the furs of Scandinavia, the fine wools of England, the cloth of
Flanders, and the wine of France.

[Footnote B: 'Hic vobis, aquatilium avium more, domus est.']

But if geography gave Venice an unrivalled site, the Venetians did the
rest. Through all the early years of their history they defied
Constantinople to the east of them, and Pope and Holy Roman Emperor to
the west; sometimes turning to one, sometimes to the other, but
stubbornly bent all the while upon independence, replying, when invited
to become subjects: 'God, Who is our help and protector has saved us to
dwell upon these waters. This Venice, which we have raised in the
lagoons, is our mighty habitation, no power of emperor or of prince can
touch us'; apt, if threatened, to retire to their islands and derisively
to fire cannon balls of bread into the mainland force, which sought to
starve them out.[2] Always they were conscious that their future lay
upon the waters, and in that East, whose colour had crept into their
civilization and warmed their blood. They were eastern and western both,
the Venetians, hot hearts for loving and conquering, icy heads for
scheming and ruling. Bit by bit they secured the ring of mainland behind
them, all the while keeping at bay the Saracen and Slav sea rovers,
whose ships were the terror of the Mediterranean. Then they descended
upon the pirates of Dalmatia, who thus harassed their trading vessels,
and took all the Dalmatian coast. The Doge of Venice became Duke of
Dalmatia. 'True it is,' says their chronicles, 'that the Adriatic Sea is
in the duchy of Venice,'[3] and they called it the 'Gulf of Venice'. Now
it was that there was first instituted the magnificent symbolical
ceremony of wedding the sea, with the proud words 'Desponsamus te mare
in signum veri perpetuique domini'![4]