arge College of Secretaries, trained in a school especially
established to fit them for their duties. In the year 1443 a decree of
the Great Council required the Doge and the Signoria to elect each year
twelve lads to be taught Latin, rhetoric and philosophy, and the number
of the pupils was gradually increased. From this school they passed out
by examination, and became first extra-ordinaries and ordinaries, called
Notaries Ducal, then secretaries to the Senate, and finally secretaries
to the Ten. The post of secretary was one which required much diligence
and discretion. The secretaries were in constant attendance on the
various Councils of State, and thus became intimately acquainted with
all the secret affairs of the Republic. They were frequently sent on
delicate missions. It was a secretary of the Ten who brought Carmagnola
to Venice to stand his trial; and, as we shall presently relate, it was
a secretary of the Senate who announced to Thomas Killigrew, the English
Minister, his dismissal from Venice. The secretaries were sometimes
accredited as Residents to foreign Courts, though they were not eligible
for the post of Ambassador. Inside the Chancellery the secretaries were
entirely at the disposal of the Grand Chancellor, and their duties were
to study, to invent, and to read cipher; to transcribe the registers
and rubrics; to keep the annals of the Council of Ten, and to enter the
laws in the statute book.

We may now turn our attention to the principal series of State papers
which issued from the five great members of the Constitution, the
Maggior Consiglio, the Senate, the Ten, the College, and the Doge, and
show how these papers were arranged under the three Chancelleries of
which we have spoken.

The Cancelleria Inferiore was preserved in one large room near the head
of the Giants' Staircase in the Ducal Palace, and was entrusted to the
care of the Notaries Ducal, the lowest order of secretaries. The
documents in this Chancellery related chiefly to the Doge; his rights,
his official possessions, his restrictions, and his state. Among these
papers, accordingly, we find the coronation oaths, the Reports of the
Commissioners appointed to examine those oaths, and the Reports of the
Commissioners appointed to review the life of each Doge deceased. This
series is valuable as revealing the steps by which the aristocracy
slowly curtailed the personal authority of the Doge, and bound his
office about with iron fett