The Ducal Chancellery, which the Council of Ten once called 'cor nostri status,' was preserved on the upper floor of the palace, and was reached by the Scala d'oro. The papers were arranged in a number of cupboards surmounted by the arms of the various Grand Chancellors who had presided in that office. The documents of the Ducal Chancellery are of far higher importance than those contained in the Cancelleria Inferiore; they consist of political papers which it was not necessary to keep secret. Among the many interesting series of documents which fell to the Ducal Chancellery, the most valuable are the 'Compilazione delle Leggi,' or statute-books distinguished by the various colours of their bindings--gold, roan, and green--to mark the statutes which relate to the Maggior Consiglio, the Senate, and the College respectively; the Secretario alle voci, or record of all elections in the Great Council; the Libri gratiarum, or special privileges. But most important of all is the great series of documents which include the whole legislation of the State relating to Venetian affairs on sea and land. Of this vast series those marked _Terra_ contain 3128 volumes of files, 411 volumes of registers, and 7 volumes of rubrics; those marked _Mar_ number 1286 volumes of files, 247 volumes of registers, and 7 volumes of rubrics. It will easily be seen how important the Ducal Chancellery is both for the verification of dates, and also as displaying so large a tract of the Venetian home administration. But important as the Ducal Chancellery undoubtedly is, it cannot vie in interest with the Cancelleria Secreta, which might, with every justice, have been called 'cor nostri status', for it is in the papers of that Chancellery that the long history of the growth, splendour, and decline of the Republic is to be traced in all its manifold details and complicated relations. The Secret Chancellery was established by a decree of the Great Council in the year 1402. Its object was to preserve those papers of the highest State importance, from the publicity to which the Ducal Chancellery was exposed. The regulation of the Secret Chancellery was undertaken by the Council of Ten, and the rigorous orders which they issued from time to time abundantly prove the difficulty they experienced in securing the secrecy which they desired. The Secret Chancellery became the depository of all State papers of great moment; and if we take the chief members of the constitution in order, and note the documents issuing from them which fell to the custody of the Secreta, we shall see how the great flow of Venetian history is to be followed here rather than in any other department of the archives.