Part 45 (2/2)
The army of Venice had now been vastly increased, by the arrival of the Star Company of Milan, and the Condottieri commanded by Sir John Hawkwood. The dikes, erected across the channels with so much labour, were removed, and the fleet took their part in the siege.
On the 14th of May there was joy in Chioggia, similar to that which the Venetians had felt at the sight of Zeno's fleet, for on that morning the squadron, which Genoa had sent to their a.s.sistance under the command of Matteo Maruffo, appeared in sight. This admiral had wasted much valuable time on the way, but had fallen in with and captured, after a most gallant resistance, five Venetian galleys under Giustiniani, who had been despatched to Apulia to fetch grain.
The Genoese fleet drew up in order of battle, and challenged Pisani to come out to engage them. But, impetuous as was the disposition of the admiral, and greatly as he longed to avenge his defeat at Pola, he refused to stir. He knew that Chioggia must, ere long, fall, and he would not risk all the advantages gained, by so many months of toil and effort, upon the hazard of a battle. Day after day Maruffo repeated his challenge, accompanied by such insolent taunts that the blood of the Venetian sailors was so stirred that Pisani could no longer restrain them. After obtaining leave from the doge to go out and give battle, he sailed into the roadstead on the 25th. The two fleets drew up in line of battle, facing each other. Just as the combat was about to commence a strange panic seized the Genoese, and, without exchanging a blow or firing a shot, they fled hastily. Pisani pursued them for some miles, and then returned to his old station.
The grief and despair of the garrison of Chioggia, at the sight of the retreat of their fleet, was in proportion to the joy with which they had hailed its approach. Their supply of fresh water was all but exhausted. Their rations had become so scanty that, from sheer weakness, they were unable, after the first week in June, to work their guns.
Genoa, in despair at the position of her troops, laboured unceasingly to relieve them. Emissaries were sent to tamper with the free companies, and succeeded so far that these would have marched away, had they not been appeased by the promise of a three days' sack of Chioggia, and a month's extra pay at the end of the war. Attempts were made to a.s.sa.s.sinate Zeno, but these also failed. The Genoese then induced the pope to intercede on their behalf; but the council remembered that when Venice was at the edge of destruction, on the 31st of December, no power had come forward to save her, and refused now to be robbed of the well-earned triumph.
On the 15th of July, Maruffo, who had received reinforcements again made his appearance; but Pisani this time refused to be tempted out. On the 21st a deputation was sent out from Chioggia to ask for terms, and though, on being told that an unconditional surrender alone would be accepted, they returned to the city, yet the following day the Genoese flag was hauled down from the battlements.
On the 24th the doge, accompanied by Pisani and Zeno, made his formal entry into Chioggia. The booty was enormous; and the companies received the promised bounty, and were allowed to pillage for three days. So large was the plunder collected, in this time, by the adventurers, that the share of one of them amounted to five hundred ducats. The republic, however, did not come off altogether without spoil--they obtained nineteen seaworthy galleys, four thousand four hundred and forty prisoners, and a vast amount of valuable stores, the salt alone being computed as worth ninety thousand crowns.
Not even when the triumphant fleet returned, after the conquest of Constantinople, was Venice so wild with delight, as when the doge, accompanied by Pisani and Zeno, entered the city in triumph after the capture of Chioggia. From the danger, more imminent than any that had threatened Venice from her first foundation, they had emerged with a success which would cripple the strength, and lower the pride of Genoa for years. Each citizen felt that he had some share in the triumph, for each had taken his share in the sufferings, the sacrifices, and the efforts of the struggle. There had been no unmanly giving way to despair, no pitiful entreaty for aid in their peril. Venice had relied upon herself, and had come out triumphant.
From every house hung flags and banners, every balcony was hung with tapestry and drapery. The Grand Ca.n.a.l was closely packed with gondolas, which, for once, disregarded the sumptuary law that enforced black as their only hue, and shone in a ma.s.s of colour. Gaily dressed ladies sat beneath canopies of silk and velvet; flags floated from every boat, and the rowers were dressed in the bright liveries of their employers. The church bells rang out with a deafening clang, and from roof and balcony, from wharf and river, rang out a mighty shout of welcome and triumph from the crowded ma.s.s, as the great state gondola, bearing the doge and the two commanders, made its way, slowly and with difficulty, along the centre of the ca.n.a.l.
Francis was on board one of the gondolas that followed in the wake of that of the doge, and as soon as the grand service in Saint Mark's was over, he slipped off and made his way back to the Palazzo Polani. The merchant and Giulia had both been present at the ceremony, and had just returned when he arrived.
”I guessed you would be off at once, Francisco, directly the ceremony was over. I own that I, myself, would have stayed for a time to see the grand doings in the Piazza, but this child would not hear of our doing so. She said it would be a shame, indeed, if you should arrive home and find no one to greet you.”
”So it would have been,” Giulia said. ”I am sure I should not have liked, when I have been away, even on a visit of pleasure to Corfu, to return and find the house empty; and after the terrible dangers and hards.h.i.+ps you have gone through, Francisco, it would have been unkind, indeed, had we not been here. You still look thin and worn.”
”I think that is fancy on your part, Giulia. To my eyes he looks as stout as ever I saw him. But certainly he looked as lean and famished as a wolf, when I paid that visit to the camp the day before Zeno's arrival. His clothes hung loose about him, his cheeks were hollow, and his eyes sunken. He would have been a sight for men to stare at, had not every one else been in an equally bad case.
”Well, I thank G.o.d there is an end of it, now! Genoa will be glad to make peace on any terms, and the sea will once more be open to our s.h.i.+ps. So now, Francisco, you have done with fighting, and will be able to turn your attention to the humbler occupation of a merchant.”
”That will I right gladly,” Francis said. ”I used to think, once, I should like to be a man-at-arms; but I have seen enough of it, and hope I never will draw my sword again, unless it be in conflict with some Moorish rover. I have had many letters from my father, chiding me for mingling in frays in which I have no concern, and shall be able to gladden his heart, by writing to a.s.sure him that I have done with fighting.”
”It has done you no harm, Francisco, or rather it has done you much good. It has given you the citizens.h.i.+p of Venice, in itself no slight advantage to you as a trader here. It has given you three hundred ducats a year, which, as a mark of honour, is not to be despised. It has won for you a name throughout the republic, and has given you a fame and popularity such as few, if any, citizens of Venice ever attained at your age. Lastly, it has made a man of you. It has given you confidence and self possession. You have acquired the habit of commanding men. You have been placed in positions which have called for the exercise of rare judgment, prudence, and courage; and you have come well through it all. It is but four years since your father left you a lad in my keeping. Now you are a man, whom the highest n.o.ble in Venice might be proud of calling his son. You have no reason to regret, therefore, that you have, for a year, taken up soldiering instead of trading, especially as our business was all stopped by the war, and you must have pa.s.sed your time in inactivity.”
In the evening, when the merchant and Francis were alone together, the former said:
”I told you last autumn, Francis, when I informed you that, henceforth, you would enter into my house as a partner in the business, when we again recommenced trade, that I had something else in my mind, but the time to speak of it had not then arrived. I think it has now come. Tell me, my boy, frankly, if there is anything that you would wish to ask of me.”
Francis was silent for a moment; then he said:
”You have done so much, Signor Polani. You have heaped kindness upon me, altogether beyond anything I could have hoped for, that, even did I wish for more, I could not ask it.”
”Then there is something more you would like, Francisco. Remember that I have told you that I regard you as a son, and therefore I wish you to speak to me, as frankly as if I was really your father.”
”I fear, signor, that you will think me audacious, but since you thus urge upon me to speak all that is in my mind, I cannot but tell you the truth. I love your daughter, Giulia, and have done so ever since the first day that my eyes fell on her. It has seemed to me too much, even to hope, that she can ever be mine, and I have been careful in letting no word expressive of my feelings pa.s.s my lips. It still seems, to me, beyond the bounds of possibility that I could successfully aspire to the hand of the daughter of one of the n.o.blest families in Venice.”
”I am glad you have spoken frankly, dear lad,” the merchant said. ”Ever since you rescued my daughters from the hands of Mocenigo, it has been on my mind that someday, perhaps, you would be my son-in-law, as well as my son by adoption. I have watched with approval that, as Giulia grew from a child into a young woman, her liking for you seemed to ripen into affection. This afternoon I have spoken to her, and she has acknowledged that she would obey my commands, to regard you as her future husband, with gladness.
”I could not, however, offer my daughter's hand to one who might reject it, or who, if he accepted it, would only do so because he considered the match to be a desirable one, from a business point of view. Now that you have told me you love her, all difficulties are at an end. I am not one of those fathers who would force a marriage upon their daughters, regardless of their feelings. I gave to Maria free choice among her various suitors, and so I would give it to Giulia. Her choice is in accordance with my own secret hopes, and I therefore, freely and gladly, bestow her upon you. You must promise only that you do not carry her away altogether to England, so long as I live. You can, if you like, pay long visits with her from time to time to your native country, but make Venice your headquarters.
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