Part 23

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.

The mutual position of the two men was a strange one. Contarini must have been well aware that Pisani’s condemnation had been utterly unjust; Pisani had suffered that condemnation without complaint, and well knew that the Doge had voted for it; both were brave and patriotic men, who believed devoutly in the system by which their own aristocracy repressed among its members any attempt at individualism, spied upon itself, and treated failure as a crime. Pisani, if the situation had been reversed, would have condemned Contarini as unhesitatingly as Contarini had condemned him. It was certainly against the theory of the Republic that he should be taken out of prison before he had expiated his defeat; but it was inevitable, and he was free.

Yet both men found something to say in these almost absurd circumstances, which was neither commonplace, nor undignified, nor merely complimentary.

[Sidenote: _Rom. iii. 278._]

‘Your prudent and wise conduct,’ said the Doge, ‘will efface your misfortunes, and avenge not only any offence which you may have received yourself’--Pisani had been called a coward by the provveditor of the Republic--‘but also the injuries which our country has suffered at the hands of our enemies; you will therefore consider rather the favour done you now than the past disgrace in which you have been, and you will gladly seize this occasion of proving how unfounded those accusations were which were made against you, and how much you desire to earn in future the gratitude of our country.’

To this cleverly-worded and not wholly inane speech Pisani replied that he had altogether forgotten the past, and that he should find means, by the grace of God, to deserve the confidence placed in him.

Before he was allowed to depart he was informed that he was not to have sole command of the Venetian troops, since Taddeo Giustiniani had been entrusted with the defence on the side towards the Lido. Pisani bent his head and answered that he had at all times obeyed the orders of the Signory.

[Sidenote: _Rom. iii. 279._]

But the people were less submissive to this schoolmaster justice; they would have Pisani, and no one but Pisani. Even the soldiers who came from the little island of Torcello protested. ‘Command us what you will,’ they said to him, ‘we will do whatever you order us, but it must be under your own eyes.’

So a deputation of the younger ones among them went to the ducal palace, carrying the banner of Torcello before them, and addressed the counsellors. ‘For the love of God,’ they said, ‘give us three galleys, which we will equip at our own cost, on condition that we be always, and everywhere, under the orders of Vittor Pisani.’

By way of answer they were ordered to go to the Lido and fight under Taddeo Giustiniani. ‘We will be cut into small pieces rather than fight under him,’ cried the men of Torcello, who were assembled in the square when the deputation brought them the answer of the Signory.

[Sidenote: _Rom. iii. 280._]

The Venetians took up the cry, and again the government was obliged to yield. To paralyse the people’s enthusiasm at such a moment, to shake their confidence, to trample upon their wholesale sympathies, was to lose Venice herself. When it was known that Pisani was appointed commander-in-chief of all the forces, the enthusiasm of the city broke out in wild cheering for Saint Mark, for the Doge, for the government; all the men hastened to enroll themselves under his standard, and all the women brought whatever they possessed of value to the palace, both jewels and other objects; they even ripped the silver trimmings and embroideries from their clothes. Forty galleys which lay in the arsenal were fitted out in three days, and in the same time two-thirds of the crews necessary had been found.

The government promised great rewards to all who should distinguish themselves in the struggle. It was announced that thirty citizen families, whichever should contribute the most directly to the salvation of the Republic, should be inscribed in the Golden Book of the nobles; that all strangers who would take arms to defend Venice should be adopted as children by the State, and should enjoy all the privileges accorded to the original burghers; finally, the government promised to distribute five thousand ducats, or over thirty-seven hundred pounds sterling, to the poorer families of the city not belonging to the nobility. Having made these promises, the State, by its decree, proceeded to threaten vengeance against all who should desert the posts assigned to them, or attempt to leave Venice so long as it was menaced by the enemy.

When all was ready for the bold attempt the Senate took final measures for the disposition of the troops, as well as for the police of the city. In those quarters which were most exposed to an attack, as, for instance, that of the Niccolotti, the inhabitants were to be continually ready to fight at a moment’s notice; in the remaining quarters only one-third of the men were to remain at home as a garrison, while the rest placed themselves under the orders of Pisani at the front. A careful watch was kept upon all vagabonds, idlers, and other suspicious persons as long as the war lasted, lest any of them should enter into correspondence with the enemy’s fleet.

When we consider the condition of the Republic at this moment, it must seem little short of amazing that Venice should have survived at all. The territory of the State was reduced by the invasion of the allies to little more than the city itself; every outpost except the tower of the salt-works was in the hands of the enemy; a large fleet with a very strong force of men was in safe possession of Chioggia, the key to the lagoons; and all attempts at negotiating with the enemy had signally failed. The Republic had, indeed, gone so far as to send a suppliant embassy to her former vassal, Francesco Carrara; he was addressed with humility as ‘Powerful and magnificent lord,’ and a fair sheet of blank paper was laid before him on which he was requested to note with his own hand his own terms for peace, with the sole condition that Venice should still be considered independent; and the ambassadors had brought with them some Genoese prisoners whom

they offered to return without ransom. But these humble proposals were haughtily refused, Carrara bade the suppliants to return and take their prisoners with them, threatening that he would ere long bridle the bronze horses of Saint Mark’s and keep them quiet for ever.

I have quoted this incident as it is given from Chinazzo’s chronicle in Smedley’s _Sketches from Venetian History_, and there seems no reason to doubt the authority of the Italian historian, whose work is to be found in Muratori.

Pisani had lost no time, while the allies were wasting theirs in useless reconnoitring and futile skirmishes. He had fortified the entrance of the Lido with temporary towers built in the short space of four days, he had sunk hulks in all the important channels, and had got ready a great number of small boats with which to convey his men across the shallow water. Moreover, as many among his troops had no experience of the oar, he had trained them as well as might be, in the short time, on the canal now known as the Giudecca. But he had kept his own plan a secret, and it does not appear that when the Venetians made their bold attack upon the allies they knew what their leader purposed. It was enough that he led them; they followed him, to do or die.

Andrea Contarini, eighty years of age, but still as brave as any youth in the host, would not suffer the expedition to go forth without him, and his example not only roused the enthusiasm of every fighting man, but was followed by a number of senators too old to bear arms. In the last extremity of danger Venice had one vast advantage against overwhelming odds, for her people were united to a man. Men gave not only themselves but all their fortunes to save their country, and for the first and, I believe, the last time in history, a commercial people forgave one another their commercial debts for the sake of the common safety. One individual burgher fitted out a galley at his own expense; another bound himself to support a thousand men throughout the war; all those who had anything to give gave it freely, and those who had nothing gave themselves.

The offensive movement of the Venetians had been preceded by several successful skirmishes in October and November, the result of which had been that the Genoese had more or less abandoned operations for the winter, and had withdrawn their fleet into the safe harbour of Chioggia to await the spring, leaving only three galleys to cruise before the entrance in case a surprise should be attempted. They seem to have been as sure of taking Venice as if they had been anchored opposite the Piazzetta; and in accordance with the military practice of those days, they and their allies hibernated, apparently taking it for granted that the Venetians would do the same, and wait resignedly to be destroyed in warmer weather. They were rudely awakened from their secure dreams of victory and spoil.

[Sidenote: _1379. Rom. iii. 285._]

The Venetian fleet stole out to sea on the evening of the twenty-first of December, consisting of thirty-four galleys, sixty smaller armed vessels, and hundreds of flat-bottomed boats. Pisani led the van, towing two heavy old hulks laden with stones. There is a disagreement of authorities as to the day of the month on which he left Venice, but all agree that the Venetians appeared off the Chioggia entrance and landed four thousand men on the point of Brondolo island at dawn on the following morning--no inconsiderable feat, though the night had been the longest of the year. The distance, on a modern admiralty chart, from the port of Lido to the Chioggia entrance, outside the islands, I find to be about thirteen nautical miles; by the canals within the lagoons it is considerably farther, but it is certain that Pisani went by the open sea.

The Genoese were taken by surprise. The three cruisers on duty as sentinels outside the port were not where they should have been, and we hear no more of

them; it almost looks as if, in their security, the invaders must have given up that last precaution.

In the face of a heavy fire and with the loss of one vessel, burned by the enemy, Pisani succeeded in sinking his hulks across the entrance. To the last the Genoese do not appear to have understood his intention, for they themselves, or their own fire, helped to sink the heavily-ballasted vessels, and it was not until all was over, and the barrier had been made insurmountable by heaping other material upon it, that they plainly saw what had happened. They were caught like mice in a trap, unless they could get their fleet out by some other way. The mouth of the Brenta river at Brondolo, two miles to the southward, still remained navigable, and Pisani proceeded to blockade it in the same way, though with far greater difficulty. Federico Cornaro was entrusted with the dangerous and difficult task, and accomplished it under a terrific fire, Pisani protecting him meanwhile from any attack from the Genoese vessels.

This being done, the enemy’s fleet was paralysed, and the result could only have been a matter of time, if Pisani had been in command of a regular force. Instead, his men were volunteers and raw recruits, capable of magnificent courage in a single engagement, as they had shown, and ready to shed their blood as they had given their treasure; but they were ill accustomed to exposure, to night work at sea in the depth of winter, to a hundred small daily sufferings to which a trained seaman is hardened and indifferent. Clearly, Pisani could not leave the scene of action, even for a day, and even if he had consented to such an act of folly, there was the old Doge, swearing upon the hilt of his sword never to return to Venice till the enemy was thoroughly beaten. Yet the volunteers of the people cared little for such an example, and threatened to go home to Venice in a body, leaving the Genoese to dig their way out if they could, and indifferent to the fact that if left to themselves they could certainly find means of reaching Venice within a few days, though they could not bring their fleet. They had been in real danger now, and they would waste no more time in idleness or futile skirmishing.

It was in vain that Pisani tried to cheer such a force by reminding them that Carlo Zeno, with a strong fleet manned by veteran seamen, was expected to return. The people knew well enough that he had been expected for months, and that there was no reason why he should appear providentially at the present juncture. It was the Christmas season; they had fought like lions, shut up their enemies, and momentarily averted extreme danger; for amateur soldiers this seemed enough, and they clamoured to be allowed to go back to their wives and children.

Like Columbus, Pisani saw himself on the very verge of losing the result of all his labour, for lack of a little more trust on the part of his men. To keep them by force was impossible, for they themselves were the male population of Venice, and for the time being they held good and evil in their hands. Even the senators and other nobles murmured at being obliged

to keep at sea, and often under fire, because the Doge had rashly sworn a solemn oath to remain.

On the thirtieth of December Pisani was driven to such extremities as to be forced to promise that unless Carlo Zeno appeared in forty-eight hours the fleet should return to the Lido, in spite of the Doge and his vow. There was no reason at all why Zeno should be expected; it was a mere empty promise, but it gained time; something could still be done in two days and two nights.

He laboured and fought on, and the short limit of time expired with the dawn of New Year’s Day. Zeno had not come, and Pisani’s men would not stay another hour. By his promise he must let them go, and it needed not his wisdom to foresee that their defection meant the fall of Venice, the end of the Republic, the general destruction of the insensate population themselves with all they had. It was of little use to have been their idol for years and their victorious dictator for ten days, if they could not bear a little cold and a little hardship for his sake. The day rose wearily for Pisani.

[Sidenote: _Marble bust of Carlo Zeno, unknown artist; Museo Civico, Room XVI._]

Then, from aloft, a sail was sighted. It was the sail of a galley. Another, and another, and another, all galleys unmistakably, they hove in sight above the horizon, eighteen in all. Hostile, or friendly? That was the question. Zeno, or destruction and the end? Then the banner of Saint Mark broke out from the peak of the foremost, and floated fair on the morning breeze. It was Zeno indeed.

And not only had the famous leader himself come at the one moment of all others when he was most needed, perhaps in his whole life; he came as a victor, bringing prizes and spoil of inestimable value. He had laid waste the Genoese coast, almost to the city itself; he had intercepted Genoese convoys of grain off Apulia, he had harassed the enemy’s commerce in the East, and he had captured, off Rhodes, a huge vessel of theirs with five hundred thousand pieces of gold.

All this he told the Doge on board the latter’s galley. He had been twice wounded and was not yet recovered, but nothing could diminish his energy nor damp his ardour; at his own request he was stationed at the post of greatest danger, opposite Brondolo, and though the Genoese made a supreme effort to destroy the barriers and get their ships out during a gale, in which some of Zeno’s ships dragged their anchors, he drove them triumphantly back into their prison, and blockaded them more securely than ever. In this action he was nearly killed again. An arrow pierced his throat when the gale had driven him under one of the Genoese forts. Lest he should bleed to death he would not pluck out the missile, but remained on deck to save his ship; till, stumbling in the dusk, he fell down an open hatch. He was lifted up senseless, the arrow was withdrawn, and he was half suffocated by his own blood; but his senses revived, and he had himself turned upon his face, so that the blood might run freely out and allow him to breathe. To such a man it seemed as if nothing short of sudden death outright could be fatal; he refused to leave his ship, and in a marvellously short space of time he was about his duty again as if nothing had happened.

Meanwhile Pisani pushed the siege and bombarded Chioggia. In his force there were numbers of German and English mercenaries, who came to blows and killed each other by the score; but an English captain named William Gold had authority enough to quell the disorder, and the regular fighting went on.

[Sidenote: _Rom. iii. 289._]

Pisani continued to bombard Brondolo. The beginnings of artillery were unwieldy in the extreme, it being thought that the main object should be to throw a missile of great size and weight, even at long intervals, rather than to discharge much smaller ammunition with precise aim. One of Pisani’s mortars is said to have thrown a marble ball weighing two hundred pounds, and the smallest siege mortars projected masses of one hundred and forty pounds. To clean, load, and once fire one of these clumsy howitzers was often the work of a whole day; but if by any chance the shot took effect, the result was formidable. A single ball from Pisani’s great bombard knocked down the church tower of Brondolo with a considerable piece of the ramparts close by, burying Pietro Doria and his nephew under the ruins.

[Sidenote: _Rom. iii. 288._]

The Venetians now held all the approaches to the lagoons from the sea; and by taking the port of Loredo at the mouth of the Adige, they cut off Brondolo and Chioggia from all communication with the Duke of Ferrara, who had hitherto sent supplies of provisions and reinforcements by that way. The time was not far distant when famine must begin to make itself felt among the besieged, and the Venetians redoubled their efforts.

Meanwhile, after the death of Doria, a bold man of original mind, Napoleone Grimaldi, took command of the Genoese. He soon saw that in the existing conditions Brondolo must fall, and that his fleet could never escape. It occurred to him that a canal could be dug straight through the island to the open sea, by which he could bring his ships out during the night, and immediately threaten Venice herself, before the Venetian fleet could return.

The work was begun, but the Venetians discovered it in time. Grimaldi had even then no less than thirteen thousand fighting men in Brondolo and Chioggia; the Venetians had barely eight thousand. They had appealed to the famous English condottiero John Hawkwood, whose engagement to fight for the Milanese had just expired; but he either thought the Venetians were playing a losing game, or else he found more lucrative employment elsewhere, for after promising his assistance he failed to come. Venice now called for volunteers, and all sorts and conditions of men appeared in answer to the call. Among them there was even a canon of Saint Mark’s, Giovanni Loredan, with four of his servants.

In the absence of any famous condottiero to take the command, the Signory condescended to appoint Carlo Zeno to the command of the land troops. He saw that if Grimaldi’s project was to be frustrated, Brondolo must be taken at once, and the whole Genoese force must be driven into Chioggia. He was as good a soldier as he was a sailor, and he did not fail. His practice in all warfare was to take every possible precaution before fighting at all, and then to engage with the most reckless and furious energy.