Germany, like lions in the desert, or eagles in the rock, secure in
their distance from equals or superiors; yet _here_ at Venice, where
every nobleman is a baron, and all together inhabit one city, no subject
can suffer from the tyranny of the rest, though all may benefit from the
general protection: as each is separately in awe of his neighbour, and
desires to secure his client's tenderness by indulgence, instead of
wishing to disgust him by oppression: unlike the state so powerfully
delineated by our incomparable poet in his Paulina,

Where dwelt in haughty wretchedness a lord,
Whose rage was justice, and whose law his word:
Who saw unmov'd the vassal perish near,
The widow's anguish, and the orphan's tear;
Insensible to pity--stern he stood,
Like some rude rock amid the Caspian flood,
Where shipwreck'd sailors unassisted lie,
And as they curse its barren bosom, die.

And it is, I trust, for no deeper reason that the subjects of this
republic resident in the capital, are less savage and more happy than
those who live upon the Terra Firma; where many outrages are still
committed, disgraceful to the state, from the mere facility offenders
find, either in escaping to the dominion of other princes, or of finding
shelter at home from the madly-bestowed protection these old barons on
the Continent cease not yet to give, to ruffians who profess their
service, and acknowledge dependence upon _them_. In the _town_, however,
little is known of these enormities, and less is talked on; and what
information has come to my ears of the murders done at Brescia and
Bergamo, was given me at _Milan_; where Blainville's accounts of that
country, though written so long ago, did not fail to receive