At the same time Renier Zeno was arbitrarily forbidden, contrary to all law, to call into question the conduct of the courts in general, but he was too proud and energetic to submit to such despotism, and what it pleased the Council of Ten to call his ‘pride’ served his adversaries as a pretext for accusing him. The Council had the imprudence to condemn him to ten years’ imprisonment in the fortress of Cattaro; but this was too much, and the Ten were soon forced to revoke the sentence as completely as they had annulled that of the unfortunate Foscarini. But the world saw, and the prestige of the Council was gone; the government cast about in vain for some means of restoring it, and could find nothing to do except to make a few reforms and changes in its old system of spying and repression. Ever since the fourteenth century there had been a locked box with a slit in it, placed in a public part of the ducal palace, into which any one might drop an anonymous written accusation against any one else, from the Doge down. Little by little the use of this means of ‘informing’ developed, until it had now become common to try cases on the mere strength of such unsupported accusations. The boxes were called the Lions’ Mouths on account of the shape they had taken, and there was much talk about them when it was attempted to reform the Code of Laws in the seventeenth century. A decree of the year 1635 restored the old regulations as to the nature of the misdeeds which might be thus denounced. [Illustration: THE FONDAMENTA S. GIORGIO, REDENTORE IN DISTANCE] It was decided that if the accusation was signed, four-fifths of the judges must agree before the case could be brought to trial; if the information was anonymous there could be no trial without the consent of the Doge, his counsellors, and the chiefs of the Ten to bring the case before the Great Council, and the trial could not be opened unless it were voted necessary by five-sixths of the assembly. These measures were no doubt prudent, but it was the system itself that was at fault; any Venetian was authorised by it to take upon himself the duties of a detective, and was encouraged to spy on his neighbours, because the courts generally rewarded the informer after a conviction.