"Let the reader therefore conceive the existence of the Venetian state as broadly divided into two periods: the first of nine hundred, the second of five hundred years, the separation being marked by what was called the 'Serrar del Consiglio; that is to say, the final and absolute distinction of the nobles from the commonalty, and the establishment of the government in their hands, to the exclusion alike of the influence of the people on the one side, and the authority of the doge on the other. Then the first period, of nine hundred years, presents us with the most interesting spectable of a people struggling out of anarchy into order and power; and then governed, for the most part, by the worthiest and noblest man whom they could find among them, called their Doge or Leader, with an aristocracy gradually and resolutely forming itself around him, out of which, and at last by which, he was chosen; an aristocracy owing its origin to the accidental numbers, influence, and wealth, of some among the families of the fugitives from the older Venetia, and gradually organizing itself, by its unity and heroism, into a separate body. This first period includes the Rise of Venice, her noblest achievements, and the circumstances which determined her character and position among European powers; and within its range, as might have been anticipated, we find the names of all her hero princes,--of Pietro Urseolo, Ordalafo Falier, Domenico Michieli, Sebastiano Ziani, and Enrico Dandolo. "The second period opens with a hundred and twenty years, the most eventful in the career of Venice--the central struggle of her life--stained with her darkest crime, the murder of Carrara--disturbed by her most dangerous internal sedition, the conspiracy of Falier--oppressed by her most fatal war, the war of Chiozza--and distinguished by the glory of her two noblest citizens (for in this period the heroism of her citizens replaces that of her monarchs), Vittor Pisani and Carlo Zeno. I date the commencement of the Fall of Venice from the death of Carlo Zeno, 8th May, 1418; the _visible_ commencement from that of another of her noblest and wisest children, the Doge Tomaso Mocenigo, who expired five years later. The reign of Foscari followed, gloomy with pestilence and war; a war in which large acquisitions of territory were made by subtle or fortunate policy in Lombardy, and disgrace, significant as irreparable, sustained in the battles on the Po at Cremona, and in the marshes at Caravaggio. In 1454, Venice, the first of the states of Christendom, humiliated herself to the Turk: in the same year was established the Inquisition of State, and from this period her government takes the perfidious and mysterious form under which it is usually conceived. In 1477, the great Turkish invasion spread terror to the shores of the lagoons; and in 1508, the league of Cambrai marks the period usually assigned as the commencement of the