Page:English Historical Review Volume 35.djvu/371

 1920 THE VENETIAN REVIVAL IN GREECE 363 theirs, which the Turks never did.' Besides, the Greeks had a feeling, justified by the result, that Turkey was stronger than Venice, and they therefore desired to be on the winning side, and thus avoid reprisals. Even the rough-and-ready Turkish justice, which was administered with the stick, seemed to one Venetian governor to be more suited to the people than the interminable Venetian procedure, presided over by ignorant young nobles, assisted by venal clerks. Thus the poor suitor fared badly, for the governor-general could not be ubiquitous. Public safety, however, improved ; as the local policeman was often a brigand, a local militia was organized by the communes, and a notoriously dangerous pass, like that of Makryplagi, through which the railway now descends to Kalamata, was guarded by the men of the neighbouring villages, who were authorized to levy a small toll from the travellers. Crime diminished, and it rarely became necessary to apply the penalty of death. With the Mainates, in particular, mildness and diplomacy were the only possible methods. Luxury, however, and moral depravation crept into Nauplia, the Venetian capital of the Morea, and the historian, Diedo,^ wrote that ' in magnificence and pomp it had no cause to envy the most cultured capitals ', Sternly practical people, the Venetians did nothing for the classical antiquities of the Peloponnese ; indeed, Grimani turned the amphitheatre of Corinth into a lazzaretto ; but the Venetian occupation spread abroad the names of the classic sites, and the various illustrated books upon the Morea and other parts of Greece, which were rapidly turned out from Coronelli's ' workshop ', were at once the result and the cause of the popular curiosity about this once famous land, which had emerged, thanks to Morosini's victories, from Turkish darkness into the light of day. As early as 1711 the Venetian government had been warned that Turkey was eager to recover the Morea, the loss of which was severely felt ; yet no preparations were made to meet the coming storm, but most of the fortresses were left in a bad condition. Nothing had been done since 1696 to protect the isthmus, and Palamedi at Nauplia alone had been fortified at immense cost with those splendid works which still remain, with an occasional abandoned cannon of 1685 on the ' Fig Fort ', a memorial of the Venetian occupation. Each of its bulwarks bore the name of a famous Venetian — Morosini, Sagredo, and Grimani — and an inscription over the gate contains the date, 1712, of its completion.^ There were not, however, sufficient men to defend it ; indeed, when war was declared the total army in the Morea consisted of only 10,735 men, while the fleet consisted of only eleven galleys and eight armed ships. In 1714, after having defeated Russia and renewed their treaty
 * ■ iv. 83. 2 Lamprynides, 'H JUavuKio, 207, 230-^0.