HISTORY OF GREECE UNDER OTHOMAN AND VENETIAN DOMINATION. AD. 1453 — 1821

 

CHAPTER IV.

Venetian Domination in Greece, a. d. 1684-1718.

 

The ambassadors of the Christian powers were never treated with greater contempt at the Sublime Porte than after the conquest of Candia. The sultan’s government complained, and not without reason, that no treaty of peace with a Christian monarch afforded any guarantee for its faithful observance. While the ambassador of France boasted that his sovereign had always been the firmest ally of the sultan, French corsairs levied ransom-money from the towns in Greece, and made slaves of the Mohammedan subjects of the sultan. Frenchmen, too, as Knights of Malta, were active in carrying on an incessant warfare against the Otho­man flag over the whole surface of the Mediterranean. Matters were not very different with the other Christian powers; nor was peace better observed by land than by sea. On the frontiers of Poland, Hungary, and Dalmatia, bands of organized troops called Cossacks, Haiduks, and Morlachs, made frequent forays into the Othoman territory. In vain the sultan’s ministers required the emperor of Germany, the King of Poland, and the republic of Venice to put a stop to these invasions; their complaints became the subject of interminable discussions, in which the Christian governments displayed their weakness and bad faith by attempting to repudiate all responsibility for these acts of hostility, on the ground that they were committed by bands of lawless brigands; or else they excused them by asserting that the acts of brigandage committed by the Christians were in revenge for similar deeds of Othoman subjects. If the asser­tion was true, it appears that the Porte paid more attention to the sufferings of the plundered Mussulmans than the Christian governments paid to the calamities of their subjects. Indeed, the feelings of the Othomans were so much excited by the incessant hostilities to which they were exposed, that the sultan was compelled to demand explanations from all his Christian neighbours. The Othoman ministers assumed a menacing tone in their intercourse with Christian ambassadors; and then they very soon discovered that the diplomatic agents of their most formidable enemies were disposed to submit to a great deal of insolence rather than involve their country in war.

The tyrannical government of the house of Austria had caused such widespread discontent in Hungary, by its fiscal exactions and bigoted treatment of the Protestants, that there was some danger of hostilities in that country ending in the total loss of the kingdom. More than one-half of Hungary was already annexed to the Othoman empire; and it seemed not improbable that the inhabitants of the remainder might prefer Turkish toleration to German tyranny.

The republic of Venice was so intent on preserving its commercial relations with the Levant, as a means of recruiting its finances after the great expenditure caused by the war of Candia, that it bore many insults on the part of the Porte with patience, and rarely uttered a complaint, except when some act of the sultan’s officers seemed likely to circumscribe the trade and diminish the gains of its subjects.

The deportment of the other Christian powers at Constantinople did not increase the consideration in which they were held. The ambassadors of France made several displays of petulance and presumption, which the Othomans repressed with insolence and scorn. Many scandalous scenes occurred. The son of M. de la Haye, the French ambassador, was bastinadoed by the Turks, and his father imprisoned. Louis XIV sent M. Blondel as envoy-extraordinary to demand satisfaction for the insult; but this envoy could not gain admittance to Sultan Mohammed IV, and returned to France without delivering his sovereign’s letter. Some time after, the younger de la Haye, who had received the bastinado, became himself ambassador, and conducted himself in such a manner at his first meeting with the grand-vizier, that he was pushed off the stool on which he was seated, and beaten by the grand-vizier’s attendants. The marquis of Nointel, who was sent to Constantinople in 1670 to repair the imprudences of his predecessors, distinguished himself rather by ostentation and petulance than by prudent and dignified conduct. He had far more violent disputes with the grand-vizier Kara Mustapha concerning the position of his seat in the audience-chamber, than concerning the trade of French subjects or the political interests of France. The lavish expenditure by which he sought to maintain his pretensions involved him in debt, and made him descend to several very mean expedients in order to obtain money. He borrowed large sums from Constantinopolitan Jews, and when his credit was exhausted, he compelled the French merchants of Pera, by an unwarranted exercise of his authority, to supply him with funds. These proceedings formed a shameful contrast with his public displays, and did not tend to increase the respect of the Turks for the agents of the great monarchs of Christendom.

The eagerness with which the ambassadors of the Christian powers intrigued and bribed, in order to overreach one another at the Porte, the importance they attached to sitting in an arm-chair in public, and the tricks they made use of to obtain exclusive privileges, led the Turks to conclude that the Christian character was a very despicable compound of childish folly and extreme selfishness. The Othoman ministers, acting on this persuasion, treated the representatives of the Christian powers at Constantinople with contempt, and made the commerce of Christian nations the object of frequent exactions.

These circumstances were operating to produce a collision between the sultan and his Christian neighbours when Achmet Kueprili, who had been grand-vizier for fifteen years, died, at the early age of forty-one, A.D. 1676, leaving the Othoman empire at the greatest extent it attained. Achmet was as remarkable for his honourable conduct as for his great talents. He was a lover of justice, and a hater of presents, which he knew were one of the great sources of corruption in Turkey. Kara Mustapha succeeded this great man as grand­vizier. He was distinguished by his excessive cupidity and insolence, as Achmet had been by his extraordinary disinterestedness and prudence. The rapid degradation of the Othoman character, and the decline of the empire, date from his accession to office. The negotiations of the Porte with foreign governments were employed by Kara Mustapha as a means of gratifying his avarice and extorting money. His presumption was as unbounded as his avarice was sordid. At the first audience he gave to the French ambassador, one of those scandalous scenes happened which we have seen reacted with a more tragical afterpiece by a Russian prince. M. de Nointel was offended at the position of his seat at an audience, and when he insisted on having his seat placed on the same level as the sofa of the grand-vizier, he was turned out of the room by his shoulders, the tshaous shouting as he pushed him along, “March off, infidel!”

A few examples of the exactions of Kara Mustapha give a faithful portrait of the state of the Othoman administration. The republic of Ragusa was under the protection of the sultan, and paid an annual tribute to the Porte. The city had been almost entirely destroyed by an earthquake in 1666, and envoys were sent to Constantinople to represent the impoverished state of the republic, and solicit a remission of the tribute. To this petition Kara Mustapha replied by immediately demanding payment of a sum of three hundred purses, or one hundred and fifty thousand dollars, on account of the additional amount of customs which Othoman subjects had paid in the port of Ragusa during the war of Candia, when they were excluded from trading in the other ports of the Adriatic. The envoys were thrown into prison, and threatened with torture; but, after a year’s imprisonment, the matter was compounded by the republic paying one hundred and twenty purses or sixty thousand dollars.

The Dutch ambassador Collier was compelled to pay a large sum to prevent the trade of Holland from being interrupted.

The Venetian bailo, Cuirana, having smuggled some valuable merchandise into his residence in order to defraud the Porte of the legal duty, was obliged to compound for his misconduct by paying the grand-vizier thirty thousand dollars. On the arrival of a new bailo, Morosini, new disputes occurred, in consequence of some Christian slaves making their escape on board the Venetian galleys in the port. These disputes were again arranged by paying the sum of fifty thousand dollars, which was distributed among the grand-vizier and the principal agents of his party. Again, when the news reached Constantinople that a number of Turks had been slain in a foray on the Dalmatian frontier, the bailo of Venice was imprisoned in the Seven Towers, and not released until the republic paid the sum of two hundred thousand dollars as indemnity.

The Genoese resident, Spinola, was accused of circulating forged coin, and he was compelled to pay the Porte five thousand dollars before he could obtain the permission to embark for Genoa. On a previous occasion he had paid a large sum as a bribe, because he established a manufactory of brandy, and a cellar for the sale of wine, in his residence.

The position of the French ambassador’s seat, at his audience with the grand-vizier, was frequently a question of State between the court of France and the Sublime Porte. Kara Mustapha persisted in denying to M. de Guilleragues the privilege of sitting on the soffra. The French submitted to this indignity, but even by their obsequiousness they could not escape the exactions of the Othoman government. Eight ships, belonging to the corsairs of Tripoli in Africa, having been pursued by a French squadron under Admiral Duquesne, sought refuge in the port of Scio, where they were fired on by the French, whose shot did considerable damage to the town, and killed several Mussulmans. The grand-vizier, who availed himself of every opportunity to fill his coffers, demanded an indemnity of three hundred and fifty thousand crowns from the French ambassador for this wanton act of hostility, and threatened to send him to the Seven Towers. After a few days’ detention, M. de Guilleragues signed an agreement to pay a present to the Porte, and was released. A good deal of bargaining was required to fix the amount of the present, and the manner in which it was to be presented to the Porte. At length the secretary of embassy and the dragoman presented themselves with articles valued at sixty thousand dollars; a curtain was suddenly drawn up, and the representatives of France found themselves in the presence of the sultan, who was seated on an elevated throne. The imperial usher then proclaimed, "Behold the agents sent by the King of France to make satisfaction for the misconduct of his ships at Scio", and the different articles were mentioned, with the value attached to each.

The English ambassador was exposed to even severer pecuniary exactions than the French. The Turkey Company was accused of having imported an immense quantity of Venetian lion-dollars, of base alloy, into Aleppo. Though the accusation appears to have been false, the, Turkey merchants preferred paying the grand-vizier a bribe of seventeen thousand dollars rather than engage in a contest which must have entailed great loss, and, from the notorious venality of the Othoman administration, no decision would have established their innocence, unless their commercial character in their general dealings had refuted the accusation.

Another device of Kara Mustapha to extort money from the English was singularly mean, but completely successful, on account of that very meanness which none could have suspected. Sir John Finch, the ambassador, was requested to send the capitulations, as the treaties between England and the sultan are called, to be examined at the Porte. He complied, and was then informed that a new treaty was necessary, which always required a number of presents. The ambassador protested that he was satisfied with the existing capitulations, and asked for their restoration in vain. Kara Mustapha ordered every obstruction to be thrown in the way of English trade, and the losses to which the merchants were exposed were so great that, to avoid further exactions, they furnished the ambassador with twenty-five thousand dollars to bribe the grand-vizier to restore the capitulations. A new ambassador, Lord Chandos, was specially instructed to complain of this exaction, and, to avoid exposure, Kara Mustapha deemed it prudent to restore the money, but other grounds were discovered for compelling the English merchants to leave the greater part of the sum in his hands.

The avarice and injustice of Kara Mustapha were so notorious that Suleiman, who was afterwards himself grand­-vizier, said during his predecessor’s vizirate, “In this man’s time the true believers cannot expect better usage than the infidels.”

The tameness with which the European powers submitted to the insolence and extortions of the grand-vizier increased his pride. When their subjects complained, he replied, “Do you not breathe the sultan’s air, and will you pay nothing for the privilege?”. At length he made the affairs of Hungary a pretext for commencing war with Austria. His presumption led him to believe that he would find no difficulty in adding Vienna to the sultan’s dominions, and, with all his incapacity, he would probably have succeeded, from the greater incapacity of the German emperor, had the house of Austria not been saved by the Poles. The first campaign was signalized by the memorable siege of Vienna, the victory of John Sobieski, and the death of Kara Mustapha, who was strangled as a punishment for his bad success, A. D. 1683.

When the republic of Venice saw that the army of the grand-vizier had been completely destroyed by the disastrous campaign of 1683, the senate considered that an immediate war with the sultan would be the best policy. The sacrifices Venice had made to preserve peace, both of money and dignity, were always met by fresh displays of insolence and new exactions on the part of the Othoman government, so that sooner or later the republic felt that it would be compelled to make a stand and defend itself by arms. It seemed, therefore, more prudent to seize the present moment for weakening the resources of its enemy, by attacking him in the south while all his best troops were employed on his northern frontier, than to wait supinely until he found leisure to choose his own time for commencing hostilities with Venice, as he had done with Austria. The Pope joined the Emperor of Germany and the King of Poland, in urging the republic to form an alliance for prosecuting the war against the Mohammedans in concert. Many allusions were made to the glorious victory of Lepanto, allusions which must have suggested to Venetian statesmen the trifling results of that great battle, and convinced them that in the war they were about to undertake, their only hope of success ought to be placed in their own resources. An offensive and defensive treaty was concluded between the republic, the Emperor of Germany, and the King of Poland, under the guarantee of Pope Innocent XI. In the month of July 1684, Capello, the Venetian resident at Constantinople, presented himself at the Porte, and communicated the declaration of war to the kaimakam, the grand-vizier being at Adrianople with the sultan. As soon as he had executed his commission, he disguised himself as a sailor, and escaped on board a French ship.

The war which now commenced was the most successful the republic ever carried on against the Othoman empire, yet it affords signal evidence that both the machine of government and the energy of the people had suffered greater deterioration among the Venetians than even among the Otho- mans. The glory acquired by Venice, and the conquests she gained, must be ascribed entirely to one great man, whose influence remedied the defects in the administration, and whose character supplied its wants. Francesco Morosini, who had been elevated to the dignity of Knight and Procurator of Saint Mark for his valour in the war of Candia, was subsequently accused of having betrayed his country’s interests when he concluded the peace which surrendered to the sultan an untenable fortress. He was honourably acquitted, but during fifteen years of peace his former services were depreciated, and he lived retired as one of the common herd of princely nobles in Venice. When, however, it was again necessary to meet the Othomans in battle, all men remembered the bloody contests of the former war and the indomitable courage of Morosini. The dignified behaviour of the patriotic general at last received its reward, and Francesco Morosini, now sixty-six years of age, was intrusted with the chief command of the forces of the republic as captain-general.

Morosini occupies so conspicuous a place in the history of Greece as well as Venice, that his private character deserves to be noticed in order that his public career may be better understood. Though he was wealthy and noble, he had passed the best years of his youth and manhood at sea. From his twentieth to his forty-third year he had been constantly engaged in active service on board the Venetian fleet, where he had gained great honour by his enterprise and daring. His mind was firm and equable; his perseverance was not inferior to his courage, yet he was neither rash nor obstinate; his constitution was vigorous and healthy; his personal appearance was dignified and his countenance cheerful; his manner bold, and somewhat haughty; his language frank and rough, or grave and courteous, according to the rank of his associates; his naval and military skill of a high order, and improved by long experience in the Othoman wars. His career proves that he possessed considerable knowledge of administrative and warlike science, but his campaigns seem also to indicate that he was not endowed with high strategical prescience. The military and naval operations under his direction were not sufficiently combined, nor were his campaigns marked by that unity of purpose which attains a definite object by regular progress. We must, however, always bear in mind that the armies he commanded were comparatively small, that his power over the best part of his land forces was limited by conventions, that he could not act without consulting a council of war, and that his plans were controlled by a jealous senate. It need not, therefore, excite our wonder if his mind turned habitually from the contemplation of enlarged views to the attainment of immediate advantages. The impatience of successful results is one of the evils of controlling distant military operations by numerous assemblies, whether aristocratical or democratical. Party objections and ignorant criticism have so much scope for their activity, that generals under such control must secure every trifling success, even though the insignificant victory entails the sacrifice of some greater results, which steady perseverance, patient progress, and long delay could alone have gained.

The naval forces of Venice, at the commencement of the war, consisted of a well-appointed fleet of ten galleasses, thirty ships of the line, and thirty galleys, besides a number of smaller vessels. The army, on the other hand, was in a neglected condition; the regular troops amounted to only eight thousand, and they were by no means in good order or well disciplined. The provincial militia, though nu­merous, and generally well armed, could hardly be made available for foreign service. The revenues of the republic did not greatly exceed two millions of sequins. With these limited resources Venice engaged in a contest with the Othoman empire.

It was of the greatest importance to Venice to follow up the declaration of war by some great success, before the Othoman government had time to reinforce its garrisons in Dalmatia and Greece. In both these countries military operations were carried on with activity, but those which relate to Greece alone require to be noticed in this work. It was by conquests in Greece that the Venetians expected to acquire such an increase of revenue as would indemnify the republic for the expenditure of the war. This consideration, and not the ambition of becoming the conqueror of Sparta and Athens, induced Morosini to recommend Greece as the chief field of military operations. He opened the campaign of 1684 by laying siege to Santa Maura. The attack was pushed with vigour, and the place surrendered in sixteen days (6th August). This conquest was of primary importance for the prosecution of hostilities against the Morea, and for the security of Venetian commerce, Santa Maura being one of the principal places of refuge for the Barbary corsairs who infested the entrance of the Adriatic. As Prevesa might have performed the same office, Morosini followed up his first success by besieging that place, which fell into his hands on the 29th of September. A plundering expedition into Acarnania, the destruction of five Turkish villages, and the capture of a few slaves, occupied the fleet and army during the interval between the capture of Santa Maura and the attack on Prevesa. At this early period of the war, disease began to make great havoc in the ranks of the Venetians, and it seems to have increased in intensity in every succeeding campaign. Count Strasoldo, the general of the land forces, was one of its victims.

In order to prosecute hostilities with vigour, the senate found that it was necessary to augment the army by the addition of foreign troops already organized in battalions and experienced in military duties. The Pope, the Grand­ duke of Tuscany, and the Order of Malta had promised to send some veteran auxiliaries, but the chief dependence of the republic could only be on its own troops. Veteran mercenaries were sought in Germany. The alliance with the Emperor enabled the Venetian government to conclude military conventions with several of the German princes, who were in the habit of hiring their troops to foreign states. Many of the German princes had taken up the trade formerly exercised by the Italian condottieri, in order to maintain larger military establishments than the revenues of their dominions could have otherwise supported, and give themselves thereby additional political importance. The war in Candia had proved that the brilliant military services of the noble volunteers of France, in spite of all the noise made about them, were of little real value in a long campaign. The professional soldiers of Germany proved more efficient troops, and during the present war they displayed not only steady courage on the field of battle, but also great patience in the camp when disease was destroying their strength and thinning their ranks. Conventions for the supply of entire regiments, completely equipped and disciplined under the command of experienced officers, were concluded with the princes of Brunswick and Saxony, each of whom bound himself to furnish the republic with two thousand four hundred men. The treaty with the Duke of Brunswick, afterwards Elector of Hanover, was concluded in December 1684, and the Hanoverian troops, after marching through Germany in winter, reached Venice in April, and joined Morosini at Dragomestre in June.1685. Their number, including officers and camp-followers, amounted to 2542 men. Though valuable troops, they were not easy to rule, complaining constantly of the treatment they received from the Venetian government and the captain-general, and quarrelling frequently among themselves.

The great object of Morosini was to conquer the Morea. He considered that it would be as easily conquered, and more easily defended, than Candia, as it lay nearer the resources of Venice. Some of the chiefs of Maina had promised to join the Venetians and rouse the rest of the Greek population to arms, if Morosini would appear in Greece with a formidable force. These chiefs induced Morosini to hope that he should be able to take possession of Misithra and Leondari without difficulty, and, by commanding the centre of the Morea, interrupt the communications of the Turks with the sea-coast. The maritime fortresses could then have offered very little resistance to the Venetians, who already commanded the sea. The Mainate chiefs boasted of what they had no means of performing. The grand-vizier Achmet Kueprili had reduced Maina to a state of complete subjection, and the Othoman garrisons in the three fortresses of Zamata, Kielapha, and Passava, had so completely established the authority of the sultan in the country, that the mountaineers were too much intimidated to think of taking up arms. Ismael Pasha had also taken precautions to preserve tranquility by marching additional troops into Maina, and compelling the principal families to give hostages for their good conduct. When Morosini arrived at Sapienza he met a deputation of Mainates, who besought him not to approach their coast, as they were entirely at the mercy of the Turks, and the people would not venture to take up arms until they saw the Venetians in possession of some important fortress in their vicinity, where the republic would be able to maintain a powerful garrison and fleet to protect the movements of their friends. Morosini, who had with him about eight thousand troops, immediately commenced the siege of Coron. The pasha of the Morea hastened to its relief with a considerable force, but was defeated. Coron was taken, after a vigorous defence, on the 11th August, and though arrangements were made for its capitulation, a suspicion of treachery caused its defenders to be massacred.

As soon as Morosini had repaired the fortifications of Coron, and put the place in a condition to repel any attack of the Turks, he crossed over the gulf to Maina. His object was to encourage the Mainates to take up arms and to gain possession of Kalamata, before which the capitan-pasha had formed an intrenched camp with an army of six thousand infantry and two thousand spahis. Morosini was well acquainted with the country, for twenty-six years before he had taken and destroyed Kalamata, carrying off the cannon from the castle, and the able-bodied men, whom he condemned to work at the oar in his galleys, after he had burned all the houses in the town. He now summoned the place to surrender, under the penalty of being treated like Coron if it resisted. The capitan-pasha rejected the summons with disdain. In the meantime the Venetians rendered themselves masters of Zamata, which was only five miles distant from Chitries, where the fleet lay at anchor. The Othoman governor of Zarnata had referred to the capitan-pasha for orders, but Morosini intercepted these orders, and opened negotiations with the garrison, to whom he offered such favourable terms, that he persuaded the aga to surrender the place on the 10th September. Six hundred Turks, with their arms and baggage, were landed near Kalamata, but the aga retired to Venice, where his treachery or cowardice was rewarded with a pension. The Venetian army, increased by the arrival of three thousand three hundred Saxons, was now placed under the command of General Degenfeld, and ordered to attack the capitan-pasha. A council of war was held, and its members agreed with Degenfeld in thinking that the position of the Turkish camp was too strong to be assailed. When, however, it was proposed to sign a written declaration to this effect, in order to transmit it to the captain-general Morosini, the Hanoverian prince, Maximilian William, declared that Morosini having given express orders to attack the Turks, in his opinion the best thing they could do would be to obey them without losing time. This observation of the young prince changed the resolution of Degenfeld, who appears to have intended to set up his own authority as a control on that of the captain-general, either from personal jealousy, or a desire to prolong the war; for he was a man of courage, and when he resolved to advance, he conducted the operations of the army with promptitude. The Turks were completely defeated, and both their camp and the town of Kalamata taken. The castle of Kalamata, being found incapable of defence, was again destroyed, as it had been in 1659, but the inhabitants on this occasion remained in possession of their property under Venetian protection. The Othoman garrisons in the forts of Kielapha, near the harbour of Vitylo, and of Passava, near Marathonisi, now capitulated, and evacuated Maina. Kielapha contained fifty-eight pieces of artillery, including some small guns mounted on the curtains. Passava was destroyed as of no use to the Venetians, who kept possession of Marathonisi; but they placed garrisons in Zamata and Kielapha, in order to watch the Mainates, and to secure the command of the ports of Armyro and Vitylo, from which the greater part of the produce of the Zygos was exported. The Venetians placed as little reliance in the unsteady disposition of the Mainate chiefs as the Turks, and employed nearly the same means for preserving their ascendancy in the country. The army of the republic was put into winter-quarters at Zante, Santa Maura, and Corfu, in the month of October, but disease continued to thin the ranks of the Germans

The campaign of 1686 was opened by the Othomans in the month of April. They penetrated into Maina and besieged Kielapha, but were compelled to abandon the enterprise on the approach of a Venetian fleet under Venieri. The republic had now secured the services of an able general to direct the operations of its army in Greece. Otho Koenigsmark, field-marshal in the Swedish service, was appointed commander-in-chief of the land forces under the orders of the captain-general. The Hanoverian troops had been increased to upwards of three thousand men, but the whole army did not exceed eleven thousand, and it was assembled so slowly that the campaign did not commence until June. Old Navarin (Pylos) was besieged, and beihg dependent for its supply of water on an aqueduct, immediately capitulated. The garrison consisted chiefly of negroes, who were conveyed to Alexandria. New Navarin, which had been constructed by the Othoman government in 1573, the year after the battle of Lepanto, to defend the entrance of the magnificent harbour, in which the largest fleet may ride at anchor, was next attacked. The seraskier of the Morea attempted in vain to relieve it, and Sefer Pasha was compelled to sign a capitulation, binding himself to surrender the place in four days. The explosion of a powder magazine on the night he signed this capitulation, by which he and many of the principal Turks perished, induced the survivors im­mediately to admit the Venetians into the fortress. Three thousand souls, of whom one thousand five hundred were soldiers, were conveyed to Tripoli. The army then besieged Modon, encamping among the luxuriant gardens in its vicinity. The place was well fortified, provided with ample supplies of provisions and ammunition, with an excellent artillery of one hundred guns, and defended by a garrison of one thousand men; but it capitulated, after a feeble defence, on the 10th of July, and the inhabitants, four thousand in number, were transported to the regency of Tripoli. Considerable booty was found in Modon, but Morosini was accused of allowing the Italians to purchase the property of the emigrants at their own terms. Of four hundred black slaves taken in the town, the Hanoverians complained that they only received seven men and three women for their share, and they said that all their booty consisted of some copper, which was sold for forty sequins.

The Hanoverians were at this time much dissatisfied with the Venetian service, in which they gained less plunder than they expected; and Morosini was extremely unpopular among them. His courage was admired, for they recounted that on one occasion, when it was expected that Modon was about to surrender, the captain-general visited the advanced battery with a train of magnificently-dressed Venetian nobles. The Turks, however, suddenly broke off the negotiations, and opened their fire on this battery: the consequence was, that all the fine-dressed nobles ran to hide themselves under cover, leaving Morosini standing alone. Complaints were made of his severity, and the Germans declared that they would not remain in the Venetian service unless the article of the convention, which placed the administration of justice and the power of punishment in the hands of an officer named by their duke, was strictly observed. Morosini, they asserted, sometimes ordered the highest Venetian officers to be put in irons and flogged, without the sentence of a court-martial. If this be true, there can be no doubt that the captain-general found it necessary to employ these strong measures to put an end to fraud and peculation. The complaints of the Germans were not always reasonable. The officers were discontented at the frequent change of place in this campaign, which compelled them to sell the horses and camp-equipage they had picked up at an inadequate price, as they were not allowed space to transport it on board the Venetian ships. The red uniform of the Hanoverians, though it was greatly feared by the enemy in battle, was too conspicuous to allow the soldiers to make much booty, and, to their great regret, prevented them from catching buffaloes, which were numerous in the Morea.

Nauplia was the next object of attack. On the 30th July, Count Koenigsmark landed at Port Tolon. The rock Palamedi, being then without fortifications, was immediately occupied by the Venetians. But though the town was com­manded by this position, it was so strongly fortified, that it was found impossible to make any progress with the siege until the seraskier, who had posted himself at Argos with four thousand cavalry and three thousand infantry, was driven from the vicinity of the place. This was effected after a sharp engagement, in which, from want of horses, the Hano­verian artillery-officers employed Greeks to drag their guns. The Turkish cavalry was well mounted, bold, and active, and covered the retreat to Corinth. The batteries on the Palamedi soon set the houses of the town on fire, but the place con­tinued to make a brave defence, as the seraskier was expected to return with fresh reinforcements. The Venetian army, which was encamped in the low ground between Tiryns and Nauplia, suffered from an autumnal fever called the plague. The Hanoverians could only muster one thousand five hundred and fifty men under arms, and they had one thousand two hundred sick and wounded. The seraskier now thought that the time had arrived for assailing the Venetian army with every prospect of success. He advanced from Corinth, and made a desperate attack on their camp on the 29th of August, which was not repulsed until Morosini landed a body of two thousand men from the fleet, who opened their fire on the flank of the Turks. Koenigsmark distinguished himself by his skill and courage in this battle, which ended in the total defeat of the Othoman army. Nauplia, being now deprived of all hope of relief, capitulated on the 3rd of September, and seven thousand persons, including one thousand two hundred men of the garrison, were landed at Tenedos. The Sclavonians in the Venetian service distinguished themselves greatly before Nauplia. Disease continued to make destructive ravages among the Germans. Their complaints were loud, and their disputes with Morosini unusually violent, when he wished to put them into winter­quarters at Nauplia. Morosini had some reason to complain, for the German officers quarrelled among themselves, intrigued against one another, and increased the service of the soldiers by carrying an excessive number of private servants on the regimental muster-rolls.

The campaign of 1687 is memorable in the history of Europe for the destruction of the Parthenon of Athens, the most wonderful combination of architecture and sculpture, and perhaps the most perfect work of art, which has yet been executed. Germany again sent new troops to reinforce the army of the republic. The Saxons returned home at the end of the last campaign; but conventions having been concluded with the Landgraf of Hesse and the Duke of Württemberg, the strength of the German contingent was not diminished. The Hanoverian battalions received an addition of one thousand two hundred men, but these new recruits were not veteran soldiers like those who had arrived in the preceding years. All Germany was at this time filled with recruiting parties for the Austrian armies in Hungary, and in anticipation of war with Louis XIV. The officers of Brunswick had even accepted French deserters into the ranks, in order to complete their companies. On the march to Venice forty of these French recruits again deserted in one day, carrying with them the arms with which they had been supplied, and before reaching Venice the loss from desertion exceeded two hundred men.

The Turks had prepared for resisting the further progress of the Venetians by forming a camp near Patras, in which ten thousand men were strongly intrenched under the com­mand of Mehemet Pasha. The delay which took place in the arrival of the troops from Germany, and the fear of placing the army in too close communication with the fleet, in which the plague had appeared, prevented the captain­general from opening the campaign before the end of July. The troops were landed to the west of Patras, and the fleet passed through the Dardanelles of Lepanto during the night of the 22nd July. Koenigsmark found that it was necessary to drive the Turkish army from its camp before commencing the siege of Patras. The position of Mehemet Pasha was strong and well chosen, but by marching round it, he suc­ceeded in attacking its weakest point, and in storming it, after a well-contested battle. Patras, the two castles commanding the entrance of the gulf of Corinth, and the town of Lepanto, were immediately evacuated by the Turks with the greatest precipitation.

These successes excited great enthusiasm at Venice, where the delay in opening the campaign had caused some anxiety. Morosini, who had been raised to the rank of hereditary knight after the taking of Nauplia, now received the title of “the Peloponnesian”. His portrait was placed in the hall of the Great Council, an honour never granted before to any Venetian during his lifetime. Koenigsmark, who was sup­posed to want money more than mere titles, was presented with six thousand ducats in a gold basin. The prince of Hanover received a jewelled sword valued at four thousand ducats, and other officers were rewarded with gold-hilted swords or gold chains. The liberality of the republic was more than royal. Koenigsmark’s pay was raised to twenty-four thousand ducats annually.

Castel Tomese, Salona, and Corinth were abandoned by the Turks, who fled in confusion to Thebes and Negrepont. Those in the Morea who could not escape out of the peninsula, retired to Misithra and Monemvasia, the only cities of which they retained possession. The retreat of the Turks was marked by the same acts of barbarity, both on their part and on that of the Greeks, which have been renewed on a greater scale in our own times. The Turks destroyed all the Greek villages on their line of march, and carried off many Christians as slaves. They frequently massacred even their own Christian slaves, when unable to take them away. The Greeks, on the other hand, waylaid and murdered every Mohammedan, man, woman, or child, whom they could surprise or capture.

The Venetians occupied Corinth on the 7th August, where they were joined by one thousand Hessians. On the 12th of August the captain-general commenced fortifying the isthmus, carrying his works along the ruins of the wall constructed by Justinian and repaired by Manuel II. This was certainly a useless waste of labour.

Morosini now proposed to attack Negrepont, as it was the key of continental Greece, and its capture would have rendered the republic master of the whole country south of Thermopylae. His plan was opposed by the generals of the land forces, who all agreed in thinking that the season was too far advanced for an operation of such magnitude; and after much deliberation, it was determined to attack Athens, where it was thought that the army would find good winter­quarters.

The lion of St. Mark rarely made use of his wings, and the passage of his forces round the Morea was unusually slow, but on the 21st of September the Venetians entered the Piraeus, and Koenigsmark encamped the same evening in the olive­grove near the sacred way to Eleusis. The army consisted of nearly ten thousand men, including eight hundred and seventy cavalry. The town of Athens was immediately occupied, and the siege of the Acropolis commenced. The attack was directed against the Propylaea, before which the Turks had constructed strong batteries. The Parthenon, and the temple of Minerva Polias, with its beautiful porticoes, were then nearly perfect, as far as regarded their external architecture. Even the sculpture was so little injured by time, that it displayed much of its inimitable excellence. Two batteries were erected, one at the foot of the Museum, and the other near the Pnyx. Mortars were planted under cover of the Areopagus, but their fire proving uncertain, two more were placed under cover of the buildings of the town, near the north-east corner of the rock, which threw their shells at a high angle, with a low charge, into the Acropolis.

In the meantime the Othoman troops descended into the plain from Thebes and Negrepont; and Koenigsmark, as had been the case at the siege of Coron, Navarin, and Nauplia, was compelled to divide his army to meet them. On the 25th of September a Venetian bomb blew up a small powder-magazine in the Propylaea, and on the following evening another fell in the Parthenon, where the Turks had deposited all their most valuable effects, with a considerable quantity of powder and inflammable materials. A terrific explosion took place; the centre columns of the peristyle, the walls of the cella, and the immense architraves and cornices they sup­ported, were scattered around the remains of the temple. Much of the unrivalled sculpture was defaced, and a part, utterly destroyed. The materials heaped up in the building also took fire, and the flames, mounting high over the Acropolis, announced the calamity to the besiegers, and scathed many of the statues which still remained in their original positions. Though two hundred persons perished by this explosion, the Turks persisted in defending the place until they saw the seraskier defeated in his attempt to relieve them on the 28th September. They then capitulated on being allowed to embark with their families for Smyrna in vessels hired at their own expense. On the 4th of October, two thousand five hundred persons of all ages, including five hundred men of the garrison, moved down to embark at the Piraeus. Morosini complains in his official report to the republic that all his precautions could not prevent some acts of rapacity on the part of his mercenaries. About thirty Turks remained, and received baptism. Count Tomeo Pompei was the first Venetian commandant of the Acropolis.

Athens was now a Venetian possession. The German troops remained in the town. One of the mosques near the bazaar was converted into a Lutheran church, and this first Protestant place of worship in Greece was opened on the 19th of October, 1687, by the regimental chaplain Beithman. Another mosque in the lower part of the town, towards the temple of Theseus, was given to the Catholics, who possessed also a monastery at the eastern end of the town, containing the choragic monument of Lysicrates. The time of service of the three Hanoverian regiments first enrolled had now expired, and on the 26th of December, 1687, they sailed from the Piraeus. In the three campaigns in which the red uniform had taken so distin­guished a part, it had lost eighty-eight officers and two thousand nine hundred men; yet, from the recruits which the contingent had received, its number still amounted to one thousand four hundred.

A short time convinced the Venetian leaders that it would be impossible to retain possession of Athens. The plague, which was making great ravages in the Morea, showed itself in the army. The seraskier kept two thousand cavalry at Thebes, and, by a judicious employment of his force, retained all Attica, with the exception of the plain of Athens, under his orders. The Venetians found it necessary to fortify the road to the Piraeus with three redoubts, in order to secure the communications of the garrison in Athens with the ships in the port. The departure of the Hanoverians weakened the army, and in a council of war held on the 31st of December, it was resolved to evacuate Athens at the end of the winter, in order to concentrate all the troops for an attack on Negrepont. Lines were thrown across the isthmus of Munychia, to cover the evacuation and protect the naval camp, which could be distinctly traced until they were effaced by the construction of the new town of the Piraeus. It was also debated whether the walls of the Acropolis were to be destroyed; and perhaps their pre­servation, and that of the antiquities they enclose, is to be ascribed to the circumstance that the whole attention of the army was occupied by the increased duties imposed upon it by the sanatory measures requisite to prevent the ravages of the plague, and the difficulties created by the emigration of the Greek population of Athens. Between four and five thousand Athenians were compelled to abandon their native city and seek new homes in the Morea. Some were established at Vivares and Port Tolon, on the coast of Argolis, as colonists; the poorest were settled at Corinth, and others were dispersed in Aegina, Tinos, and Nauplia. About five hundred Albanians, chiefly collected among the peasantry of Corinth and Attica, were formed into a corps by the Venetians, but no Greeks could be induced to enter the army.

The last act of Morosini at Athens was to carry away some monuments of ancient sculpture as trophies of his victory. An attempt was made to remove the statue of Neptune and the Chariot of Victory, which adorned the western pediment of the Parthenon, but, in consequence of an oversight of the workmen employed, and perhaps partly in consequence of a flaw or crack in the marble, caused by-the recent’ explosion, which destroyed a con­siderable part of the building, the whole mass of marble was precipitated to the ground, and so shivered to pieces by the fall that the fragments were not deemed worthy of transport. This misfortune to art occurred on the 19^th of March 1688. Instead of these magnificent figures from the hand of Phidias, Morosini was obliged to content himself with four lions, which still adorn the entrance of the arsenal at Venice. One of these, taken from the Piraeus, is remarkable for its colossal size, its severe style, and two long inscriptions, in runic characters, winding over its shoulders. The complete evacuation of Attica was at length effected. Six hundred and sixty-two families quitted their native city, and on the 9th of April the Venetians sailed to Poros.

These records of the ruin of so much that interests the whole civilized world, awaken our curiosity to know something of the character and feelings of the modern Athenians, Greeks and Albanians, who then dwelt under the shadow of the Acropolis. Neither Morosini nor his German auxiliaries, though they joined in lamenting the destruction of the ancient marbles, seemed to think the modern Greeks deserving of much attention, merely because they pretended to represent the countrymen of Pericles and still spoke Greek. Venetian statesmen perceived the same degeneracy in their national character as German philologians dis­covered in their language. The Greek population, from its unwarlike disposition, was only an object of humanity; the Albanian peasantry, though a hardier and more courageous race, was not sufficiently numerous in the immediate vicinity of the city to be of much military importance. Yet, to a Hessian officer, Athens appeared a large and populous town, with its ten thousand inhabitants, and the Athenians were found to be a respectable and well-disposed people. But they were so completely destitute of moral energy, that they were unable to take any part in the public events of which their city was the theatre. They had no voice to give utterance to their feelings, though Europe would have listened with attention to their words. Perhaps they had no feelings deserving of utterance. Greece was thus the scene of important events, in which every nation in Europe acted a more prominent part than the Greeks. Even my countrymen from the misty hills of Caledonia, are named among the officers who joined the Hanoverians in 1686 as volunteers.

Morosini was elected Doge of Venice on the death of Giustiniani, and he was invested with the insignia of the ducal rank at Poros. The senate made the greatest exer­tions to increase the army in the Levant, and enable the doge to perform some exploit worthy of the prince of the republic. New troops were recruited in Germany, but they arrived slowly, and a campaign, which from the nature of the climate ought to have commenced in the month of April, was not opened until the season of the greatest heat had arrived. On the 8th of July 1688 the Venetian expedition sailed from Poros to besiege Negrepont. The land forces amounted to upwards of thirteen thousand men, the crews of the fleet to about ten thousand. The garrison of Negrepont consisted of six thousand men, and the place was strongly fortified. Its communications with the continent were secured by a fortified bridge over the Euripus, and covered by the strong fort Karababa. On the land face, in the island, the fortifications were strengthened by a deep and broad ditch. A strong outwork, affording space for an intrenched camp, occupied by four thousand five hundred janissaries, crowned an eminence which protected the suburbs. Koenigsmark was of opinion that the attack ought to begin from the land side, by investing Karababa and the bridge, and thus cutting off the communications with the Othoman army at Thebes; but the doge considered that it would be easier to attack the place from the island, and his opinion prevailed. On the other hand, his proposal to make an immediate attempt to storm the eminence on which the janissaries were intrenched, was rejected, and the advice of Koenigsmark, to proceed against it by regular approaches in order to spare men, was adopted. In both cases the decision proved unfortunate. A month was lost in the attack on the outwork, and after a succession of bloody skirmishes it was at last taken by storm on the 30th of August. Thirty pieces of cannon and five mortars fell into the hands of the besiegers, who were then enabled to push their approaches up to the ditch of the citadel. But, as the communications between the garrison and the army of the seraskier remained open, reinforcements and supplies were continually introduced into the place, and the sick and wounded were withdrawn. In the meantime the Venetian army was encamped near a pestilential marsh, which spread disease through its ranks. Thousands of soldiers perished, and almost all the higher officers were unable to do duty. Count Koenigsmark died on the 15th of September, and before the end of the month a majority of the land forces was incapable of service. The progress of the siege was very slow. At length, on the 12th of October, Morosini resolved to make a desperate attempt to storm the place. Even with all the assistance that could be drawn from the fleet, only eight thousand men could be mustered under arms. This number was clearly inadequate to attack a strong fortress garrisoned by six thousand men, for the Turkish garrison, having been strengthened by fresh reinforcements, was still a9 numerous, and far more confident, than at the commencement of the siege. After a long and desperate struggle the assault was repulsed at every point, but not until the Venetians had lost one thousand men. All hope of taking Negrepont was now abandoned, and it only remained for Morosini to save the relics of the expedition. The re-embarkment of the land forces was covered by Prince Maximilian of Hanover, and effected without loss. On the 21st of October the army was landed at Thermisi in Argolis, by no means a healthy spot, and from thence the German troops, whose period of service had expired, were embarked for Venice. The remaining battalions of the Hanoverians and Hessians quitted Greece on the 5th of November 1688.

Before returning to Venice, Morosini was desirous of rendering his title to the proud epithet of ‘the Peloponnesian’ indisputable by the conquest of Monemvasia, the only fortress in the peninsula of which the Othomans still retained possession. He made an unsuccessful attack on it in 1689; and almost immediately after its failure, the state of his health compelled him to resign the comhiand of the fleet. His successor, Cornaro, gained possession of Monemvasia in the following year; but the place yielded to famine, and not to the arms of the republic.

The possession of the fortresses of Lepanto and Corinth gave the Venetians the command of the whole northern shore of the gulf, and the greater part of northern Greece submitted to their authority, the Turks only retaining garrisons at Zeitouni, Talanti, Livadea, and Thebes, and in the mountain­passes which connect the valley of the Spercheus with the Boeotian plains, in order to secure the communications between Thessaly and Negrepont by land. But a considerable part of continental Greece was left without either Turkish or Venetian troops, and the Greek population not venturing to take up arms to defend their property, the country was exposed to be pillaged by marauders from both sides. Several districts were occupied by bands of deserters from the Dalmatian and Albanian troops in the service of Venice. Bossina, the leader of one of these bands, established his head-quarters permanently at Karpenisi, where his authority was recognized by the primates of the surrounding country, who paid him regular contributions, for which he defended them against the plundering expeditions of the Mohammedan Amauts and Christian armatoli. Bossina assumed the title of General of the Venetian deserters. In vain Morosini endeavoured to suppress desertion and punish the deserters, by offering a reward of ten zechins for every deserter brought back to a Venetian port. The Albanians and armatoli, who posted themselves in the mountain-passes, arrested a few, and delivered them up to be punished; but the evil continued, in consequence of the irregularity with which the republic paid the troops enrolled in its own possessions on the Adriatic. The success of Bossina induced another corps, under Elia Damianovich, to occupy Lidoriki and the surrounding district; and to such a state of anarchy was Greece reduced, that the peaceable cultivators of the soil found these foreign deserters more humane and effectual protectors than either the Othoman or Venetian governments, and far less cruel and rapacious than the native Greek armatoli, who were a species of Christian gendarmerie in the service of the Porte. The Greek primates furnished the leaders of the deserters with monthly pay and subsistence for their followers, and the deserters defended the country against the armatoli and the foragers from the hostile armies, and maintained better discipline than was observed either by the Venetian or Othoman troops.

The Othoman government finding that the disorders in Greece were every day becoming greater, and that the num­ber of districts which failed to pay taxes was constantly increasing, became seriously alarmed at the defection of the Christian population, and laid aside its usual haughtiness in order to make use of its Greek subjects in opposing the progress of the Venetians. Liberaki Yerakari, one of the Mainate chiefs who had embraced the Othoman party when Kueprili compelled Maina to pay haratch, and who had assisted the Turks in establishing their permanent garrisons at Zarnata, Kielapha, and Passava, was subsequently imprisoned at Constantinople for acts of piracy. He was now liberated, invested with the title of Bey of Maina, and sent to the army of the seraskier at Thebes, where he appeared, at the end of the year 1688, with about three hundred followers. He endeavoured to bring back the Greeks who had submitted to the Venetians, to their allegiance under the sultan; and he invited the Athenians who had fled to Salamis and Aegina to return to their native city, promising them pardon for the past, and protection against illegal exactions in future. Many availed themselves of this offer when they found it was confirmed by the seraskier. Liberaki also opened secret communications with his partizans in Maina, in order to raise a rebellion against the Venetians; and he entered into negotiations with the deserters at Karpenisi and Lidoriki, in order to persuade them to join the Turks. These negotiations were unsuccessful, and he was defeated in an attempt to gain possession of Salona by force.

In the year 1690 the Othoman armies, having received reinforcements, drove the deserters from the districts they occupied, and recovered possession of all the open country north of the Dardanelles, of Lepanto, and the Isthmus of Corinth, but they were defeated in an attack on the fortress of Lepanto. The property of the unfortunate Greek peasantry continued still to be exposed to devastation by the hostile armies, and by bands of marauders who plundered on their own account. Two examples may be cited to show the miserable condition of the population in continental Greece. In the year 1692, a party of Moreot Albanians made an incursion as far as Livadea, which they plundered, carrying off many slaves, seven hundred oxen, and four thousand sheep. Again, in the year 1694, another party of the Greek and Albanian militia in the Venetian possessions invaded continental Greece, and plundered Patradjik and many of the neighbouring villages.

These campaigns reflected no glory on Venice. The doge believed that he could again bring back victory to the arms of Venice by taking the command in person, and in 1693 he returned to Greece. He was now seventy-five years old, an age at which it is difficult to infuse enthusiasm into the hearts of lukewarm followers, so that fortune probably treated him kindly by conducting him to the tomb at Nauplia on the 16th January 1694, before he had dimmed the glory of his former deeds by any signal failure. Francesco Morosini was the last great man who has acted a part in the public affairs of Greece; his exploits have not yet been eclipsed by those of any subsequent hero.

The new captain-general, Zeno, attacked Chios. The imprudence of assailing the Turks close to the coast of Asia Minor, and near the centre of their resources, was pointed out to him in vain. Zeno was a party leader and a braggart. Chios was taken without difficulty, but the Othoman government displayed all the energy which it has so frequently put forth on the occurrence of great misfortunes. It did everything in its power to render its fleet superior to that of Venice, by constructing a number of line-of-battle ships, for it had observed that its line-of-battle ships were better able to contend with the Venetians on equal terms than its galleys. After some severe fighting, Zeno lost heart, fled, abandoned his conquest, and was deservedly imprisoned on his return to Venice.

About the same time the Othoman government made a bold attempt to regain possession of the Morea. A Turkish army assembled at Thebes, traversed the Isthmus of Corinth without opposition, and encamped in the plain of Argos; and Liberaki, who accompanied the Turks, availed himself of his secret correspondence with many discontented Greeks to plunder the interior of the peninsula. The capitan-pasha, Mezzomorto, sailed from the Dardanelles to assist the invading army. The German corps of auxiliaries in the Venetian service was concentrated at Nauplia, and, when joined with a body of Venetians and Sclavonians, formed a small army, which was placed under the command of General Steinau, who attacked and defeated the seraskier before the arrival of the Othoman fleet. The Turks were driven back to Thebes, and Liberaki was bribed to desert the sultan and enter the service of Venice. Molino encountered the capitan-pasha off Scio, and two naval engagements were fought, in which, however, the Venetians gained no advantage over the Turks. It was now evident that the Othoman government was recovering its energy and strength, and peace was necessary to enable Venice to retain the possession of her recent conquests.

After long negotiations peace was concluded at Carlovitz, in Januaiy 1699, between the Emperor of Germany, the King of Poland, the Republic of Venice, and the Sultan. Venice retained possession of the places it had conquered in Dalmatia, of Santa Maura, of the Peloponnesus, and of Aegina; and it was relieved from the tribute it had formerly paid to the Sublime Porte for the possession of Zante. Prevesa, the northern castle at the entrance of the Gulf of Lepanto, and the city of Lepanto, were restored to the sultan after the destruction of their fortifications. The republic must have felt that, in spite of all the valour and ability of Morosini, and the great expense it had incurred in bringing German mercenaries to Greece to fight in its cause, still the conquests it had gained were due more to the victories of Prince Eugene on the Danube than to its own power and exertions.

When the Venetians conquered the Morea, they found it ruined and depopulated. At the commencement of the war the Turks distrusted the Greeks, and took every precaution in their power to deprive them of the means of combining together and assisting the enemy. The Christians were everywhere disarmed, the granaries were emptied, and their contents transported into the fortresses; and their flocks and herds were driven into the districts commanded by Turkish garrisons. When the Turks were at last compelled to abandon the country, they carried off everything of value belonging to the Christians which they could transport, in order to indemnify themselves for what they were compelled to leave behind. The youth of both sexes were seized when they were likely to prove valuable slaves, and the property of the Greeks was destroyed on the line of retreat. The richest plains of the Morea, having been in turn the scene of military operations, were left almost uncultivated. Famine followed war, and the plague came as an attendant on famine, carrying distress and ruin into districts which neither war nor famine had visited. The roads were neglected, the bridges broken down, the towns in ruins, commerce annihilated, the administration of justice in abeyance, and the whole peninsula filled with bands of armed brigands, who seized what they wanted wherever they could find it. With these robbers the pastoral population in the mountains often formed alliances, in order to share in the plunder of the agricultural population of the plains.

The Venetians found that, in order to render their con­quest of any permanent utility, it would be necessary to establish a decided military superiority over the whole country, in order to restore that feeling of security without which there can be no prospect of agricultural and commercial prosperity, even in the most fertile regions. The Venetian government performed its duties both with good­will and ability. It possessed men experienced in dealing with Greeks; and the loss of Crete had taught them a lesson of tolerance and moderation. Their recent government of Tinos had been mild and judicious; and that island, which is now the most industrious and flourishing portion of the Greek kingdom, owes its superiority to the Venetian govern­ment. Still there were many difficulties in the way of establishing order in the Morea which did not exist in the islands, and these difficulties must be candidly weighed before we venture to pronounce that Venice acted either injudiciously or tyrannically during the period it ruled the Morea.

Many circumstances prevented the Venetian government from intrusting the Greeks with any considerable share in the local administration. They did not, however, so completely falsify the communal system, and render it a mere organ of the central administration, as has been done recently by Bavarian and Greek ministers. The Venetians were compelled to guard against the influence of the Othoman Porte, which continued to be great in the Morea, both over the Greek primates, who had property or connections in the Turkish provinces, and over the Greek clergy. The power of the Patriarch of Constantinople was an especial object of disquietude, as he was an instrument in the hands of the Othoman government to create opposition to Venice. The complete alienation in religious and national feeling between the Greeks and the Catholics rendered it impossible for the Venetians to attempt amalgamating the native population of Greece with the subjects of the republic, by conferring on the Moreotes the privileges of citizens of Venice. The French of Louisiana and the Spaniards of Florida, though staunch Catholics, have become good citizens of the United States; but no concessions have hitherto induced the Greeks to become loyal to any foreign state. They can be industrious in money-making like the Jews, but even when they accept the boon of foreign citizenship as a means of increasing their gains, they rarely, if ever, become good citizens. To judge the Venetian government fairly, it must be compared with the British government in the Ionian Islands, and with the Bavarian domination in Greece, and surely it will not suffer by the comparison.

When the Venetians found leisure to devote their atten­tion to the civil government of the Morea, the native population had sunk, through the ravages of war and pestilence, to about one hundred thousand souls, although, before the commencement of hostilities, the Christians alone, including Greeks and Albanians, were estimated at two hundred and fifty thousand, and the Turks at fifty thousand; an estimate which does not appear to be far removed from the truth. Morosini established a provisional civil administration, which restored order, and, with the cessation of the plague, the increased security of property enabled the Morea to recover so rapidly from its misfortunes, that, in the year 1701, the native population, Greek and Albanian, had already reached two hundred thousand. Morosini introduced the municipal system of the continental possessions of Venice into the towns he conquered. The rights he thereby con­ferred on the Greeks, and the improvement which took place in their condition, soon produced a considerable immigration from Northern Greece, where the Turks were slower in re­establishing order. Thousands of families, with their baggage and cattle, were conveyed by the Venetians from the northern coast of the Gulf of Corinth into the Morea, and the emigra­tion became so great as to induce the Porte to order the pashas and provincial governors to treat the Greeks with greater consideration and justice than they had previously received from the Othoman authorities. Thus one of the most valuable results of Morosini’s conquests was, that it compelled the Turks to make an effort to gain the good-will, or at least to alleviate the discontent, of their Christian subjects¹. Another feature which marked a considerable change in Turkish society was the return of many families of Mohammedan agriculturists to Christianity, which their ancestors had forsaken in order to escape from persecution and fiscal oppression. The liberality of the Venetians at this time is shown by the fact that they allowed these con­verts to join the Greek Church. At any earlier period they would have considered themselves bound, as a Catholic power, to force the converts to embrace Catholicism, or else to remain Mohammedans.

The revenues derived by Venice from the Morea were considerable. They consisted of one-tenth of all the agricultural produce, besides taxes on wine, spirits, oil, and tobacco, and a monopoly of salt. It is needless to dwell on the impediment which the payment of tenths offers to any improvement in agriculture, though this tax is not to be regarded as too heavy in amount; still the manner in which it must unavoidably be collected renders it always a wasteful, as well as an oppressive mode of obtaining a revenue. The Venetians in order to avoid constant disputes between the fiscal officers of the government and the people, found it necessary to farm the tenths. The consequence was, that the farmers, who were generally Greek archonts, always con­trived to make their agents live at the expense of the people in the district they farmed, and, by uniting the trade of money-lenders and dealers in agricultural produce with their occupation as farmers of the revenue, they employed the great powers they received as collectors of the taxes to enforce payment of their private debts. In order to relieve agriculture from these abuses, the Venetian government endeavoured to facilitate the farming of the revenues by the communes for terms of not less than five years, and the plan was attended with considerable success.

The salt monopoly was the cause of great oppression, and still greater inconvenience, though the price was only two solidi a pound (about a halfpenny). The expense of transport and loss of time in procuring salt from distant magazines were serious and just grounds of complaint against the system; for in many places where the peasant could easily have procured salt gratis on the sea-shore within a few miles of his sheepfolds, he was compelled to take a day’s journey with his mules in order to purchase it at some distant depot of the monopoly.

The Venetian government gained possession of extensive domains in the Morea; but it had sufficient experience in territorial administration to know that the State is the worst possible landed proprietor, and that the land belonging to government is often the portion least profitable to the public treasury. The patronage of the powerful, the neglect and dishonesty of officials, and the avidity of farmers, all contribute to the mal-administration of property placed in such exceptional circumstances as government lands.

The revenues of the Morea are stated by Grimani, the general proveditor from 1698 to 1701, at 605,460 reals: but his estimate was apparently too high; and Emo, who ad­ministered the province from 1705 to 1708, found the actual receipts only amounted to about 400,000 reals. By wise measures and liberal concessions he increased the receipts to 461,548. The good effect of a mild administration became still more visible during the government of Loredano (1708 to 1711), as the revenues rose to more than half a million of reals.

The regular expenses of the Venetian government amounted to only 280,000 reals, so that a surplus of 220,000 was annually paid over into the treasury of the fleet. Though it was necessary to maintain a considerable naval force in the Grecian seas to protect the country against the incursions of corsairs, and to enforce the commercial laws and restrictions of the republic, still there can be no doubt that the revenues of the Morea under the Venetian domination were amply sufficient to pay all the expenditure both of its internal administration and of its military and naval establishments in time of peace.

The commerce of the Greeks was almost annihilated when the Venetians commenced the war. The Ionian sea and the Archipelago were so crowded with pirates, that even Greek fishing-boats could hardly venture to creep out of a harbour, lest the men should be carried off to labour at the oar in some French, Maltese, or Barbary corsair. These pirates had established many regular stations in the Levant. The Chris­tians compelled several Greek towns on the continent and in the islands of the Archipelago to pay them a regular tribute, in order to secure their lands and fishing-boats from being plundered; while the Mohammedans had formed estab­lishments in the Othoman fortresses in Western Greece and Albania for the sale of the plunder and slaves they collected in their cruises between the Barbary coast and the Adriatic.

The only foreign trade that existed in the Morea at the time of its conquest was that between Messenia and Barbary, and between Monemvasia and Alexandria. It was very insignificant. A few boats were also employed in transporting the produce of the Morea to the Ionian Islands, from whence it was conveyed to Venice in armed vessels. The Venetian conquest quickly restored some activity to the trade of the native Greeks. The demand for good wine was soon so much increased by the number of foreigners established in the Morea, that it was for a time necessary to import the better qualities from France, Italy, and the islands of the Archipelago. But the Moreotes, as soon as they were assured that their labour would be well rewarded, made such im­provements in the preparation of their own wines as to share in the profits of this trade, and supplant the foreign importers, who were compelled to confine their dealings to the finest qualities, which could only be consumed in small quantities.

The trade of the Morea was prevented from receiving all the extension of which it was capable by the severity of the restrictive commercial policy enforced by the Venetians. The possessions of the republic were regarded as valuable to the State in the proportion in which they contributed to increase the trade and fiscal receipts of the city of Venice. Instead, therefore, of allowing the inhabitants of the Morea to trade directly with the nations who might desire to consume Greek produce, and of raising a revenue by export duties, the Venetians compelled their subjects to send every article of value they exported to Venice, which, by this system of restriction, was rendered the sole emporium of the trade between Western Europe and the Venetian possessions in the Levant. The rigour with which this system was enforced injured the inhabitants of the Morea by lowering the price of every article of export, and it prevented the French, English, and Dutch merchants from purchasing many articles which they had previously procured there, while, instead of seeking them at Venice, they generally succeeded in procuring them in provinces of the Othoman empire. The trade in oil, silk, Turkey leather, and fruit, suffered particularly from this monopoly.

The Venetians at first established seven fiscal boards in the Morea, of which Patras, Castel Tornese, Modon, Coron, Kielapha, Monemvasia, and Maina were the seats; but these were afterwards reduced to four, corresponding to the four provinces into which the peninsula was divided for the facility of the civil administration. These were, Romania, with Nauplia or Napoli di Romania for its capital; Laconia or Zaccunia, of which Monemvasia was the capital; Messenia with Navarin, and Achaia with Patras, as their chief towns. Each of these provinces had its proveditor, in whose hands the civil and military authority was placed; its Rettore, or chief judge; and its Camerlingo, or intendant of finance. The whole Morea was governed by a general proveditor. As soon as Morosini had conquered any town, he established in it a Consiglio, or municipal council, in imitation of the communal system adopted in the Venetian provinces of the terra firma. This council chose the magistrates and local officials, who were selected from the Greek inhabitants devoted to the interests of Venice, and on these magistrates considerable privileges were conferred. The council itself was generally composed of Venetians, or Venetian subjects. The general practice of Europe, the prejudices of the age, and the peculiar position of the Venetians in their foreign dependencies, rendered it impossible for the republic to avoid employing privileges and monopolies as a means of attaching partizans and creating a revenue. But no care or prudence on the part of the general proveditors, who appear to have governed, on the whole, both ably and honestly, could prevent these privileges and monopolies from nourishing intrigues and financial abuses. All endeavours to extirpate these evils proved vain: as soon as one abuse was discovered, and a remedy applied, it was found that it was replaced by some new corruption, equally injurious to the State and to society, equally profitable to officials, and equally oppressive to some class of the native population. The system of privileges and exemptions has sometimes proved a powerful instrument of State policy, where the great object has been to hold the mass of the people in subjection, by making their own jealousies supply the place of an active police and a large military force; but it has invariably served as a premium for official dishonesty and political immorality.

One of the evils of the system may be noticed as an example of its effects. The burgesses of towns were exempted from the burden of quartering troops, which fell heavily on the inhabitants of the country. The better class of Greek proprietors, who resided on their property, or who inhabited the rural districts as traders in agricultural produce, soon contrived to corrupt the lower Venetian officials and place themselves on the roll of burgesses in the nearest town. They then succeeded in gaining an exemption from quartering soldiers in the house they inhabited, as being the country residence of a burgess. This abuse made the burden fall heavier on the poor peasantry, who having no persons of knowledge, wealth, and influence to defend their interests, became the victims of great oppression on the part of the Venetian military. The soldiers were only entitled by law to receive rations of barley bread and cheese; but they exacted dinners of roast meat, wheaten cakes, and wine. The assessment authorized by the Venetian government was light, for the annual maintenance of one soldier was charged on eighteen families; but laws are powerless where the government is both weak and corrupt.

At first sight, it would seem that the Venetian senate possessed absolute power to govern the possessions of the republic in Greece,for there existed no nobility, no established system of laws, and no organized corporations in the Morea. But this was not really the case. The traditional maxims of Italian statesmen, the privileges of the nobles of Venice in the dependent territories of the republic, and the financial principles then deemed conducive to political power, on the one hand, joined to the restless disposition of the Greeks, who often fancied that a wider career would be obtained for their activity and ambition by the restoration of the Othoman domination, to the want of truth and con­science engendered by their servile condition, and to the violence of their orthodox prejudices, on the other hand, presented, on many subjects, barriers to improvement, which the Venetians had not strength to destroy. The Greek character seems less adapted for political order than for individual progress. Envy and suspicion have always been marked characteristics of Hellenic society; and more Greek states have been ruined and subjected to foreign conquest at every period of history by the operation of internal vices than by the force of hostile nations. The inhabitants of the Peloponnesus, from some causes which it is difficult to detect, but which appear to have operated in the most dissimilar conditions of civilization, and in times and circumstances widely different, are considered by their countrymen as the most envious and suspicious of all the Greeks. The Venetian general-proveditors, who were extremely anxious to improve the condition of the country, complained that, though they found the inhabitants active and intelligent, they found them false from excessive suspicion, and obstinate from aversion to foreigners. It was deemed a patriotic duty to persist in native habits, even when these habits had originated in the oppression of the Othoman domination. They were so suspicious and envious that the middle classes wasted the greater part of their time in watching the conduct of their neighbours, and in taking measures of precaution against imaginary schemes of supposed intriguers. The consequence was, that all the Greeks lived together in a state of feverish excitement, wasting great energies to no purpose. They laboured with their whole attention directed towards a distant point from which they expected an enemy to issue, as the husbandman who sows a field on the verge of a tribe of nomades. The higher classes were rapacious, avaricious, and idle. They despised all agricultural and manual industry, and looked for wealth to saving rather than to industry. Their contempt for the agricultural classes was shown by their calling all who were engaged in the cultivation of the soil Albanians, and all who were occupied in pastoral pursuits Vallachians. These two classes, the cultivators of the soil and the shepherds, were unquestionably the most industrious and honest portion of the population of Greece at this period, which may be in part attributed to the circumstance that they had been less exposed to the demoralizing influence of a bad political government, and of a worse social system. One feature in the Moreote population of every rank made a strong impression on the Venetians. This was, the insuperable aversion they manifested to military service. No young men were desirous of seeking to advance their fortunes by arms. The aversion they displayed to war contrasted strangely with their unquenchable thirst for civil strife. The Mainates were the only part of the population of the Morea attached to a military life. The most noted bands of robbers in the peninsula were generally composed of Albanians from northern Greece.

It has been already mentioned that, after the conquest of Crete, the Othoman government had reduced Maina to com­plete submission, and compelled the inhabitants to pay the haratch like the other Greeks. The assertion that this tax was never paid by Maina, though extremely erroneous, since it had been levied by the Othomans in the sixteenth century, was now revived, and has often been repeated since. After the Othoman government had established regular garrisons in the fortresses of Zarnata, Kielapha, and Passava, in 1670, the Mainates paid this hated imposition, which was considered as the severest mark of Othoman servitude, until they were relieved from it by the victories of the Venetians.

When the Mainates joined Morosini they concluded an alliance with Venice, which conferred on them many privileges, and authorized them to establish an independent local administration throughout their mountains. The most important privilege they obtained was exemption from paying a tenth of their agricultural produce to the State. This tax was commuted for a fixed tribute, called by the Mainates maktu. During the Venetian domination in the Morea the Mainates succeeded in constituting themselves into a really independent people, but the use they made of their independence did not tend to improve the condition of the mass of the population, for Maina became the scene of innumerable family feuds, and petty civil wars; and the defeated party generally endeavoured to gain a livelihood by plundering the Venetian provinces of Messenia and Laconia, or by exercising piracy. The Mainates displayed great courage and extraordinary perseverance in their feuds, though they sought rather to waylay and assassinate their enemies than to meet them in open fight. The northern and central parts of Maina were, however, valuable to Venice, which retained a monopoly of their trade, for they exported a considerable quantity of valonia, red dye, galls, cotton, and oil. The population was estimated at more than twenty-five thousand souls.

The first object of the Venetians, after they had established their domination in the Morea, was to give security to property. They recognized every existing private right, and wherever a right of occupancy was clearly established, the possessor was considered the absolute proprietor in so far as the State was concerned. To the peasants who had cultivated property claimed by the Othoman government the boon was very great, as their payments to the fisc were diminished one-half. The primates and ecclesiastics, it is true, frequently contrived to appropriate to themselves property that had belonged to private Turks and to the Othoman government; but the Venetians wisely overlooked some fraudulent gains on the part of individuals, in consideration of the great benefits which the measure conferred on the many small cultivators of the soil, who were thereby rendered the undisputed proprietors of the lands their families had long occupied.

Immense tracts of land still remained uncultivated, of which the property was vested in the State by the fortune of war. When this property was capable of being immediately rendered productive by some outlay of capital, as in the case of mills, cisterns, warehouses, and building-sites, it was conceded to tenants on leases for ten years, with the obligations of making the necessary outlay, and of paying one-tenth of the annual produce. But irrigable lands, gardens, and meadows, in the vicinity of towns, were let for a rent of one-third of their produce, as was customary in private leases. Pasture lands, olive groves, and vineyards, were usually let for a money rent. When peace was concluded with Turkey in 1699, and the domination of the Venetians was definitively recognized by the sultan, the Greeks began to consider their lot as subjects of Venice permanently fixed. The republic made use of this opportunity of giving additional security to its power, by endeavouring to gain the good-will of the native population of the Morea. All temporary rights of property in the domains of the State were declared permanent. Thus all lessees became proprietors on paying their previous rent as a perpetual duty. A complete survey of the peninsula and a census of the population were then completed.

Until the conclusion of peace the Morea had been infested by bands of robbers; numerous exiles from the Othoman provinces, who were too lazy or too proud to work, and deserters from the army, wandered about, and when they were not employed as gendarmes, local guards, or policemen, exercised the trade of brigands. The Venetian administra­tion proved successful in establishing order and security for life and property. The municipalities were intrusted with some real power; they were authorized to form a local militia to guard their property, on the condition of undertaking the responsibility of making good any losses sustained within their limits by robbery. Even the jealous republic intrusted them with the right of bearing arms. Sagredo, the last general-proveditor who ruled the Morea in time of peace, reported the country to be so tranquil that few crimes were committed which required to be punished with death. This, we must remember, was said at a time when death was the punishment universally applied to many minor offences. It forms a sad contrast with the condition of Greece in the year 1855^.

The administration of justice in civil affairs, though very much superior to what it had been under the Othomans, was still very defective. The tribunals were presided over by young Italian nobili, whose long residence at Padua had not always enabled them to acquire more knowledge of law than a short sojourn at Venice taught them to forget; for they generally displayed great aptitude in learning the vices and corruption of that luxurious city. Their ignorance was a constant subject of complaint. The clerks of court, who possessed more knowledge, were notorious for venality and dishonesty, and the advocates, who were Ionians, were prompt agents in pointing out to the young judges how they, could enrich themselves by selling judicial sentences. Wealthy suitors easily gained their causes, but the poor were exposed to delay in every process, and could find no protection from the law against acts of injustice committed by the Greek primates.

The weakness or mildness of the Venetian civil administration increased the sufferings of the peasantry, as it relieved oppressors from the fear of punishment. The feeling of impunity among the unprincipled Greek archonts and merchants, soon led them to gratify their avarice and revenge by iniquitous law-suits, which they usually succeeded in gaining by bribing false witnesses. The Venetians saw these evils gradually increase, but they were unable to suppress the false testimony which was habitually given in the courts of law. Their legis­lation was ineffectual to restrain the demoralization of Greek society, nourished by the bad example of their own judges. The same want of truth and honesty, which contributed for many centuries to maintain the Greeks in a servile position, baffled the partial efforts of the Venetians to improve their condition. Time alone can show whether the establishment of the national independence will efface from the Greek character these vices. The general-proveditor, Emo, describes the Moreotes in 1708 very much as the Emperor Cantacuzenos had described them in the middle of the fourteenth century. The Venetian says they were a race addicted to wrangling, unwearied in chicanery, and inexorable in revenge, who seemed to take delight in nourishing the bitterest quarrels with all their neighbours. The imperial historian mentioned the mutual hatred which the archonts of the Morea cherished to the hour of death, and the feuds which they regularly transmitted, as a death-bed legacy or an inalienable inheritance, to their children and heirs.

Religious liberty was not a principle of government recog­nized by any European state in the seventeenth century; the difference of faith consequently formed an insurmountable obstacle to an equitable administration of public affairs in all European governments. The spirit of the Italians was peculiarly opposed to toleration. Indeed, so deeply was intolerance a part of Christian civilization at this time, that even a sense of the wrong which they had suffered for conscience sake in the Old World, did not restrain the exiles, who sought religious liberty in America, from persecuting those who differed from them in their new homes. The Venetians were then remarkable for liberality, but, as sincere Catholics, they could not become the sovereigns of the orthodox Greeks without awakening strong feelings of opposition to their government, even though their conduct was marked by unusual prudence and toleration, and though they had long acted as protectors of the orthodox against papal influence at Constantinople.

The vicinity of the sultan’s dominions, the great power of the Patriarch of Constantinople over the Greek clergy, and the general feeling which induced the members of the orthodox church in Greece to regard the sultan as their protector, created a sense of insecurity on the part of the senate of Venice, which made it avoid, with the greatest care, giving its Greek subjects any just cause of dissatisfaction. It knew well that no act of the republic could deprive the Greek clergy of their civil influence any more than of their ecclesiastical authority.

The Venetians, nevertheless, considered it their right as conquerors, and their duty as Catholics, to restore to the papal clergy all the mosques which had been Christian churches at the time of the Othoman conquest. Many of these buildings had been erected by the Frank princes. The Venetians naturally invested the Catholic Church with the fullest authority over the Catholics in Greece, but they did not permit the Pope to assume any supremacy over the Greek Church. The Catholic Church in the Morea was divided into four bishoprics, under the superintendence of the archbishop of Corinth. Catholic priests and monks flocked to the Morea from Italy and the islands of the Archipelago.

The Greek Church retained all the property and privileges it had possessed under the sultans, and was not required to make any concessions of ecclesiastical superiority to its Romish rival. The power of the Patriarch of Constantinople, however, both as being a foreigner in a hostile State, and as a political agent in the hands of the Othoman government, caused great anxiety at Venice. The Patriarch named the bishops in the Morea; his influence was, consequently, all- powerful with the clergy, who looked to his favour and protection for ecclesiastical advancement; and the power of the clergy over the great body of the people was exorbitant. The Patriarch of Constantinople named also the abbots of many monasteries. One-half of the annual offerings made by the priests, and by each family in every diocese, was paid over by the bishop to the exarch of the Morea, who received these sums on account of the Patriarch. A portion of the revenues of the monasteries was also remitted to Constantinople by their abbots. The bulls of the Patriarch possessed as much authority in the Morea as in any part of the Othoman empire, for his excommunications were feared by all the orthodox laity as well as clergy, and his patronage was powerful to advance the temporal interests of his partizans. The Venetians, who had deprived papal bulls of authority in their dominions until they received the sanction of the civil govern­ment, desired to exercise the same control over the bulls of the Patriarch of Constantinople. The measures adopted marked the prudence of the senate, and were carried into execution by the general-proveditors with great moderation. No acknowledged exarch of the Patriarch was allowed to reside in the Morea, and the publication of patriarchal bulls by the clergy was prohibited; while, in order to curtail the influence which the distribution of immense patronage con­ferred on the Patriarch, the Greek communes were invited to select their own bishops, and an attempt was made to abolish the payment of the dues which were remitted to Con­stantinople. The Venetian authorities were well aware that the Archbishop of Patras acted secretly as exarch for the Patriarch, and that the bishops and abbots, in order to secure the good-will of the Patriarch and synod at Constantinople, continued to make considerable remittances of money to the patriarchal treasury; but they were satisfied to put an end to the public payment of these dues, without forcing the Patriarch to assail their political authority in defence of his revenue. By this conduct the influence of the Patriarch in the Morea was considerably diminished, without producing any direct collision between the Greek Church and the civil power.

Simony was too deeply engrafted on the orthodox church to admit of its being extirpated by external influence. The bishops sold the office of priest, and the communes, when they became invested with ecclesiastical patronage, followed the established usage of the church, and endeavoured to turn ecclesiastical elections into a means of increasing the communal revenues. They bargained with their nominee for a share of the ordinary ecclesiastical dues and church offerings. Thus the clerical office was rendered universally an object of bargain and sale. The proveditors could not venture to interfere. They required the assistance of the Greek clergy to aid in maintaining public order, and found it politic to wink at abuses which often rendered the priesthood anxious to secure the support of the government. Thus the same policy of employing the Greek Church as an instrument of police, to watch over the people and to support the power of a foreign domination, which had been established by the Othomans at Constantinople, was adopted by the Venetians at Nauplia. The vices of the Greek ecclesiastical system made the priesthood the most efficient agents for riveting the chains of their country. The success of the Venetian policy was proved when the Patriarch sent a letter to the primates of Misithra, enjoining the community to solicit the nomination of a new bishop from Constantinople, instead of the one chosen under the authority of the Venetian government. The community of Misithra left the letter unanswered, and the bishop it had chosen remained in office.

The presence of the Catholic clergy in the Morea, though it caused some exacerbation on the part of the orthodox Greeks, was nevertheless productive of permanent good. The Catholics first drew the attention of the Moreotes to the improvement of the system of education then prevalent, and extended a desire for instruction more widely among the people. They also taught the Greeks that active charity, and a constant exercise of benevolence, are prominent duties in the office of a Christian parish-priest. The superior moral character, the greater learning, and more disinterested behaviour, in pecuniary affairs, of the Catholic priesthood, formed so strong a contrast to the meanness, ignorance, and rapacity of a large portion of the orthodox, that even the Greeks acknowledged the virtues of the papal clergy. The influence of the Catholics was greatly increased by the knowledge of medicine which several possessed, by their readiness to attend the sick, and by their liberality in furnish­ing medicines from dispensaries established at the expense of the church. Many schools were founded in the provincial towns, and several colleges were established, in which the education was so much superior to that bestowed on the pupils in any Greek schools then existing in the Morea, that many of the orthodox sent their children to be educated in these establishments. The college of Tripolitza was remark­able for its excellence, and for the concourse of orthodox Greeks who attended it. This declaration of public opinion in favour of morality and education produced a sensible effect bn the Greek clergy. They began to exert themselves to win that personal esteem, which they saw was attained by their Catholic rivals, and a considerable improvement was soon visible in their general conduct. The torrent of social demoralization which had been rolling onward and gaining additional force as time advanced, under the Othoman domination, was now arrested.

The first productive seeds of social improvement were sown in the minds of the Greeks by their Venetian masters during the short period of their domination in the Morea. The hope, as well as the desire of bettering their condition, became then a national feeling, which gained strength with each suc­ceeding generation, until it ripened into a desire for national independence. The obligations of the Greeks to the Venetian government and to the Catholic clergy may not be very great, but it would be an oversight in the history of the Greek nation to omit recording these obligations. The young Greeks of the Morea, who grew to manhood under the protection of the republic, were neither so ignorant, so servile, nor so timid as their fathers who had lived under the Turkish yoke. It is true that the Venetian government failed in making any great social improvements in Greece, and in gaining the good-will and gratitude of the people; but what foreign government has ever succeeded better ?

Prudence induced the Venetian senate to maintain a strict neutrality during the great European war of the Spanish succession. To avoid being involved in the general hostilities, it overlooked more than one open infraction of its territory by the belligerents; and, as often happens with those who fear to make a single enemy, it soon remained without a single friend. Its policy was presumed to be dictated by the selfishness of the ruling class, whose members were more anxious to preserve their large salaries and sinecures than to support the dignity of the republic. Rather than encounter the slightest risk of diminishing their own incomes, they allowed Venice to be despised as a spiritless state. The consequence was, that when the Treaties of Utrecht and Rastadt re-established peace in Western Europe, Venice remained without an ally. France, whose success in placing a Bourbon on the Spanish throne had given her a predominating influence in the Mediterranean, was the ancient ally of the Othoman Porte, and was supposed to be especially envious of the great extension which Venetian commerce had gained by a long neutrality. The French government, seeing no hope of their merchants recovering the share they had formerly enjoyed of the Levant trade, as long as the possession of the Morea enabled the Venetians to enforce their system of monopoly, was suspected of urging the Porte to commence hostilities with the republic.

In the meantime Russia had taken its place as a first-rate power in the international system of Europe, and already threatened the power, if not the existence, of the Othoman empire. The statesmen of Venice were too traditional in their policy, and too conservative in their views, to appreciate the full value of an alliance with the Czar Peter at this crisis. The moment was one when all thoughts of neutrality ought to have been laid aside, unless Venice was convinced that she possessed singly the strength necessary to defend the Morea against the whole force of the Othoman empire. A considerable change had taken place both in the internal condition of the Othoman empire and the state of its relations with Russia at the commencement of the war with Peter the Great in 1710. The Russian empire was strong in the feeling of progressive improvement and increasing power. Peter was elated by his victory over Charles XII, the military hero of the age. The Othoman empire showed visible signs of decline and weakness. The defects in the financial administration and in the dispensation of justice became every day more apparent, as the necessity for order and security of property were more generally felt in consequence of the progress of social civilization. The military organization, which had given power to the sultan’s government, was ruined: the janissaries, instead of being, as formerly, the best infantry in Europe, were little better than a local militia of armed burghers; the institution of the tribute-children, which had long been the firmest support of the Othoman empire, no longer supplied the sultan’s army with a regular influx of enthusiastic neophytes and well-disciplined soldiers; the timariot system was weakened by the poverty and depopulation of the provinces and the luxurious manner of living of the large landed proprietors. War was no longer the normal condition of Othoman society. The difficulty of recruiting the armies of the sultan was constantly augmenting. An inferior class of men was received into the army; and it was generally believed that the Mussulman population was everywhere decreasing in number. On the other hand, it was said that the Christians were rapidly increasing, and there were many proofs that the Greek population was acquiring a new degree of importance. Wherever the Greeks enjoyed some degree of security, whether under the protection of Venice or of Russia, they began to exhibit signs of mental and commercial activity.

Sultan Achmet III was despised by Peter the Great as a weak prince; and the Othoman ministers were considered both worthless and venal. The Czar was persuaded that a single campaign would enable the Muscovite army which had gained the battle of Pultowa to sweep from the field any force the Sultan could assemble to oppose it. Russian agents had visited every part of European Turkey, in order to instigate the Christians to revolt. The Greeks were reminded of ancient prophecies said to have been found in the tomb of Constantine the Great, which declared that the time had arrived when the Byzantine empire was to be restored by the Russians. The Sclavonians were flattered with the assurance that they were destined to become the dominant race in a new eastern empire, as the sovereignty of Constantinople was about to pass into the hands of the Czar of Russia, the head of the Sclavonian race and the emperor selected by Heaven to rule all the orthodox nations of the earth. In short, the Czar Peter had good reason to believe in 1710 what his successor Nicholas said in 1853, “that the affairs of Turkey were in a very disorganized condition; that the country itself seemed falling to pieces; and that he had to deal with a sick man—a man seriously ill, whose constitution afforded little hope of recovery”. To increase the internal fever which threatened the existence of Turkey, Peter augmented the exacerbation by construct­ing several forts on its frontiers. Repeated infractions of the Othoman territory by his subjects were left unredressed ; and the hospodar of Moldavia, Demetrius Cantemir, was gained over to betray the interests of his sovereign the sultan. Peter apparently expected that the sultan would not venture to resist his encroachments, and he was surprised when a decla­ration of war anticipated the progress of his clandestine schemes. It found him, however, fully prepared for carrying out his plans by force of arms.

Peter led the Russian army forward in person to invade the Othoman empire; but his expectation of being wel­comed by a general rising of the Christian population in Moldavia and Vallachia was disappointed. The presence of a numerous Turkish army soon showed him that he was not likely to find it a very easy task to plant the cross over the dome of St. Sophia. The campaign of 1711 confounded all Peter’s hopes, and astonished Europe. The Christians remained everywhere quiet: in every province of the Othoman empire the Mohammedans flew to arms, with all their old warlike energy. Peter the Great advanced incautiously, and was surrounded by the Tartars of the Crimea, and by the army of the grand-vizier. Cut off from all hope of escape, except by daring manoeuvres and the most desperate valour, he despaired of being able to force his way through the Othoman army, and preferred signing a disgraceful peace to encountering the risk of entering Constantinople as a prisoner. By this treaty the czar engaged to demolish the fortifications which he had recently constructed at Kamiensk, Samara, and Taganrog; to yield Azof to the sultan, and to abandon all his artillery to the grand-vizier as a trophy of victory. The czar also bound himself not to meddle in the affairs of the Cossacks, nor to send ambassadors to reside permanently at Constantinople, This humiliating treaty was signed in July 1711, on the banks of the Pruth.

The credit of the Othoman arms was restored by this unexpected display of strength. The Christian subjects of the Porte were reconciled to their allegiance by the increased profits of an extended trade in the Sea of Azof, the Black Sea, and the Levant, and by somewhat milder treatment on the part of their masters. The sultan subsequently renewed his treaty of peace with Poland; and at last, by the treaty of Adrianople in 1714, finally regulated his disputes with Russia concerning the execution of the treaty of the Pruth, and arranged the frontiers of the two empires. At the same time the Porte prosecuted its war­like preparations both by land and sea with unusual vigour. The object of these preparations was generally supposed to be the reconquest of the Morea; yet Venice alone would not believe in the danger which threatened her power; and when war was declared by the Othoman government, the republic was unprepared to meet the enemy, and the military and naval forces of Venice were far too weak to offer a successful, or even a prolonged resistance, to a serious attack on the part of the Turks. The Venetians believed that the object of the sultan’s preparations was to conquer Malta. If they had displayed the same energy and determination as the Order, they might perhaps have saved the Morea. For as soon as the grand master, Raimond Perellos, was informed of the extent of the naval armament fitting out at Constantinople, he summoned all the knights in Europe to the defence of the island, provisioned the fortress for a long siege, and strengthened the fortifications in every possible way. The Porte declared war with Venice in the month of December 1714, making use of some disputes concerning the conduct of Venetian cruisers to Turkish ships and of the protection granted to bands of insurgents on the Dalmatian frontier by the Venetian authorities, as a pretext for an appeal to arms.

The grand-vizier who took the command of the army destined to invade the Morea was Ali Kumurgi, the son of a charcoal-maker in the village of Soloes, on the southern bank of the Lake of Nicaea. He had been received as a child into the serai, and educated as an imperial page. The favour of Sultan Mustapha had raised him to the rank of chamberlain, and Sultan Achmet III treated him with even greater favour than his brother. At an early age he was appointed selictar-aga, and his counsels exercised considerable influence on the sultan’s conduct, even before he became a minister of the Porte. His first public office was that of grand-vizier; but when placed at the head of the government, though he was destitute of experience, he displayed considerable talents as a statesman, and great energy as a general.

The Othoman army assembled at Adrianople in spring, and after the cavalry had remained some time encamped in the rich plains of Serres and Saloniki, in order to feed the horses on green barley, according to the invariable usage of the East, the grand-vizier marched southward. On the 9th of June he reviewed his troops at Thebes, and according to the official returns, the army then assembled amounted to 32,844 cavalry, and 72,530 infantry. If this estimate be reduced one quarter, which is not too great a reduction for so large a body of men, consisting of many irregular bands under almost independent officers, the army of Ali Kumurgi may still be estimated at 70,000 men.

The fleet sailed from Constantinople under the capitan-pasha, Djanum Khodja, and the grand-vizier received the news that it had conquered Tinos before he quitted Thebes. This island, of which the Venetians had retained the sove­reignty for five centuries, and which had repeatedly foiled the attacks of powerful Othoman fleets, was surrendered by the proveditor, Balbi, without striking a blow.

From Thebes one division of the army was sent forward to the isthmus, with orders to proceed along the southern coast of the Gulf of Corinth, and besiege the Castle of the Morea, at the Straits of Lepanto. The Asiatic troops were employed in the meantime in rendering the road over Mounts Cithaeron and Geranea suitable for the transport of the artillery and baggage which accompanied the main body of the grand army.

During the period which followed the peace of Carlovitz the Venetians had employed much time and large sums of money in strengthening the fortifications of Nauplia, Modon, and the fort at the Straits of Lepanto, called the Castle of the Morea. They were surrounded by deep ditches and augmented by such new works as the modern system of defence rendered necessary; and when the war broke out these three places were made the chief military establishments of the republic in the Morea. The Hill of Palamedi, which commanded Nauplia, was crowned by a well-planned series of works, consisting of three closed forts and four detached batteries, amply supplied with water from large cisterns constructed in the rock. The most elevated of the three forts commanded the whole defences, and was furnished with bomb-proof buildings. Corinth and Monemvasia were considered impregnable from their natural position. It was the plan of the senate to confine all preparations for defence to these five fortresses, which were well furnished with artillery, ammunition, military stores, and provisions. The other fortified places in the peninsula were dismantled. But fortresses are of little use without strong garrisons; for insufficient garrisons and bad troops really facilitate the progress of an enemy. The whole military force of Venice in the Morea when the war broke out only amounted to eight thousand men, and the Venetian fleet in the Levant, under the captain-general Delfino, consisted of only forty-two ships, large and small, some galleys with oars, a few galleasses, and some galliots carrying mortars. The captain-general counted much on the attachment which he supposed the Greek population felt for the Venetian government, and believed that the Greek militia would display great valour in the field, and impede the advance of the Othoman army by hanging on its flanks and rear. Against these forces the grand-vizier advanced with seventy thousand men, and the capitan-pasha with a fleet of sixty ships, besides galleys and galleasses.

On the 25th of June, 1715, Ali Kumurgi passed the wall across the Isthmus of Corinth, which was far too extensive for the Venetians to think of defending it, and, advancing through the lines they had constructed to connect Corinth and Lechaeum, leaving the fort on the sea-shore on his right and the city on his left, he encamped near the Gulf of Corinth. On the 28th the trenches were opened against the outer wall guarding the ascent from the town to the Acrocorinth, and the proveditor, Giacomo Minoto, was summoned to surrender the place. The summons was rejected, and Sari Achmet Pasha (by whose advice, in the following year, the grand-vizier lost the battle of Peterwardein and his life) was ordered to press forward the siege. The Venetian garrison consisted of four hundred soldiers, assisted by two hundred armed Greeks; but the place was crowded with Greek families, who had retired with all their most valuable property within its walls. These non-combatants were all eager for a capitulation, believing that they would be able to save their property by a speedy surrender of the fortress. The Turks directed their attack from a hill to the south. Their batteries were too distant to produce much effect, but they protected the advance of the janissaries, who contrived to effect a lodgment under the walls; and it was resolved to attempt storming the outer gate, when Minoto hoisted a flag of truce. The Reis-effendi was sent into the place to settle the terms of surrender, and a capitulation was concluded, by which the grand-vizier engaged to transport the Venetian garrison in safety to Corfu.

On the morning of the 3rd August, while preparations were going forward to convey the garrison to the Othoman ships at Kenchrees, on the Gulf of Aegina, the janissaries, who were enraged at being deprived of the immense booty supposed to be accumulated in the fortress, contrived to escalade an unguarded part of the wall, and commenced plundering the houses. About noon a great smoke was seen from the Otho­man camp to rise over the Acrocorinth, and a loud explosion announced that from some unknown cause a powder magazine had blown up. The grand-vizier was soon informed that the janissaries had forced their way into the place and broken the capitulation. The cause of the explosion was never known. The Turks accused the Venetians of setting fire to the powder, and commenced a massacre of the garrison. The troops, who were hurried up to the Acrocorinth, by order of the grand-vizier, in order to arrest the disorder, could only save the lives of a part of the Venetians, and conduct them to a place of safety in the camp. The janissaries made slaves of the Greeks, men, women, and children; nor did the grand-vizier venture to put a stop to these captives being sold publicly in his army. It was reported by the prisoners that Minoto had perished in the confusion; but it was afterwards known that a soldier of the Asiatic troops had taken him prisoner, and concealed him in order to profit by his ransom. He was secretly conveyed to Smyrna, where he was released by the Dutch consul, who advanced his ransom money, Bembo, the second in command, and about one hundred and eighty Venetian soldiers, with a few women, were saved, and sent on board the vessels at Kenchrees, from whence they were conveyed to Corfu, according to the terms of the capi­tulation. The grand-vizier,, though he feared to attempt depriving his troops of their plunder in the camp, sent orders to all commandants of ports, and captains of defiles in the mountains, to secure and send back any Venetians who had been clandestinely enslaved; but he took no measures to deliver the Greek captives, whose sale in the camp was legalized by regular certificates issued by the proper officers.

The mutinous conduct of his troops chafed the pride of Ali Kumurgi, who, in order to make a display of his power, calculated at least to make individuals tremble, ordered Suleiman Pasha of Selefke (Seleucia in Cilicia) to be beheaded, as a punishment for his delay in bringing up his troops to head-quarters. This pasha prayed in vain that he might be strangled privately in his tent, instead of being publicly executed before the whole army.

As soon as the capture of Corinth was generally known, the Greeks crowded to the Othoman camp, and gave the grand-vizier the strongest assurances of their attachment to the Othoman government, and of their eagerness to see the Venetians expelled from the Morea. Ali promised them protection, and issued orders that they were to be treated as subjects of the sultan, and on no account to be molested in their persons nor injured in their property. These orders were obeyed, for the grand-vizier enforced the strictest dis­cipline in his army during its march, and effectually protected the property of the rayahs in all the districts through which he had passed. This conduct secured to his numerous army regular supplies of provisions and forage; the peasants brought their produce in abundance to the markets which were established in his camp according to the system of earlier times, when liberal payment for provisions filled the Othoman camps with plenty, and excited the astonishment of Christian Europe. The Moreote peasantry welcomed the grand-vizier whose cavalry paid for their barley, as they considered this conduct a proof that he would be a better master than the Venetians, who allowed their mercenaries to extort wine and meat gratis. Either from carelessness or from weakness and fear of causing dissatisfaction among the rural population, the Venetian authorities neglected to destroy the supplies in the country between Corinth and Nauplia. The army of the grand-vizier found the houses filled with provisions, the threshing-floors covered with grain, and the pastures stocked with cattle. It met with no obstacle in its advance, and on the 11th of July, Ali Kumurgi encamped in the plain between Tiryns and Nauplia. On the 14th the janissaries, by a daring attack, effected a lodgment in the covered way of a tenaille on Palamedi, but suffered great loss in an obstinate and rash attempt to storm the tenaille itself. On the 15th the Othoman fleet arrived, and on the following day seventeen heavy guns and some large mortars were landed, and placed in the batteries prepared to receive them. Little impression, however, had been made either on the fortifications of the town or on the works of Palamedi, when, on the 20th of July, a mine was sprung against the tenaille where the former assault had been repulsed, and the janissaries, rushing forward over the ruins, carried the work by storm. The Venetians in the works behind were seized with a panic, and the whole of the Palamedi was abandoned in the most cowardly manner, for the forts were in a state to have made a long defence, and to have secured an honourable capitulation, even after the loss of the tenaille. The janissaries followed so close on the steps of the flying garrison as to enter the town of Nauplia by the gallery which descends from the Palamedi, without encountering any opposition. The troops in the plain, seeing the confusion on the ramparts and a Turkish standard in the town, plunged into the muddy ditch and escaladed the walls in the most exposed position. The proveditor Bono no sooner heard that his troops had retreated from the Palamedi than he hoisted a white flag; but the janissaries were already in the place, and the Othoman troops had commenced pillaging the city before the grand-vizier was aware that it was taken. It is said that twenty-five thousand persons were either slain or reduced to slavery. About a thousand Venetian soldiers were brought to the grand-vizier, who paid their ransom to their captors, and then ordered them to be beheaded before his tent. Balbi, who commanded the insular fort called the Burdgé, immediately surrendered, and eight thousand sequins were found in his possession. When Nauplia fell, the garrison consisted of nearly two thousand regular troops, amply provided with every means of defence.

Nauplia was at this time a well-built town, as well as a strong fortress. Its fortifications were excellent; its public and private buildings large and solid structures; its population numerous and wealthy. Its feeble defence afforded strong proof of the incapacity and worthlessness both of the civil and military authorities of the Venetian republic. But, on the other hand, the grand-vizier and the Othoman generals are not entitled to attribute the conquest of the place either to their valour or military skill. The whole merit of the rapid success is due to the courage, or rather temerity, of the janissaries, who, by a succession of rash attacks, and a gallant defence of every step of ground they acquired, though maintained with severe loss, gained pos­session of the Palamedi, the key of the fortress, in nine days. Ali Kumurgi, who did not pretend to possess any knowledge of military affairs, remained in the camp during the whole siege, and never once visited the trenches of the janissaries on Mount Palamedi. Sari Pasha, who commanded there, no more expected to see the place fall, by the explosion of a single mine, than the proveditor Bono.

From Nauplia the grand-vizier marched through the Morea Jay Akhladokampo, Tripolitza, Veligosti, the Lakkos of Messenia and Nisi, from whence, proceeding towards Navarin, but leaving that place on his right, he encamped before Modon on the 11th of August. Coron and Navarin were abandoned by the Venetians, and their garri11sons withdrawn to Modon, into which the greater part of the Venetian property in both towns had been conveyed, though articles of great value had been previously transported to the Ionian Islands and to Venice. The fortifications of Modon were commanded by a rising ground in the vicinity. The grand-vizier, who wished to save the valuable property in the town from pillage, summoned the governor to surrender, declaring that, if he refused the terms offered, he should not be admitted to any capitulation, but must surrender at discretion. This summons was rejected; for, as the captain-general Delfino was anchored at Sapienza with a fleet of fifty sail, the garrison felt sure of support. The Turks opened their trenches, and the capitan-pasha arrived with the Othoman fleet. Delfino then declined the engagement offered, lest, as he himself says, disasters by sea should accompany defeat on shore, and Venice should find that her only fleet had been sacrificed in vain. The garrison of Modon, seeing that it was abandoned to its fate by the captain-general, after a feeble defence offered to capitulate. Sari Achmet, the beglerbey of Roumeli, wished to save the place, but the grand-vizier refused all terms; and the janissaries, availing themselves of the truce, approached the walls, and found an entrance into the town, which they immediately commenced plundering. The greater part of the inhabitants were reduced to slavery, but the wealthiest had employed the preceding night in conveying their money and jewels on board the ships in the port, and the capitan-pasha allowed many of them, with the soldiers of the garrison, to escape on board the Othoman fleet. All the males in the place would probably have been put to the sword, and their heads heaped up before the tent of the grand-vizier, to obtain the usual head-money, had his kihaya not declared that, the place having surrendered at discretion, the law of the Prophet forbade the massacre of the inhabitants, and, therefore, the grand-vizier was not authorized to pay any head-money under such circumstances. The troops grumbled at what they called the avarice of the kihaya, for they knew the liberality of the grand-vizier too well to attribute the decision to his love of money; so they made the most they could by the sale and ransom of their prisoners whose lives were spared. The Venetian general Pasta was protected and well treated by the capitan-pasha, who, when a slave at Venice, where he had passed seven years in the galleys, had been treated with kindness by that officer.

The Castle of the Morea surrendered to Kara Mustapha, the pasha of Diarbekr, after only three days of open trenches. The Venetian troops, six hundred in number, were transported to Cephalonia, but the Sclavonians and Greeks of the garrison were reduced to slavery. The janissaries, however, violated the capitulation, and detained many of the Italian soldiers until they were ransomed by the pasha. Kielapha and Zarnata, though well prepared for defence, surrendered on the first summons.

From Modon the grand-vizier marched by Leondari and Misithra to Elos, where he awaited the capitulation of Monemvasia, which took place on the 7th of September. This impregnable insular rock was supplied with provisions for more than two years; but the Greek inhabitants who possessed property in the Morea were eager to exchange the mild domination of the Venetian republic for the stern yoke of the Othoman sultan, as at the present day we see the inhabitants of the Ionian Islands eager to transfer their allegiance from Great Britain to King Otho.

The grand-vizier, having completed the conquest of the Morea, returned to Adrianople, where Sultan Achmet III then resided. Before the end of the year the Venetians abandoned Santa Maura and Cerigo; Suda and Spinalonga were taken by the capitan-pasha.

The surviving Turkish exiles who had been driven from the Morea by the Venetians were now re-established in pos­session of their landed property, and many of those Mussul­mans who had embraced Christianity to preserve their estates were condemned to death, though they had always continued to wear white turbans, and affected to retain as much attachment to Mohammedanism as the Venetian and the Greek people would tolerate. This system of compliance in religious matters at the dictation of the civil power was borrowed from the Greeks, and most of these compliant Mussulmans were of Greek descent; but the votaries of Islam had no sympathy with those measures of dishonourable conformity which, under the name of economical arrangements, make so prominent a figure in the history of religious opinion in the Byzantine church.

The Emperor of Germany was alarmed at the facility with which the Othoman army had conquered the Morea, and he feared that the sultan would follow up his victory by an attempt to re-establish the Othoman power in Hungary, where the tyrannical government of the house of Austria had, as usual, filled the country with discontent. The court of Vienna, alive to its true interests, did not show the same supineness as the Venetian senate. It had an able minister, as well as an experienced general, in Prince Eugene of Savoy. An offensive and defensive alliance was concluded with the republic, and the Porte was invited to re-establish peace on the basis of the treaty of Carlovitz. To this demand the natural reply was an immediate declaration of war; but the divan was anxious to avoid hostilities, and the grand-vizier had some difficulty in getting war declared. He however took the command of the army destined to invade Hungary; and on the 5th of August, 1716, the battle of Carlovitz or Peterwardein was fought. The Othoman army was completely defeated by Prince Eugene, and Ali Kumurgi was among the slain. Another Othoman army, under Kara Mustapha Pasha, in conjunction with the fleet under the capitan-pasha Djanum Khodja, besieged Corfu about the same time. That fortress was valiantly defended by Count Schulenburg, whom Prince Eugene had recommended the republic of Venice to appoint general of its troops, with the rank of field-marshal. The energetic defence of Schulen­burg, and the news of the defeat at Carlovitz, forced the Turks to raise the siege of Corfu on the 19th of August. The events of that siege belong to the history of Venice, and have very little connection with that of the Greek nation. It was the last glorious military exploit in the annals of the republic, and it was achieved by a German mercemercenary soldier. The defeat of the Othoman expedition enabled the Venetians to regain possession of Santa Maura.

The following year was distinguished by the siege and capture of Belgrade, which surrendered to Prince Eugene on the 18th of August. The operations of the Venetians were confined to the conquest of Butrinto, Prevesa, and Vonitza, and to several indecisive naval engagements in the Archipelago.

The victories of Prince Eugene disposed the sultan to peace, which was concluded, after long conferences, at Passarovitz, on the 21st of July 1718. Venice was compelled to cede the Morea, Tinos, Aegina, Suda, and Spinalonga to the sultan; but the republic retained possession of the places it had conquered in Dalmatia, as well as Santa Maura, Butrinto, Prevesa, and Vonitza, and it received back Cerigo. Austria acquired the fortresses of Temesvar, Belgrade, and Semendria.

The facility with which the Othoman arms had conquered Greece, and the feeble resistance which Venice offered to an invading army, after the care with which the administration of the Morea had been organized during a period of eighteen years, affords an instructive lesson in the history of the government of foreign dependencies. There is no sure basis of the subjection of any foreign nation, unless there be a decided superiority of military power on the part of the rulers; and no scientific administrative combinations can secure good government and an equitable dispensation of justice, unless private individuals are courageous, honest, and deeply imbued with a love of truth and self-respect. No moderation and no political art alone will ever reconcile a subject people to foreign domination, unless the sovereign authority connect its power with the existence of popular municipal institutions. Indeed, no government can properly fulfil its duties, nor rightly aid the progress of social civilization, which does not leave the population of each village, town, and district to exercise an active share in the administration of its local affairs, in the management of its local improvements, and in the control of its local finances, responsible only to the public opinion of the country and to the law of the land. The fear which the Venetians entertained of the Greek population of the Morea induced them to centralize all power, and the corruption of the Venetian nobles made that centralization the cause of general discontent. It was the venality, rapacity, and cowardice of the ruling classes and of the wealthy native archonts, far more than the defects of the government, that destroyed the power of the republic in Greece.

Venice, like all governments which persist in a traditional system of administration during a long period of tranquillity, stood greatly in need of administrative reforms at the commencement of the eighteenth century. Her system of commercial restrictions and monopolies was so hostile to the interests of every Christian power engaged in the trade of the Levant, that it prevented any State from becoming her friend and ally. All foreign governments regarded her with jealousy, and she was utterly destitute of all generous or progressive social impulses from within. The government offices were regarded as provisions for younger sons of the nobles. The military career was abandoned to the provincial militia or to foreign mercenaries, for it entailed years of service in distant garrisons, and offered slow promotion. Long service alone could bring rank; and if wealth came, it came when age had deprived its possessor of those passions which, at Venice, rendered wealth valuable for their gratification. On the other hand, the civil and judicial service admitted of rapid promotion through favour and intrigue, while means could be found of making them conducive to the accumulation of illicit gains. The universal practice of corruption, bribery, and peculation had dulled the force of conscience, and all sense of honour appeared to be wanting in the civil government during the eighteenth century. The young nobles who had it in their power to share in a contract, or to sell a judicial sentence of importance, might hope to return to Venice with wealth to enjoy those pleasures which rendered her inhabitants notoriously the most luxurious, debauched, and idle population in Europe. In a State where suspicion was the characteristic of the government, dissipa­tion the occupation of society, and where the feelings of the people were systematically suppressed, it is not surprising that selfishness and cowardice marked the conduct both of the government and of individuals, nor that the republic of Venice was unable to resist the forces of the Othoman empire.

 

CHAPTER V.

The Causes and Events which prepared the Greeks for Independence.—a.d. 1718-1821.