Saturday July 4, [1914], Venice,

There was a whirr at St. Marco and a 1000 pigeons swept round a shabby man with a pail containing refuse wheat. The clock in the tower at the corner struck 9 & the man began to scatter the grain while the pigeons fluttered round him and piled up 2 or 3 deep where the grain had been scattered. Ten minutes later it had all been eaten, breakfast was over and a more or less satisfied cooing sounded over the piazza. From this on they could expect only short lunches of corn or peas from visitors, supplied in paper cones by old men.

It is pleasant to loaf on a marble bench under the arcade of the Doge’s palace and look towards the water & crowds hurrying to take the steamers to the Lido, well dressed and holiday looking, largely girls with too high heels and too tight dresses; but also old and young women in the ugly black Venetian shawl with dangling tassels. Gondoliers wait for fares. Old men sell candies. Young men cry their daily paper. Priests and brown monks pass by. Two immaculate gendarmes pace by with dignity. ...

The row of gondolas at the water front all tilt to the same side. Off their balance like the church towers & the palace walls, all of which have a lurch or a bias.

— Notebook 18, 1914, pages 13 - 14