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172 step to oppose them. One of these pirates, in 1198, defeated the imperial admiral with thirty ships. The emperor only succeeded in putting an end to his ravages by proposing terms to him through the Genoese, and then setting the Pisans to attack him.

The Genoese had, however, become equally troublesome. A Genoese pirate, named Caffario, had, after great difficulty, been captured and killed. On his death the emperor requested Genoa to send an ambassador to his court with a view to negotiations. This was done, and arrangements were made for the restoration of the buildings and wharves that the Genoese had possessed in Constantinople, but the negotiations can hardly be said to have been concluded when the city was captured by the Crusaders.

The weakness of the empire, and particularly at sea, from the accession of Isaac the Second, had become clear to every Italian state. The imperial shores had become the prey of every pirate who chose to attack them. Pisans and Venetians, though during the last fifteen years of the century almost constantly fighting against each other, occasionally united in piratical attacks upon the empire, while they regarded Constantinople as neutral ground.

But while the hostility which had been growing between the empire and the Italian states generally greatly weakened the former, that displayed by Venice was the strongest, and contributed most largely to the capture of Constantinople. The ill-feeling between the Greeks and Venetians had gained great strength with the grant of concessions to Pisans and other Italian states in the time of Manuel. It had been increased by several events in the same reign, until, in 1171, in a moment of irritation, all the Venetians in the empire were arrested and their property placed under sequester. A short but hotly contested war followed. In the following year the republic sent a fleet of a hundred vessels to attack the imperial forces in Dalmatia. Ragusa surrendered on the second day of the siege. Dalmatia was conquered. Negropont, Chios, Scyros, and other places were pillaged. For a while everything seemed to be going in