For centuries these
confraternities of gondoliers who presided over the ferries, or
traghetti, of Venice had been corporations, self-governing, with
officers and endowments recognized by the Republic, and with a standard
of gondolier morals admirably defined in their codes--those "Mariegole"
which were luxuriously bound and printed, with capitals of vermilion, a
page here and there glowing like an illuminated missal with the legend
of the patron saint of the traghetto, wherein one might read such
admonitions as would make all men wiser.
But of late there had been much unruliness among the younger members of
the traghetti, and a growing inability among their officers to cope with
increasing difficulties, because of these barcarioli tosi, who lived in
open rebellion against this goodly system of law, poaching upon the
dearly bought rights of the traghetto gondoliers, yet escaping all
taxes. And because of the abuses which had been gradually undermining
the fair reputation of the established orders of the traghetti, the
Republic, by slow encroachments upon ancient concessions, was surely
reducing their wealth and independence.
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