No State, indeed, has ever exercised a
greater moral influence over its subjects, whether abroad or at home.
If traitors were to be found among the Pregadi, there was ample
compensation for this in the fact that every Venetian away from home
was a born spy for his government. It was a matter of course that the
Venetian cardinals at Rome sent home news of the transactions of the
secret papal consistories. The Cardinal Domenico Grimani had the
dispatches intercepted in the neighbourhood of Rome (1500) which
Ascanio Sforza was sending to his brother Lodovico il Moro, and
forwarded them to Venice; his father, then exposed to a serious
accusation, claimed public credit for this service of his son before
the Gran Consiglio, in other words, before all the world.
The conduct of the Venetian government to the Condottieri in its pay
has been spoken of already. The only further guarantee of their
fidelity which could be obtained lay in their great number, by which
treachery was made as difficult as its discovery was easy. In looking
at the Venetian army list, one is only surprised that among forces of
such miscellaneous composition any common action was possible. In the
catalogue for the campaign of 1495 we find 15,526 horsemen, broken up
into a number of small divisions. Gonzaga of Mantua alone had as many
as I,200, and Gioffredo Borgia 740; then follow six officers with a
contingent of 600 to 700, ten with 400, twelve with 400 to 200,
fourteen or thereabouts with 200 to 100, nine with 80, six with 50 to
60, and so forth.
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