During the music all these devoted people listened
attentively, and at the end, the ladies lapsed back into their chairs and
fanned themselves, while the gentlemen walked up and down the floor of
their cell, and stopped, two by two, at the door of the ladies' room,
glanced mournfully athwart the moral barrier which divided them, and sadly
and dejectedly turned away. Amazed at this singular species of social
enjoyment, I inquired afterward, of a Venetian lady, if evening parties in
Venice were usually such ordeals, and was discouraged to learn that what I
had seen was scarcely an exaggeration of prevailing torments. Commonly
people do not know each other, and it is difficult for the younger to
procure introductions; and when there is previous acquaintance, the
presence of some commanding spirit is necessary to break the ice of
propriety, and substitute enjoyment for correctness of behavior. Even at
dancing parties, where it would seem that the poetry of motion might do
something to soften the rigid bosom of Venetian deportment, the poor young
people separate after each dance, and take each sex its appointed prison,
till the next quadrille offers them a temporary liberation.
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