133 



ei-ful Ky the same moans, and, not contont with licr own limitPfl fishing 

 grounds, un(l(Ttook the coiKjuost of others: usurpinir the fisheries of 

 the regions of the Bosplioras, sh(; ciptured and f()r a while awed into 

 submission their rightful owners.* Amsterdam, from a village of her- 

 ring-catchers, cabins, and curing-sheds, rose, by the skill of the inmates 

 of these frail structures, by the fame of their commodities in foreign 

 countries, and by the immense:' consumption of them at home, to unex- 

 ampled affluence and grandeur; and the sayings evervwhere current 

 two cezituries ago, that "Amsterdam is f)uuded on herring-bones," and 

 thai "Dutchmen''s bodies are built of pickled herrings," were hardly 

 more than (quaint expressions of historic truth. 



The islands and portions of continent separated from each other by 

 deep and boisterous channels, which compose the kingdom of Denmark, 

 couspelled the Danes to communicate with different parts of their coun- 

 try by sea, and their barren soil as imperatively obliged them to resort 

 to fishing for support. Extending their voyages at length from their 

 own coasts to Greenland and Iceland, the skill and wealth thus acquu'ed 

 enabled them to add the ports of Copenhagen, Altona, and Kiel, to the 



fiicted the kiss, sad, as a monument of their triiiraph, they afterwards placed in the church of 

 6ta. AiriH'se a picture represeutiiis; the cert'inouy." 



MoBcenigo, wto died in ]4"2:'., wms well versed iii the coiuinerciul and maritime nflairs of his 

 eountrv'; and he advauced both to uucSMiujtled prosperity. A census taken while he was in 

 SKpreme authoiity fixed the population of the capital at liiD.OOO souls. 



Eariy in tin* fixteeiitb century, the French ambassador, Louis 1 lelian, pronounced a speech, 

 m wMch he u\i:ered tli« mosS, violent invectives against the Venetian.s, who he declared had 

 " abandoned the cause of Heaven, and deserved to be execrated by God and man — to be 

 hunted down by sea and land — and to be exteinninated by fire and sword." Referrinif to their 

 wars and (Minmicsts, he said, tisat " not a century has eiapsed sine*' these fishermen emerged 

 from their boi^s; iuid no soouer had thej* pliiced foot on terra firnia than they aeijuired greater 

 dominion by wiM-fidy than Rome won by arms in the lotiir course of two hundred yi-ars; and 

 they had already concerted plans to bridfje the Don, th(! Jvliine, the Seine, the Rhone, tha 

 Tagus, and the Ebro, and to establish tfai'ir ru3e in everj' province of Europe." 



Her power, however, was soon weiikened. Her salt works, in which from her very birth 

 she had rcfesed all partnership and defied ail competition, were shared by compulsion with 

 the Hidy Sci' withiu a few years after the maledictions of the French minister. Her decline 

 i.nd fall need jiot be here related. lis moderu times Venice is hardly known for her fislierios. 

 Her exports of the products of th(^ sea in IH-,'!) were of the value of about twenty-tlve thou- 

 eand dollars, while her imports amounted to «early a quarter (d" a million of dollars. '• The 

 6shin^' boats tf \'eniee," says McC'iiliocli, in IH:;-^, "are not of a size to be rated as vi'ssels of 

 ttmn;\<i<-. Alxiut sixteen tkoiisaud of the popuiation subsist by fishing near the port mid over 

 tte Ijigoon." 



* " At the eiose of the thirteenth eeatury," says a historian of Venice, " Genoa, by her con- 

 aexion with the (Jreeks, had ftequired great strength in the East. She was mistress of Scio; 

 site possessed many eKtablisiimenls on the shores ni' tin; Black sea, and auu)ng them the im- 

 portant town 'if Cairiu wliieh comniiusds the entrance of tlu^ sea of Azoph. Above all, she 

 hf^d, as a fief of the enii)irc, Pera, tbe suliurli (d' Constantinople ; and by its occupation she 

 virtually retained tiie keys of tliat great cjipita!. Slir ninlrollrd its Jishirirs and its riisto}ns. 

 With'jiil lirr prriiilssion, not a hark ronhl niriiriiJr its liiirltor; and, a.s she closed or threw open 

 her granaries, faiiiine or abitt^daiice w.uted on her pleasure." 



Giblion, in his Decline and Fall, speaking of Genoa, and referring t-o the year i'^A^, remarks 

 that she "»iu|)pljed the (Jreeks with (ish and eorn — two arii(des of food alnio.st eipially im- 

 pwrtant to a sujjerstitious peo]»Je." "They proceeded," he continues, "^> i/.sMry> //</ rH.s7/>/»w, 

 tkcjls/iirji, evil mm the toll of the, Rimp/iiints, Jriim trliirli tliiij ilvrirrd a rrvcnuf of tiro hiimlrcd 

 (koitsini'l pirrjs of (^olil. A lijizan-'int mssr.l ithirh prrsumal to fish at the. month of tin liarhor 

 teas sunl< >itf these an/lnrious strangers, anil Iht fishermrn mere niurilered. Instead of suing for 

 piirdon, the (ii'Ufie-'e deniianled satisfac-.li(Ui; re(piired in a haughty strain that tiie (jreeks 

 dioidd renounce the exercise of DavijfatJon, and encountered with regular arms the first sallies 

 of the popidar indjyjiiitiou," 



