The destruction of the venerable doge himself still remained to be accomplished. Amongst the most resolute enemies of the Foscari was Jacopo Loredano. His father Piero and his uncle Marco had been the stern opponents of Francesco Foscari, and died under circumstances which gave rise to suspicions of their having perished by his means. In that bitterness of soul which sometimes leads men to the most extraordinary modes of expressing their feelings, Jacopo Loredano opened, in his books of trade, an account with his great enemy, charging him as debtor for the lives of his father and his uncle.-A page was left unwritten upon, on the opposite side. To balance this account of blood became the principal object of Loredano's life; and, having been elected a member of the Council of Ten, opportunities were not wanting of enforcing the payment of the debt

Almost heart-broken by the death of his son, the doge had retired to his palace, where, incapable of applying himself to the business of the state, he lived secluded from the public eye. This secession furnished Loredano with grounds upon which to rest his project. He proposed in the council that, as Foscari neglected the duties of his ducal office, they should proceed to the election of another doge. Of such a deposition there had been no instance in the annals of the republic, and the council hesitated before the adoption of so arbitrary a measure. Waiting upon the doge in a body, they endeavoured, in the first instance, to procure from him a voluntary renunciation of his dignity; but the lofty spirit of Francesco Foscari was not yet quelled. He said that he had sworn faithfully to serve the republic, and that, until re

leased from his oath and deposed, he would not lay down his sovereign authority. The council being again assembled absolved him from his oath, and commanded him to resign within three days the symbols of his ducal power. In obedience to this mandate, Foscari delivered up the doge's ring, which was broken in his presence, and supported by the arm of his brother prepared to quit the palace of St. Mark, where for five and thirty years he had lived the first servant of the republic. A secretary, seeing him about to descend the Giants' Staircase, suggested to him that he would find it more convenient to descend through a more private passage, as the Giants' Stairs were crowded with the citizens. "No," said Foscari, "by those steps I mounted, and by those will I descend." The people as he passed testified their affection and respect, and such was the nature of the public excitement, that the Council of Ten found it necessary to publish a proclamation forbidding the Venetians, under pain of death, to speak of the late deposition.

The electors were now assembled in conclave to choose a new doge, and on the 30th October, 1457, Paschal Malipieri was raised to the supreme dignity. The great bell of St. Mark, announcing the appointment of his successor, sounded in the ears of Francesco Foscari. Grief and indignation overwhelmed the frame already worn out by age and infirmities:-he died before the cheerful peals which welcomed the new doge had ceased to sound. His enemies, who had despoiled him of his power while living, insisted upon rendering him ducal honours when dead, and notwithstanding the remonstrances of

his widow, who implored permission to expend her own dowry upon his obsequies, the body of Foscari was again borne up the Giants' Stairs, and, clothed in the ducal garments, exposed to the public gaze, his successor assisting at the ceremony in the simple robe of a Venetian

senator.

Jacopo Loredano, turning to his books of trade, opened them at the leaf where he had stated the account between himself and Francesco Foscari, and on the opposite page inscribed the fatal acquittance "l'ha pagata." "He has paid it!"