Page:A History of Architecture in All Countries Vol 2.djvu/379

Rh bk. vin. c'H. IV. VENICE. di]"" )o The largest and most prominent civic example of Venetian Gothic is the Doge's Palace, commenced in 1354 (Woodcut No. 792), a build- ing which all the world agreed till very lately in thinking very ugly, though an attempt has recently been made to exalt it above the Parthenon, and all that was great and beautiful in Greece, Egypt, or Gothic Europe. There are indeed few buildings of which it is so difficult to judge calmly, situated as it is, attached to the basilica of vM-^i-h^r H^;-f+^{=*<« MifMm - 1 1 I I 1 792. Central Part of the Fa9ade of the Doge's Palace, Venice. (Prom Cicognara.) St. Mark, facing the beautiful library of Sansovino, and looking on the one hand into the piazza of St. Mark's, and on the other across the water to the churches and palaces that cover the islands. It is, in fact, the centre of the most beautiful architectural group that adorns any city of Europe or of the world — richer than almost any other building in historical associations, and in a locality hallowed, espe- cially to an Englishman, by the poetry of Shakespeare. All this