Each gondolier had suffered the bows of his boat to incline slightly towards the left shore of the canal, as the jockey is seen, at the starting-post, to turn his courser aside, in order to repress its ardor, or divert its attention.  But the first long and broad sweep of the oar brought them all in a line again, and away they glided in a body.

For the first few minutes there was no difference in speed, nor any sign by which the instructed might detect the probable evidence of defeat or success.  The whole ten, which formed the front line, skimmed the water with an equal velocity, beak to beak, as if some secret attraction held each in its place, while the humble, though equally light bark of the fisherman steadily kept its position in the rear.

The boats were soon held in command.  The oars got their justest poise and widest sweep, and the wrists of the men accustomed to their play.  The line began to waver, It undulated, the glittering prow of one protruding beyond the others; and then it changed its form.  Enrico of Fusina shot ahead, and, privileged by success, he insensibly sheered more into the centre of the canal, avoiding by the change the eddies, and the other obstructions of the shore.  This manoeuvre which, in the language of the course, would have been called “taking the track,” had the additional advantage of throwing upon those who followed some trifling impediment from the back-water.  The sturdy and practised Bartolomeo of the Lido, as his companions usually called him, came next, occupying the space on his leader’s quarter, where he suffered least from the reaction caused by the stroke of his oar.  The gondolier of Don Camillo, also, soon shot out of the crowd, and was seen plying his arms vigorously still farther to the right, and a little in the rear of Bartolomeo.  Then came in the centre of the canal, and near as might be in the rear of the triumphant waterman of the main, a dense body, with little order and varying positions, compelling each other to give way, and otherwise increasing the difficulties of their struggle.  More to the left, and so near to the palaces as barely to allow room for the sweep of his oar, was the masked competitor, whose progress seemed retarded by some unseen cause, for he gradually fell behind all the others, until several boats’ lengths of open water lay between him and even the group of his nameless opponents.  Still he plied his arms steadily, and with sufficient skill.  As the interest of mystery had been excited in his favor, a rumor passed up the canal, that the young cavalier had been little favored by fortune in the choice of a boat.  Others, who reflected more deeply on causes, whispered of the folly of one of his habits taking the risk of mortification by a competition with men whose daily labor had hardened their sinews, and whose practice enabled them to judge closely of every chance of the race.  But when the eyes of the multitude turned from the cluster of passing boats to the solitary barge of the fisherman, who came singly on in the rear, admiration was again turned to derision.