"Further, you would fain with all your might demonstrate that I have committed the crime of high treason against royalty! The very thought of so horrible an offence at first made me tremble. But after having made earnest inquiries regarding the place from which your Majesty comes, I have at last regained my peace of mind, as I could nowhere discover what I was in search of. Tell me, have you inherited this Majesty from your Doges, or pirated it upon the high seas at the time you gave up your city as a place of resort for the Mahometans, and through greed of gain, drew so many Turks to your country that they almost threatened to overwhelm the whole of Christendom? Perhaps you brought this Majesty out of Spain on your back, or it may be that it found its way to your country in a ship from England, which was consigned by an English merchant to one of your countrymen who had just been elected Doge, and which, as you remember, brought a letter the address of which ran thus: 'To Monsieur N.N., Doge of Genoa, and Dealer in General Wares.' "Tell me, in Heaven's name, whence you have obtained the dignity of a monarchy and the title of royalty, when the fact is that your Republic has, in bygone times, been nothing but a corporation of gain-greedy pirates? For these many centuries have any had a seat in your councils save such as held civic offices? Is it from them that you have got 'your Majesty?' Is not even the name of Duke, which you give to your Doge, an improper title? I am assured that the laws and fundamental articles of your Republic are so constructed that no one can be prince save the law itself, and you consequently, as the organs and administrators of it, improperly assume to yourselves the name of 'sovereign;' and the people are with as little propriety called subjects, since they must rule conjointly with you, as is in fact the case. Although you still remain in peaceful possession of your country, which is much more than you deserve, yet I am not able to see that it must therefore go equally well with you in Corsica, where the people, having their eyes open, stand by their just demands, and feel themselves constrained to throw the yoke from their neck. I, for my part, am firmly resolved to act as reason and love of justice prompt. And because you have proclaimed me through the whole world as a deceiver of all and every nation, I have now proposed to myself to demonstrate the contrary by deed in the case of one nation at least, and that, the oppressed Corsicans. As often as I can deceive you, by undeceiving you as to the estimate you put on my character, I shall do so with more than ordinary pleasure, and give you permission to do the like to me—when you can.