Italian Yesterdays, vol. 1

by Mrs. Hugh Fraser

Contrary winds, or rather fortunate ones, drove them over to Grado, whose Patriarch was the son of the murdered Candiano, the predecessor of Pietro’s father, and Pietro was somewhat nervous of approaching the former in the midst of his own people. But the Patriarch had buried the old feud, perhaps with the aid of the thought that Pietro’s cause, at the moment, was his own, and sailed out to meet them, and brought with him the Standard of St. Heonagora, which he left with them.

Sailing away, Pietro received the submission of all the defenceless ports and islands from Grado clear to the pirates’ stronghold, the rock-enclosed city of Lagorta, the sight of which might have given pause to a much stronger force than that which he had brought with him; but, as Napier so truly says, moral force is the greatest thing in war, from wherever or whatever it may be derived, and, strong in the righteousness of his cause, his belief in himself, and, it may be, fortified by the homage of the ports and islands, he attacked, seized, and destroyed it utterly.

The welcome which Venice gave him on his return was no half-hearted affair, as one may imagine, since he had sailed away from a State—and returned with a small empire in his lap. The Clergy, all in the most sumptuous vestments, were pulled across from the historic olive woods of Castello and met Pietro in his own magnificent barge, at the Lido, where the Bishop prayed and the priests sang and the incense rose, and the Bishop sprinkled Pietro with holy water, and poured what was left into the lagoon, imploring the Almighty to make the sea safe both for them and for all others who should sail upon it.

In this search for flowers, one cannot stay in one part of the garden, methodically extracting the choice of its beds, and then move, as methodically, on to the next; so I must be excused if, seeing a bloom, I pick it, and look around me afterwards for another, instead of keeping my eyes on those on either side of me, when I might be tempted to smaller and weaker blossoms, and so, my basket filled, find no room for the best, when I come upon them afterwards.

Marco Polo was one of a family of merchants, quiet and law-abiding people, and who traded successfully, in spite of the almost continuous state of war in which their world was plunged, with the near East, and particularly with Constantinople, where for many years they had been in perfect safety, thanks to the chests full of treaties which the Venetians had made with the rulers of the Eastern Capital.

But now, as Marco came into his manhood, his affairs were no longer quite so secure, for a change of dynasty seemed to be approaching the near East, and the Venetians, being allies of the old House, were by consequence the enemies of the new, and of their friends—a state of things not at all to the taste of those steady, somewhat pompous men of affairs who, until that time, had had this extremely satisfactory market to themselves.

Foreseeing, probably, that their State would presently be involved in a war for the commercial supremacy of the East, the outcome of which was, to say the least of it, doubtful, Marco and his brother resolved to take time by the forelock and establish a new trading base before the old one was lost to them for ever; so, after a great deal of prolonged discussion, and one may imagine how much adding and subtracting and multiplying and dividing of figures, the two men started, sailed for the Crimea, where a foothold at least had already been obtained, and a base of supplies partially established.

They left Constantinople while the struggle between Paleologus and the Latins was at its worst, and took with them a stock of goods, as being the most portable and convenient agent of exchange in the mysterious and practically unknown countries for which they were bound. They seem to have had some idea of the products of the East, however, and no doubt expected to make a most profitable journey among the barbarians.

A stranger journey has never, perhaps, been taken. The East, the huge, ponderous, top-heavy old East, was only known of at all through the emissaries of Innocent IV and, as an occasional assistance against the Saracens, by the Crusaders.

Their wanderings from Soldadina to Bokhara must have been eventful enough, for that part of the world was quite as much at war with itself as was Europe, but Bokhara itself must have been a weary memory to them afterwards, for they were kept there for the better part of three years, being unable either to advance or to retire—the unknown in front and the over-risky deserts behind.