alone, and as the Byzantine navy, like the Turkish fleet in our own days, had been neglected and the money intended for its maintenance had been misappropriated, he applied for aid to the mercantile Republic of Venice. The Venetians saw a chance of consolidating their trade in the Levant, and, as the price of their assistance, obtained from the embarrassed Emperor the right of free trade throughout the empire, where the Greek cities of Thebes, Athens, Corinth, Nauplia, Methone, Korone, Corfù, Euripos, and Demetrias are specially mentioned as their haunts. But the aid of a Venetian fleet did not prevent the victory of the Normans over Alexios on the plain near Durazzo, where Cæsar and Pompey had once contended. The Emperor retreated to Ochrida, where, two generations earlier, the Bulgarian Tsar Samuel had fixed his residence, while his conqueror, after taking Durazzo, marched across Albania and captured the city of Kastoria, which was defended by three hundred English, members of the Imperial Guard. Recalled to Italy by troubles in his own dominions and by the distress of his ally the Pope, Guiscard left the prosecution of the campaign to his son Bohemond, who penetrated into Thessaly, that historic battle-ground of the Near East. But the walls of Larissa and the gold of Alexios proved too much for the strength of the Normans, and Bohemond was forced to retire to Italy. He found his father fresh from his triumph at Rome, which he had delivered to the Pope, and ready for a second campaign against the Byzantine Empire. In 1084 Guiscard set sail again; after three naval battles with the Greeks and their Venetian allies, Corfù once more surrendered to the Normans, and their leader used it as a stepping-stone to the island of Cephalonia. But he contracted a fever there, which put an end to his life and to the expedition, of which he had been the heart and soul. The village of Phiskardo has perpetuated his name, thus marking this second attempt of the West to impose its sway upon the East.