Meanwhile, against the barred doors of the Council Chambers, where those grave Signori were balloting and re-balloting with exemplary patience for the golden balls, the nuncio knocked again, breathless with his latest message sent in haste from the Holy See:  “The election of a new prince would be void, being made by a people under censure.”

But the law of Venice was ready with its decorous shield, and the message could not pass beyond.  The punctilious Signoria might give no audience in the days that intervened between Doge and Doge, except to receive that message of condolence which it had not entered the heart of his Holiness to frame, and the nuncio appealed in vain to other authorities in Venice to win him audience for the delivery of his sovereign’s mandate.

With whatever burnings of heart and secret hopes and ambitions those forty-one elected nobles, after days of weary, patient tossings of gold and silver balls—­a mere intricate child’s play had it not been for the greatness of the prize—­saw themselves closed within the chamber from which they might not issue forth until there was again a prince in Venice; with what vividness a Giustinian foresaw his own stern visage stamped on the coin of Venice in that moment when his name appeared on the first folded paper drawn from the fateful urn; with what dignity he concealed his baffled hope and watched, from under frowning eyebrows, a Morosini and a Ziani pass, in turn, through the fierce ordeal of relegation to obscurity—­the annals of that secret council do not reveal.

But in this stress of Venice the electors quitted themselves like true men, and when the noble Cavaliere Leonardo Donato—­full of dignity, of wisdom, and of honors, skilled in diplomacy and experience, and bold as wise—­came forth to scatter his coronation gift of coin in the Piazza, and after solemn religious ceremonial was shown from the pulpit of San Marco as Prince of Venice, well might the people shout in acclamation, “Provato!  Provato!” ("Approved!”) and the watching courts of Europe hasten to express, through their resident ambassadors, eager congratulations that one so fitted to fill the position with distinction had taken his place among the rulers.

But Orazio Mattei brought no message of congratulation from Rome.

XVII

Giustinian Giustiniani had been among the electors and had listened to that strict canvassing of acts, both private and official, which preceded the final vote for the Prince of Venetia.

“Venice hath taken stand before the courts of Europe with a leader who feareth naught—­save not to do the right,” he magnanimously assured the Lady Laura one evening when, according to their wont, they were discussing the theme which never failed in interest.  “Nay, not even that; for Donato hath courage in himself, and in his own rulings faith, and more a man needs not.”