The governors of this bank, seeing the Republic restricted to a few families and the Ottoman power becoming master of the seas, wisely returned to the state (1562) Corsica, the cities of Ventimiglia and Sarzana, with its strong castles, the burgh of Levanto and the populous valley of Teico. Our rich citizens lent their fortunes at high interest to the government of Spain; but the industries which had been the life of the people gradually declined. In the first years of the century, Liguria was in its most flourishing condition. The smallest hamlets had profitable industries and trade. On the Western Riviera, Taggia was famous for its Muscatelle wines which Alberti says were not inferior to those of Candia and Cyprus. The trade in them was very active. Oneglia was prosperous, and Diana sometimes produced twenty thousand barrels of oil in a single year. Albenga, though its air was unwholesome (whence the proverb of the time,) “Albenga piana, se fosse sana si domanderebbe stella Diana,” was rich in the produce of its fruitful soil. There was universal movement, industry, wealth. But it was of short duration; the new system of government dried up all the fountains of our riches. In 1597, Genoa was reduced to sixty-one thousand inhabitants; Savona which had once counted thirty-six thousand citizens, in 1560 numbered only fourteen thousand, and in 1625, the number had fallen to eight thousand. The decrease was in this proportion throughout the Republic. Campanella had good cause to say to Genoa:--“Leave your markets, your gains, your barren glories! Blush for the riches of your citizens which contrast so terribly with the misery of the Republic.”