The Italian temper is known to be both hot and hasty; but the
temper of oriental Cyprus is even more fiery, and so it was not
surprising that, in this most one-sided fray, the fun soon became
fighting in earnest; for anger begets anger.
All about the young prince was a tossing throng of restless and
angry boys, while the beleaguered lad, still standing at bay,
flourished a wicked-looking stiletto above his head and answered
taunt with taunt.
At this instant the door of the Cornaro Palace opened quickly,
and the Prince Giacomo felt himself drawn bodily within; while a
bright-faced young girl with flashing eye and defiant air
confronted his greatly surprised tormentors.
"Shame, shame upon you, boys of Venice," she cried, "thus to
ill-use a stranger in your town! Is a score of such as you
against one poor lad the boasted chivalry of Venice? Eh via! the
very fisher-lads of Mendicoli could teach you better ways!"
Taken quite aback by this sudden apparition and these stinging
words, the boys dispersed with scarce an attempt to reply, and
all the more hastily because they spied, coming up the Grand
Canal, the gorgeous gondola of the Companions of the Stocking, an
association of young men under whose charge and supervision all
the pageants and displays of old Venice were given.
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