Page:Historic Girls.djvu/157

Rh Giacomo, Messer Andrea Cornaro, the uncle of Catarina, came to Cyprus to inspect and improve the lands belonging to his brother Marco.

Venice, in those days was so gteat a power that the Venetian merchants were highly esteemed in all the courts of Europe. And Uncle Andrea, who had probably loaned the new king of Cyprus a goodly store of Venetian ducats, became quite friendly with the young monarch, and gave him much sage advice.

One day—it seemed as if purely by accident, but those old Venetians were both shrewd and farseeing—Uncle Andrea, talking of the glories of Venice, showed to King Giacomo a picture of his niece, Catarina Cornaro, then a beautiful girl of fourteen.

King Giacomo came of a house that was quick to form friendships and antipathies, loves and hates. He "fell violently in love with the picture,"—so the story goes,—and expressed to Andrea Cornaro his desire to see and know the original.

"That face seemeth strangely familiar, Messer Cornaro," he said.

He held the portrait in his hands, and seemed struggling with an uncertain memory. Suddenly his face lighted up, and he exclaimed joyfully:

So; I have it! Messer Cornaro, I know your niece."