“I am sworn to sobriety.  Is thy vessel ready, as wont, for the errand?”

“Is the senate as ready with its money?  This is the fourth of my voyages in their service; and they have only to look into their own secrets to know the manner in which the work hath been done.”

“They are content, and thou hast been well rewarded.”

“Say it not.  I have gained more gold by one lucky shipment of fruits from the isles than by all their night-work.  Would those who employ me give a little especial traffic on the entrance of the felucca, there might be advantage in the trade.”

“There is nothing which St. Mark visits with a heavier punishment than frauds on his receipts.  Have a care with thy wines, or thou wilt lose not only thy bark and thy voyage, but thy liberty!”

“This is just the ground of my complaint, Signor Roderigo.  Rogue and no rogue, is the Republic’s motto.  Here they are as close in justice as a father amid his children; and there it is better that what is done should be done at midnight.  I like not the contradiction, for just as my hopes are a little raised by what I have witnessed, perhaps a little too near, they are all blown to the winds by such a frown as San Gennero himself might cast upon a sinner.”

“Remember thou art not in thy wide Mediterranean, but on a canal of Venice.  This language might be unsafe, were it heard by less friendly ears.”

“I thank thee for thy care, though the sight of yonder old palace is as good a hint to the loose tongue as the sight of a gibbet on the sea-shore to a pirate.  I met an ancient fellow in the Piazzetta about the time the masquers came in, and we had some words on this matter.  By his tally every second man in Venice is well paid for reporting what the others say and do.  ’Tis a pity, with all their seeming love of justice, good Roderigo, that the senate should let divers knaves go at large; men, whose very faces cause the stones to redden with anger and shame!”

“I did not know that any such were openly seen in Venice; what is secretly done may be favored for a time, through difficulty of proof, but—­”

“Cospetto!  They tell me the councils have a short manner of making a sinner give up his misdeeds.  Now, here is the miscreant Jacopo.  What aileth thee, man?  The anchor on which thou leanest is not heated.”

“Nor is it of feathers; one’s bones may ache from its touch, without offence, I hope.”

“The iron is of Elba, and was forged in a volcano.  This Jacopo is one that should not go at large in an honest city, and yet is he seen pacing the square with as much ease as a noble in the Broglio!”

“I know him not.”

“Not to know the boldest hand and surest stiletto in Venice, honest Roderigo, is to thy praise.  But he is well marked among us of the port, and we never see the man but we begin to think of our sins, and of penances forgotten.  I marvel much that the inquisitors do not give him to the devil on some public ceremony, for the benefit of small offenders!”