nor Tyranny can blight.

XV.

Statues of glass-all shivered-the long file
Of her dead Doges are declined to dust;
But where they dwelt, the vast and sumptuous pile
Bespeaks the pageant of their splendid trust;

Their sceptre broken, and their sword in rust,
Have yielded to the stranger: empty halls,

for July 27, St. Pantaleon's Day in the Roman calendar (xxxiii. 397-426), gives the preference to Pantaleon, and explains that he was hailed as Pantaleemon by a divine voice at the hour of his martyrdom, which proclaimed "eum non amplius esse vocandum Pantaleonem, sed Pantalee

The accompanying woodcut is the reproduction of the frontispiece of a black-letter tract, composed by Augustinus de Cremâ, in honour of the "translation" of one of the sainted martyr's arms to Crema, in Lombardy. It was printed at Cremona, in 1493.]

1. Shakespeare is my authority for the word "Ottomite " for Ottoman. "Which Heaven hath forbid the Ottomites" (see Othello, act ii. sc. 3, line 161).—[MS. D.]

2. ["On 29th September (1669) Candia, and the island of Candia, passed away from Venice, after a defence which had lasted twenty-five years, and was unmatched for bravery in the annals of the Republic."-Venice, an Historical Sketch, by Horatio F. Brown, 1893, p. 378.]

3. ["The battle of Lepanto [October 7, 1571] lasted five hours. . . . The losses are estimated at 8000 Christians and 30,000 Turks. . . . The chief glory of the victory rests with Sebastian Veniero and the Venetians."-- Venice, etc., 1893, p. 368.]

Thin streets, and foreign aspects, such as must
Too oft remind her who and what enthrals,7H
Have flung a desolate cloud o'er Venice' lovely walls.

XVI.

When Athens' armies fell at Syracuse,

And fettered thousands bore the yoke of war,
Redemption rose up in the Attic Muse,1

Her voice their only ransom from afar :
See! as they chant the tragic hymn, the car

Of the o'ermastered Victor stops-the reins

Fall from his hands-his idle scimitar

Starts from its belt-he rends his captive's chains,

And bids him thank the Bard for Freedom and his

strains.ii.

XVII.

Thus, Venice! if no stronger claim were thine,

Were all thy proud historic deeds forgot

i. And won her hopeless children from afar.-[MS. M., D. erased.] ii. And sends him ransomeless to bless his poet's strains.—[MS. M.] or, And sends him home to bless the poet for his strains.

[MS. D. erased.]

1. [The story is told in Plutarch's Life of Nicias, cap. xxix. (Plut. Vit., Lipsiæ, 1813, v. 154). "The dramas of Euripides were so popular throughout all Sicily, that those Athenian prisoners who knew . . . portions of them, won the affections of their masters. . . I cannot refrain from mentioning this story, though I fear its trustworthiness . . . is much inferior to its pathos and interest."-Grote's History of Greece, 1869, vii. 186.]