they had allowed Ossuna to recruit his army from among their auxiliaries, was nothing compared with the immediate and awful risk which they ran by fostering in the very heart of Venice a band of ruffians who believed themselves employed to conspire against it, and might at any time be tempted to carry the design into execution.

Granting, then, that Venice was a party to the designs of Ossuna prior to the conspiracy, the way in which Daru supposes they were to aid their schemes is, in the last degree, cumbrous, dangerous, and improbable.

But, still more, where was the necessity, in any view, for the series of atrocious murders (extending, as Daru assumes, though that is very doubtful,* to many hundreds) by which the Venetians are supposed to have endeavoured to conceal their participation in Ossuna's designs? On Daru's own view, Pierre and Renault knew nothing of the real design of Ossuna. The conspirators with whom they dealt were all equally ignorant from them the Venetian Senate had nothing to fear. Why, then, these wide-sweeping executions of parties not in the secret, and from whom no intelligence of the plot could ever be communicated to Spain? Could any state, however "secret, bold, and bloody," resort to such a barbarous mode of concealing their slender participation in Ossuna's designs, and that, too, where the parties executed had nothing in their power to reveal?

:

It would be easy to accumulate considerations of this nature; but surely those which we have already advanced are sufficient to show,—

1st, That the very groundwork of Daru's hypothesis, the privacy and participation of Venice in the treasonable schemes of Ossuna prior to the date of the conspiracy, is entirely wanting. And,

2d, That even if the fact was so, it would be altogether inadequate to account for the events which occurred.

One by one, then, the different theories which profess to account for this mysterious transaction are found

to fail, and we are driven back again to the original account as given by the Venetian annalists themselves. And what are the great difficulties by which their account of the transaction is embarrassed, which should lead us now to deny the very existence of a conspiracy? We shall advert in a few words to these as stated by Daru, who has embodied the substance of all the previous objections in his own.

1. Nothing can be founded on the supposed improbability of Ossuna's being engaged in the supposed plot, from its atrocious character. The man who, in 1819, is assumed to have been plotting treason against his own king, was not likely to be scrupulous in his dealings with a foreign state, which he evidently detested. Besides, Bedamar, we see, did engage in the plot heart and hand, believing it to be real; and we have no reason to suppose the morality of Ossuna to have been more rigorous than that of the Spanish ambassador.

2. But had the design succeeded, it is argued, Spain could never hope to keep possession of Venice, or finally to destroy that power. Probably the other European states would have interfered; but, in the mean time, a blow would have been struck, from which the commerce and importance of Venice would, in all probability, never have recovered; and Spain and the chief conspirators, Bedamar and Ossuna, would have enriched themselves. Besides, the states of Europe might probably have been as passive, had the design of Spain succeeded, as they evidently were indifferent to the unprincipled nature of Ossuna's own attempt against Spain.

3. But then, the smallness of the means, and the miserable nature of the instruments employed! Why, such adventurers were the very instruments who would be selected for such a purpose; daring, unprincipled, destitute of character, men who might be avowed or disavowed as suited the purposes of the prime movers of the plot. Pierre and his friends, who were the best judges of their chances of success, and Bedamar, the cautious ambassador, appear never to have doubted of the practicability of their design;

VOL. XLI. NO. CCLIX.

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and when it is considered how easily a metropolis may be thrown into confusion by a mob, and its inhabitants, however numerous, overawed, we find no difficulty in conceiving the project of a sudden and destructive attack on the town, when backed by Ossuna's galleys in the harbour, to have been perfectly possible.

4. But then comes Daru's stronghold the confessions of Pierre to the Venetian Government, many months before the public announcement of the discovery of the conspiracy. If Pierre revealed the plot, it is argued, he could not well be concerned in its execution if the plot was real, and revealed by him, the senate could never have rewarded him for his information by drowning him in the Lagune. This objection is doubtless forcible; but its apparent weight, it is thought, may be removed.

Two suppositions may be taken, either of which might account for what took place. The first, and we think the most probable, is that though Pierre unquestionably communicated to the Venetian Government a project of Ossuna's for an attack upon the town and burning the galleys in the harbour, this was truly done to obtain their confidence, so as to enable him to accomplish his schemes with the greater safety, and to lull them into security, when they found the attack was not made.

These revelations, let it be observed, began within four days of his arrival in Venice. We do not know what was the precise information given by Pierre. Very probably it was entirely different from the truth, and calculated to mislead the Venetian Government. He himself stated as much to his accomplice Moncassin, "Ch'egli aveva dato ad intender certa impresa che disegnava il Duca d'Ossuna, di fare per impatronirse di questa citta ma che tutto era in contrario." If then the discovery was but a part of the plot; if the Venetian Government afterwards discovered that they had been deceived, and that this adventurer was still engaged in furthering the schemes of Bedamar and Ossuna, what difficulty is there in accounting for his punishment and that of his comrades?

But it is quite possible, that, after

all, Pierre may either, through terror or treachery, have really intended at first to thwart the plot and to make known to Venice the designs of the Duke. Still, if he was guilty of one such act, we can hardly suppose him scrupulous about another. Having betrayed Ossuna to Venice, he might again be equally ready to betray Venice to Ossuna, and revive those intrigues which he had at first been led to abandon. His whole career, which, so far as it can be traced, is that of a scheming and perfidious adventurer, is in favour of the supposition that he might very easily be again involved in the schemes of Ossuna, to whom his assistance would now be so much the more valuable, that he possessed to some extent the confidence of the Venetian Government from his former revelations. In this case also, if the Venetian Government afterwards discovered that they had been deceived, is his punishment and that of his accomplices difficult to be accounted for?

We shall only add, in reference to this point, that Nani, who gives the account of the conspiracy quoted in the outset, sees no inconsistency between its reality and the fact of Pierre's previous revelations, which he expressly mentions. He doubtless had before him when he wrote the means of bridging over the difficulty, which we can only do by conjecture; but the important fact is, that he does not view these previous confessions as a difficulty even requiring explanation.

5. But then, it is said, the Council of Ten, in their communications to the Senate, suppress all mention of the previous communications of Pierre, and represent the first discovery of the conspiracy as made by Juven and Moncassin. And why this concealment, it is asked, if the conspiracy was real? The answer to this is, that the Ten did not conceal in their communications to the Senate the fact of Pierre's revelations. They are repeatedly alluded to. In particular, the Council of Ten expressly stated to the Senate,* that they had been made acquainted with the conspiracy since the month of March. And even if they had, there would have been nothing in the fact very difficult of explanation, because if they had not acted on Pierre's

communications, they might naturally enough wish to conceal their own negligence by passing over the circumstances of the previous communication.

6. The silence which the Venetian Government observed in regard to this affair, is sufficiently accounted for on the ground stated by themselves,-viz. their anxiety not to disturb the peace which had with so much difficulty been concluded. But we have in its records the whole history of the affair as communicated by them in their confidential communications to their own ambassadors, or from the Council of Ten to the Senate, and we have the sentences of the conspirators. And here, without going farther into the subject, we may be allowed to express a doubt as to the numbers of the executions. No execution could take place in Venice without the sentence of the Council of Ten; we have its records, and in these no deaths are mentioned, except those of Jacques Pierre, Reynault, Bruillard, the two De Bouleaux, and Rossetti in Venice, and Berard and Furnier at Crema. Juven, who had been the means of discovering the conspiracy, was acquitted, and this

circumstance in itself seems fatal to the theory of Daru, namely, that the object of the Venetians was to bury in oblivion their own participation in Ossuna's schemes, by the comprehensive destruction of the accusers as well as the accused. Moncassin was also spared, and even rewarded with a pension, though he received a hint to retire to Candia. Daru is again mistaken in saying that he was soon after assassinated there, with the connivance, he thinks, of the Venetian Government; on the contrary, we find him receiving an assurance in 1620 that his pension would be continued to his son.*

These embody the main points of objection to the old account as given by Nani, and we confess we see in them nothing formidable. If any difficulty should remain, this at least seems clear, that of all the accounts which have been given, this which supposes the existence of a real conspiracy against Venice, organized by Bedamar and Ossuna, and in which Pierre and Reynault were the leading instruments, is the most natural, the most satisfactory, and the one best vouched by historical evidence.