If the whole hatred of the Corsicans and Genoese could be put into two words, these two are Sampiero and Doria. Both names, suggestive of the deadliest personal feud, at the same time completely represent their respective nationalities. Stephen Doria exceeded all his predecessors in cruelty. He had sworn to annihilate the Corsican people. His openly expressed opinions are these:--"When the Athenians became masters of the principal town in Melos, after it had held out for seven months, they put all the inhabitants above fourteen years of age to death, and sent a colony to people the place anew, and keep it in obedience. Why do we not imitate this example? Is it because the Corsicans deserve punishment less than those ancient rebels? The Athenians saw in these terrible chastisements the means of conquering the Peloponnese, the whole of Greece, Africa, and Sicily. By putting all their enemies to the sword, they restored the reputation and terror of their arms. It will be said that this procedure is contrary to the law of nations, to humanity, to the progress of civilisation. What does it matter, provided we only make ourselves feared?--that is all I ask. I care more for what Genoa says than for the judgment of posterity, which has no terrors for me. This empty word posterity checks none but the weak and irresolute. Our interest is to extend on every side the circle of conquered country, and to take from the insurgents everything that can support a war. Now, I see but two ways of doing this--first, by destroying the crops, and secondly, by burning the villages, and pulling down the towers in which they fortify themselves when they dare not venture into the field." The advice of Doria sufficiently shows how fierce the Genoese hatred of this indomitable people had become, and indicates but too plainly the unspeakable miseries the Corsicans had to endure. Stephen Doria laid half the island desolate with fire and sword; and Sampiero was still unconquered. The Corsican patriot had held an assembly of the people in Bozio to strengthen the general cause by the adoption of suitable measures, to regulate anew the council of the Dodici and the other popular magistracies, and to organize, if possible, an insurrection of the entire people. Sampiero was not a mere soldier, he was a far-seeing statesman. He wished to give his country, with its independence, a free republican constitution, founded on the ancient enactments of Sambucuccio of Alando. He wished to draw, from the situation of the island, from its forests and its products in general, such advantages as might enable it to become a naval power; he wished to make Corsica, in alliance with France, powerful and formidable, as Rhodes and Tyre had once been. Sampiero did not aim at the title of Count of Corsica; he was the first who was called Father of his country. The times of the seigniors were past.