ellent as we are in system, we are not quite perfect in
practice. This is grave matter of the young Gradenigo, Signori!"

"I have long known his unworthiness," returned his more aged colleague.
"It is a thousand pities that so honorable and so noble a patrician
should have produced so ignoble a child. But neither the state nor the
city can tolerate assassination."

"Would it were less, frequent!" exclaimed the Signore Soranzo, in
perfect sincerity.

"Would it were, indeed! There are hints in our secret information, which
tend to confirm the charge of Jacopo, though long experience has taught
us to put full faith in his reports."

"How! Is Jacopo, then, an agent of the police!"

"Of that more at our leisure, Signor Soranzo. At present we must look to
this attempt on the life of one protected by our laws."

The Three then entered into a serious discussion of the case of the two
delinquents. Venice, like all despotic governments, had the merit of
great efficiency in its criminal police, when it was disposed to exert
it. Justice was sure enough in those instances in which the interests of
the government itself were not involved, or in which bribery could not
well be used. As to the latter, through the jealousy of the state, and
the constant agency of those who were removed from temptation, by being
already in possession of a monopoly of benefits, it was by no means as
frequent as in some other communities in which the affluent were less
interested. The Signor Soranzo had now a fair occasion for the exercise
of his generous feelings. Though related to the house of Gradenigo, he
was not backward in decrying the conduct of its heir. His first impulses
were to make a terrible example of the accused, and to show the world
that no station brought with it, in Venice, impunity for crime. From
this view of the case, however, he was gradually enticed by his
companions, who reminded him that the law commonly made a distinction
between the intention and the execution of an offence. Driven from his
first determination by the cooler heads of his colleagues, the young
inquisitor next proposed that the case should be sent to the ordinary
tribunals for judgment. Instances had not been wanting in which the
aristocracy of Venice sacrificed one of its body to the seemliness of
justice; for when such cases were managed with discretion, they rather
strengthened than weakened their ascendency. But the present crime was
known to be too commo