Venice, without the singing

We came into Venice at night, by gondola, out of the railway station, and I will say at once that it was the finest thing I had seen in Europe. The palaces came up out of the black water on both sides, with lamps in them, and the gondola went between them without a sound, like a hearse that had been to a good school. Then the gondolier began to sing.

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I had read about the singing gondoliers of Venice in poetry, where they sing like nightingales on the silver lagoon. Ours sang like a man who has been asked to sing and is not going to forgive you for it. He had one song, about a girl, and he sang it with his whole heart and none of his voice. I asked him to stop. He did not understand. I asked him in French. He sang it in French.

By day Venice is a little different. It is old, and it has been old a long time, and in places it has begun to sink politely into the water, the way an elderly lady sits down. The palaces are grand on the side that faces the canal and plain on the side that faces the alley, like a great many people. But the light on the water is beyond anything, and the churches are full of paintings, and every painting is by Tintoretto or Titian, or else the guide is not doing his work.

In Venice the streets are full of water and the people are full of wine, and between the two the visitor has nowhere to stand.

We spent six days there, and I could have spent six more, if somebody had muffled the gondoliers. I have been told they sing less now. I hope it is true. Venice is the one place in the world where the silence was the attraction.