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 families, and at last the merchants, whose profits amount, at least, to six hundred thousand ducats This is the produce of your garden; do you wish to destroy it? Surely not; but we must defend it against all attacks; seeing that you are the only people to whom the land and the sea are equally open; you are the channel through which all riches flow; the whole universe is interested in your prosperity; all the gold and silver in the world come into your hands."

Nor, indeed, though as Count Daru has suggested there may be some inaccuracies in these numbers owing to the errors of copyists, were the words of the old Doge those of merely idle bombast. Besides the revenues recapitulated by him, in the home manufacture of silk, cloth, arras, glass, gold, silver work, and wax, the Venetians, by means of their wealth and skill, assisted in some measure by their system of protection, and by their geographical position, carried on a very extensive and lucrative trade, which, with other branches of their commerce, greatly increased when they obtained the supremacy over their commercial rivals, the Pisans and Genoese. Not the least valuable object of merchandise at that period was the traffic in slaves; for, strange inconsistency! while the Popes rigorously prohibited all commerce with the Infidels, a prohibition to which the Venetians reluctantly submitted, the Church allowed the purchase and sale of slaves without hindrance in the open markets of Europe!

The arsenal of Venice, which included also the dockyards, had long been the admiration of foreigners; and when that city reached the plenitude of her