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 the canal, high above the heads of the floating populace, their painted Saints and Madonnas shot luminously through by the level rays of the sun.

As the procession passed on down the quay, and the high priest drew near, bearing the Host under its embroidered canopy, the throngs on the fondamenta dropped on their knees to catch the scattered blessing, rising again, an instant later, one group after another, which gave to the line of figures an undulating motion, as of a long, sinuous body, coiling and uncoiling.

The pleasure of Vittorio's passengers was not a little heightened by the proximity of Nanni's old gondola, which lay only one boat's width removed from their own, and was filled to overflowing with the wives and children of his two gondolier brothers. The Signorinas were by this time on terms of intimacy with Vittorio's family, their chief pet among the children being the smallest boy, always spoken of by his adoring parents as the piccolo Gio-