reached maturity and eminence before the two republics again resumed the
contest for the mastery of the sea. It would not, I think, be possible
to accuse either of having been at any time more aggressive than the
other had been, or was, without unfairness. There was an element of fate
in the struggle; it was the inevitable contest for final superiority
which takes place whenever two individuals, or two bodies of men, or
two nations, are pitted against each other in the same pursuit under the
same circumstances. The disastrous wars with Lewis of Hungary for the
possession of Dalmatia, in which Venice became involved after the death
of Faliero, the repeated revolts in Candia, and above all, the ravages
of the plague, reduced the population and the wealth of Venice until, at
last, she seemed an easy prey. Most assuredly the neutral powers that
calmly watched the approach of the war which broke out in 1378 did not
believe that Venice could come out of the trial still keeping her
independence.
[Sidenote: _1378._]
On the morning of the twenty-second of April in that year, a vast
multitude thronged the square and the basilica of Saint Mark’s. Vittor
Pisani was to receive his commission as commander-in-chief of the fleet
at the steps of the high altar, to hear the solemn high mass, and then,
kneeling before Andrea Contarini, he was to take from the Doge’s hands
the great standard of the Republic.
The chief of the Republic spoke to him briefly in tones that rang
through the hushed cathedral. ‘You are chosen by God,’ he said, ‘to
defend the honour and the possessions of your country, and avenge the
offences of those who would destroy the freedom which our fathers gave
us. Into your hand we commend the flag that has ever been the terror of
our enemies; see that you bring it back victorious and unstained.’
Vittor Pisani sailed out of the harbour with only
[Sidenote: _Rom. iii. 263._]
fourteen vessels, intending to thwart any attempt on the part of
Fieschi, the Genoese admiral, to enter the Adriatic. But the Genoese
were still far away, delayed by contrary winds, and Pisani sailed round
Italy to the Roman shore before he sighted the enemy’s fleet. The battle
that followed was fought within sight of Anzio on the thirtieth of May
1378.
In a heavy south-westerly gale, which, as often happens in the
Mediterranean, was accompanied by terrific thunderstorms, the Venetians
bore down upon their opponents. They evidently had the advantage of
being before the wind, while the Genoese must have been obliged to heave
to in order to hold their own, a matter of no small difficulty for a war
vessel of the fourteenth century. Yet in spite of their superior
position at the time of the attack, four out of the fourteen Venetian
galleys were so hopelessly separated from the rest as to be unable to
join in the fight. Any seaman will at once understand that they must
have run past the Genoese to the northward, and that they were then
unable to beat back to the scene of action before night. On the other
hand, one of the Genoese ships got aground on the dangerous lee shore
and went to pieces.
The result of long and fierce fighting was a complete victory for the
Venetians. They captured five of the enemy’s galleys and took Fieschi
himself prisoner. He must have had gloomy forebodings when he was taken,
remembering how Pisani’s terrible namesake had drowned five thousand
prisoners of war after the battle of Lojera, or Cagliari. And the
Venetian admiral doubtless remembered and hoped to atone
[Illustration: THE SALUTE, NIGHT]
for that barbarous deed, for he treated his captives with every
kindness; and even after they had reached Venice they were not confined
in the prisons, but were merely shut up and guarded in vast warehouses,
where they had plenty of air and were abundantly provided with
necessaries. A committee of noblemen was deputed to take care of them,
and to see that they lacked nothing. The ladies of Venice also organised
themselves in a sort of sisterhood, for the purpose of ministering to
the not over-great sufferings of the vanquished, and the noblest names
of the Republic stand on the list of those charitable women. Anna
Falier, Francesca Bragadin, Margherita Michiel, Marchesina Bembo, and
several others are especially mentioned by the historians as ‘angels of
goodness and devotion.’ All Venice sought to be forgiven by Europe for
the horrors of Lojera.
Pisani had been far too prudent to push on to Genoa with a fleet which
only counted nineteen sail, including his five prizes, and he deemed it
wiser to return to the Adriatic and to harass the Genoese on the coast
of Greece and Dalmatia, whence, under the protection of the King of
Hungary, they constantly made piratical excursions against the Venetian
merchantmen.
[Sidenote: _Storming of Cattaro, A. Vicentino; Sala dello Scrutinio.
Rom. iii. 265._]
After taking possession of several strong places, Pisani asked
permission to return to Venice in order to rest his men and refit while
waiting for the spring, but the Senate ordered him to continue cruising
off Istria in case the Genoese should unexpectedly enter the Adriatic.
There is no doubt but that this measure was prudent in itself, but, on
the other hand, Pisani’s fleet was altogether in too bad a state to
keep at sea through the winter, and in a more or less hostile
neighbourhood. A sickness of some kind, not explained by the
chroniclers, decimated the crews of his galleys, and he seems to have
lacked suitable and sufficient provisions, as well as stores for
repairing his rigging and sails. He obeyed the Senate’s orders, however,
and he made his headquarters at Pola.
In February he was informed that he was confirmed in his charge of
admiral of the fleet, but at the same time the Senate appointed him two
advisers, or counsellors, following the true Venetian method of
watching, and often hampering, the commander in the prosecution of the
war. These ‘provveditori,’ as they were called, were the famous Carlo
Zeno and a certain Michel Steno--whether the one who had precipitated
the conspiracy of Marino Faliero twenty-four years earlier or not does
not appear certain. At all events, he reached his post and remained with
Pisani, but Zeno did not.
Later in the spring Pisani received a reinforcement of eleven galleys,
sent him in order that he might be able to protect the Venetian vessels
that regularly plied between Venice and Apulia to supply the Republic
with corn.
While he was convoying a number of these vessels, a storm forced two of
his galleys to take shelter in Ancona, where they were seized by the
Genoese; but a few days later Pisani encountered the latter, beat them
in a short engagement, and recaptured his ships. Scarcely had he got to
anchor in the harbour of Pola, however, when twenty-five Genoese
men-of-war hove in sight, under the command of Luciano Doria. Pisani
could not reasonably hope to fight such a fleet with any chance of
victory, and would have preferred to await the arrival of his
reinforcements under Carlo Zeno, who was expected in a few days; but his
officers clamoured for battle, and Michel Steno, the provveditor, even
went so far as to hint that Pisani was a coward to stay in port. This
was more than the admiral could bear, though he was the mildest and most
long-suffering of brave men; and in the shortest possible time he got
his fleet under way, calling upon all who loved Saint Mark to follow
him.
I know not whether the wind gave him any advantage at first, as at
Anzio, or whether the brilliant little victory he won was due to the
fury of his attack. Be that as it may, he slew, or helped to slay,
Luciano Doria with his own hands, and put the imposing Genoese fleet to
flight.
But the enemy, in the absence of pursuit, soon rallied, and in a few
hours inflicted upon Pisani a most disastrous defeat. He himself barely
escaped with six galleys out of the nineteen or twenty that had composed
his force. Poor in ships, as Venice was at that time, this was a blow
that threatened her existence; for the Genoese now had nearly forty
vessels, including the prizes recently taken, some of which were perhaps
the very galleys they had lost to Pisani at Anzio.
How far Pisani’s misfortune was the result of the unwise advice he was
obliged to submit to from Michel
[Sidenote: _Rom. iii. 268._]
Steno, it is not easy to say; but he was certainly badly handicapped by
the non-arrival of his other appointed counsellor, Carlo Zeno, with the
promised reinforcements. The Senate took neither the one question nor
the other into consideration, any more than it showed the slightest
grateful recollection of his many former services to the Republic. He
was hastily tried, convicted of having failed to do his duty, and
sentenced to six months’ imprisonment, with the loss, during five years,
of all emoluments he received from the State and of all public office
for the same period. Venice always acted on the principle that no amount
of success could condone one failure, and that defeat was next door to
treason. Michel Steno fared somewhat better, for he was not actually
imprisoned, but he and all the officers of the fleet were suspended from
all public functions for a year.
These drastic measures did not improve the position of the Republic in
that time of immediate danger. It was easy to consign Vittor Pisani to
the pozzi, but it was quite another matter to replace him, especially in
the absence of Carlo Zeno, the only other man of the same calibre upon
whom Venice could count.
Pietro Doria had taken the place of Luciano, whom Pisani had killed in
battle, and he worked his way steadily up the eastern coast, retaking
one by one all the fortified places which Pisani had recently seized,
until at last his fleet appeared off the Lido, literally within sight of
Venice.
The consternation was indescribable, and it is more than likely that if
Pietro Doria had boldly forced the entrance to the lagoons, the city
would have fallen an easy prey. Indeed, the situation of the Republic
seemed even then almost desperate, for while she was beaten at sea and
assailed by the Genoese fleet, the Carrara had leagued themselves
against her with the King of Hungary, and threatened her land boundaries
on the north and west.
But it always happens in the history of nations, as it generally does in
the private lives of individual men, that the last extremity of danger
calls forth the true character of peoples, as of persons. It is then
that the hero is a hero; it is then that the coward performs miracles of
speed in flight.
Venice called out every man able to bear arms. A patrician, Leonardo
Dandolo, was entrusted with the defence of the Lido; two others were
charged with the protection of the basilica of Saint Mark’s and the
adjoining square; another was made responsible for the quarter of the
Rialto; and others again were told off to defend the outlying islands,
Torcello, Murano, and Mazzorbo. Finally, Jacopo Cavalli, a foreign
captain, was promised a very large recompense if he could perform the
almost impossible feat of defending the Venetian territory on the
mainland with four thousand horse, two thousand footmen, and a not
inconsiderable number of bowmen.
The monastery of Saint Nicholas on the Lido was converted into a regular
fortress. Three huge hulks, which I conjecture to have been old
transports from
[Sidenote: _Rom. iii. 268._]
the days of the crusades, were lashed together with triple chains, and
sunk at the entrance to the lagoons. As far as possible all the male
inhabitants of the city were armed, and were so organised as to be ready
to fight whenever the great bell of Saint Mark’s should give the signal.
Meanwhile ambassadors were sent one after the other, and in haste, to
the court of Hungary in the hope of detaching the King from his alliance
with the lords of Padua, but they utterly failed to bring about the
desired result; for both the Carrara and the Genoese spread abroad in
Buda the report, by no means exaggerated, that Venice was at the last
extremity, and must soon yield to her allied enemies; and the King,
trusting to this welcome news, answered the Venetian ambassadors with
such arrogance that they had no choice but to take their leave.
[Sidenote: _Rom. iii. 273._]
The Genoese fleet lay at anchor off the Lido, and the only chance of
safety seemed to lie in attacking it boldly, for as yet it consisted of
no very large number of vessels. Six good Venetian ships of war, manned
by picked men, would no doubt suffice, and these could still be
produced. They were placed under the command of Taddeo Giustiniani, and
they sailed out through the narrow channel that had been left navigable.
Now it chanced that on board of one of the Genoese galleys there was a
certain man, a Venetian sailor, who had been taken prisoner with the
galley commanded by Giovanni Soranzo when Vittor Pisani was defeated;
and he was brave and loved his country, but his name has not come down
to us. When he saw the Venetian ships making ready, inside the Lido, he
managed to drop himself overboard, and he swam for his life towards the
entrance; and as Giustiniani sailed out he
[Illustration: CALLE CASALLI]
saw this man ahead swimming, and making desperate signals to the
Venetians to bring to.
The commander recognised him as a Venetian either by his appearance or
by his language, laid his topsail to the mast and took him aboard, to
learn that the Genoese vessels before him were but the vanguard of a
huge fleet which was itself at hand, and would soon be in sight. To
engage was now out of the question, and could only end in the total loss
of the six Venetian vessels; Giustiniani put about and re-entered the
lagoons, to take the bad news to Venice.
The first fault committed by the Genoese was that, having surprised the
city, they did not profit by their advantage and storm it at once, at a
moment when at least half the population must have been paralysed with
fear. Instead, they seem to have followed a consistent but mistaken
plan; for they pillaged and laid waste the outlying islands one by one
with the evident intention of destroying the city’s supplies, and of
ultimately cutting off all communication between it and the mainland.
In the course of this more or less systematic operation they came before
Malamocco on the sixth of August 1379; but here they met with a first
check, for they perceived that the place was too strongly fortified to
be rashly attacked, and they therefore sailed past it towards Chioggia,
which was, and is, the most important strategic point of the lagoons.
Chioggia is close to the mainland, at the western extremity of the
Venetian archipelago. The name belongs vaguely, in old maps, to the long
island properly called Brondolo, on the western end of which is built
the town of Brondolo; more particularly to the Port, or entrance between
this island and the one called Palestrina, between which two the ‘Lupa,’
the Tower of the She-Wolf, rises out of the water; and especially to
the small city of Chioggia. The latter is divided into two parts--the
greater Chioggia, built on a
[Illustration: CALLE DELLA DONAZELLA]
number of very small islets, and the lesser, which stands on the inside
shore of the main island. There was a bridge between the two parts.
The entrance to the port of Chioggia being deep and safe, the Venetians
had deepened also a natural channel, twenty-five miles long, which led
thence through the shallow lagoons to Venice, and this was one of the
best and safest approaches to the city from the outer sea, a fact which
was well known to the Genoese, who looked upon Chioggia as the real key
to the capital, and the name of the place has been given by all
historians to the war that followed. It is almost needless to say that
the extreme shallowness of the lagoons was a real defence against an
enemy not well acquainted with the channels, which, as every one knows,
are marked by tall timbers that project from six to fifteen feet above
the water. To remove these was a first measure of defence.
[Sidenote: _Rom. iii. 274._]
The most tremendous exertions were made by the Venetians to prepare
themselves for an attack, which would almost certainly have been fatal
to them if the Genoese had not put it off too long. Reinforcements were
at once sent down to Pietro Emo, the Podestà of Chioggia, who anchored a
large armed hulk in the channel, manning it with soldiers and supplying
it with provisions to last some time.
The lesser Chioggia, on the shore of the island, was abandoned as not
defensible, but the main town was very effectually fortified, and each
little islet became a separate stronghold. On the side of the allies
Carrara succeeded with great difficulty in conveying a considerable
force of men from Padua down the old branch of the Brenta, which the
Venetians had obstructed by sinking a hulk across it. Carrara is said
to have dug a channel round this point in a single night. The allies had
now about twenty-four thousand fighting men.
[Sidenote: _Rom. iii. 275._]
Pisani had been beaten at Pola in May; it was on the sixth of August
that the Genoese reconnoitred Malamocco and anchored off Chioggia
harbour, and their attack upon Chioggia itself began on the eleventh. On
that day the armed hulk which Emo had moored in the channel was captured
and burned, and the Genoese fleet was able to enter the port and lie
before the besieged town, while Carrara and the Paduans assailed it from
the side of the lagoons in their light boats. Every day the united
forces renewed their attack, and hour by hour they won their way into
the strong little place, taking the bridges and fortifications one after
another. By the fifteenth of the month, the bridge to Brondolo having
been taken, it was clear to the Venetians that Chioggia was lost, and
Dandolo considered how he might withdraw his force to Venice. It seemed
only too certain that every man who could be saved alive would be needed
for the defence of the capital, and it was still possible to escape
across the shallows, where the Genoese could not follow in their ships
and the Paduans did not know their way. The carnage had already been
frightful. It is said that six thousand Venetians were slain, and that
three thousand and five hundred were taken prisoners. Dandolo saved a
large number in his retreat; but the heroic Pietro Emo refused to leave
the town, and remained with fifty devoted men to fight to the very
death within his own palace walls. The town was sacked forthwith, and
much of it was burned; over what was left the standards of Genoa, of
Carrara, and of Hungary were displayed where the banners of Saint Mark
had floated for centuries, until that bloody day.
Chioggia fell as the sun went down, and the news reached Venice late
that night. The city was all awake and in desperate anxiety, and when
the truth was known, fear turned almost to panic. Women rushed
frantically to the churches to confess and receive the sacraments, as if
the Last Judgment of God were upon them. The men were at first silent,
paralysed in absolute consternation; since Chioggia was gone, the
Genoese might be upon Venice by morning.
But again they let the opportunity pass, and the Venetians were
vouchsafed a breathing space, which might seem but enough to show them
how desperate their situation really was. For Treviso was already
besieged by Carrara’s troops when Chioggia fell, and the allies were
closing in upon the city like a wall of iron.
The Doge Contarini displayed a coolness and a courage altogether heroic.
The Republic had oppressed its chief by an intolerable system of spying
and petty limitations that reduced his personality to a nonentity in
ordinary times. It had forbidden him almost everything; but it had not
forbidden him to die for his country. The example of one man could still
revive the courage and sustain the calm of thousands. Venice was not
lost, so long as that one true citizen remained alive.
[Illustration: CAMPO S. BENEDETTO]
The Doge and the Senators gave all their own treasure to the public
fund, and imposed regular taxes on the citizens; they distributed the
supplies of arms with great good judgment, and sent out scouts upon the
lagoons in the lightest and swiftest skiffs, in order that no movement
of the enemy should escape observation.
But the people murmured against the government, even in their constant
terror; for Vittor Pisani was their idol, and he was still in prison.
It may have been the intention of the Genoese and their allies to starve
Venice to a surrender; but I think it more likely that Doria’s
procrastination was in accordance with his own character, and that it
was in part due to the almost inevitable complications which arise where
military command is not vested in one person, but is shared almost
equally by a number of allied captains.
The very first and most pressing danger was past when Contarini called a
general assembly of the people, on the thirteenth of September, by
causing the great bell of Saint Mark’s to be rung. It was long since the
summons had been heard, and the population answered it eagerly. The
cathedral was soon thronged to suffocation by men of all ages and
conditions, who listened in profound silence to the eloquent words of
the senator Pietro Mocenigo. He spoke from a high balcony or pulpit, and
his ringing voice was heard in the farthest corners of the great
building.
He told his hearers that the time had come when they must think of the
honour of their women, the lives of their young children, and the safety
of their worldly goods; he said that whosoever lacked necessary food for
himself and his family need only ask for what he needed at any
patrician house--he should be treated as a friend, as a brother, the
last crust of bread should be shared with him. That was all, save that
he called upon all sensible men to speak, if they had any advice to give
which would be for the public good and safety.
The impression made by this simple speech was profound, for the people
owed the aristocracy no long-standing grudge as in other Italian cities.
The nobles had neither ground them down, nor tormented them, nor
dishonoured them, but had only taken the political power and, with it,
the responsibilities of government. In the wars of Venice the nobles had
shed their blood for their country much more abundantly, in proportion
to their numbers, than the people themselves; and in peace, their
suspicions, their spyings, and their eternal repression had been
directed against each other, and never against the poor man. And now
they reaped their reward; they stooped to call the poor man brother, and
the mere words flattered him, and cheered him, and made a hero of him.
Happy Venice, even in that dire extremity!
Then many rose up in the church and cried out that every ship in the
arsenal that would float must be manned to attack the enemy rather than
yield to starvation.
Mocenigo, the orator, being satisfied with this answer of the people,
went on to the question of choosing a leader, and proposed Taddeo
Giustiniani; but the multitude would none of him, and shouted for
Vittor Pisani. Under him they would win or die, they cried as one man,
and they would have no other.
To resist such a demand would have been madness, and for once the lordly
Signory bowed before the plebeian will. The captain was forthwith led
out of prison, and the crowd, frantic with joy at his release, carried
him in triumph on their shoulders round the square of Saint Mark’s.
‘Long live Vittor Pisani!’ they shouted.
‘No,’ he cried, answering them in commanding tones. ‘Long live Saint
Mark!’
Some obeyed him, and some would not, and the two cries mingled together,
‘Pisani, Saint Mark, Saint Mark, Vittor Pisani.’
[Sidenote: _Daru, ii. 217._]
The historian Daru, whose passion for romance sometimes led him far,
says that Pisani asked to be allowed to spend one more night in
confinement, in order that he might prepare himself by prayer for
performing his devotions the next morning, and that it was from the
window of his prison that he rebuked the crowd for cheering him. Yet
Daru himself, a few pages earlier, had just described the prisons of
Venice in the fourteenth century as horrible dens which had neither
light nor air except from a narrow corridor, adding that the most
piercing screams could never be heard outside.
Men like Pisani have little need of acting or posing in order to
increase their prestige, for it is enough that they should show
themselves and brave men will follow them. The captain was taken from
prison at once and, after saying a prayer in the basilica, went before
the Doge.