Page:The Works of J. W. von Goethe, Volume 12.djvu/196

182 down there, as well as in the greater square, choked up, and full of water.

When a rainy day comes, the filth is intolerable: every one is cursing and scolding. In ascending and descending the bridges, one soils one's mantle and greatcoat (Tabarro), which is here worn all the year round; and, as one goes along in shoes and silk stockings, he gets splashed, and then scolds; for it is not common mud, but such as adheres and stains, that one is here splashed with. The weather soon becomes fine again, and then no one thinks of cleaning the streets. How true is the saying, the public is ever complaining that it is ill served, and never knows how to set about getting better served. Here, if the sovereign people wished it, it might be done forthwith.

This evening I ascended the Tower of St. Mark's. As I had lately seen from its top the lagunes in their glory at flood-time, I wished also to see them at low water; for, in order to have a correct idea of the place, it is necessary to take in both views. It looks strange to see land all around where there had previously been a mirror of waters. The islands are no longer islands, merely higher and house-crowned spots in one large morass of a gray-greenish colour, and intersected by beautiful canals. The marshy parts are overgrown with aquatic plants,—a circumstance which must tend, in time, to raise their level, although the ebb and flow are continually shaking and tossing them, and leave no rest to the vegetation.

I now return with my narrative once more to the sea. I there saw yesterday the haunts of the sea-snails, the limpets, and the crab, and was highly delighted with the sight. What a precious glorious object is a living thing! how wonderfully adapted to its state of existence, how true, how real (seyend)! What great advantages I now derive from my former studies of