One of the Fregosi of Genoa a certain Valerio, and Pietro Strozzi, the notorious French agent, all of whom habitually haunted the lagoons, roused sufficient public anxiety to necessitate diplomatic communications between Courts, and to disquiet fretful Italian princelings.

Banished from their own provinces, and plying a petty Condottiere trade, such men, when they came together on a neutral ground, engaged in cross-intrigues which made them politically dangerous.

They served no interest but that of their own egotism, and they were notoriously unscrupulous in the means employed to effect immediate objects.

At the same time, the protection which they claimed from foreign potentates withdrew them from the customary justice of the State.

Bedmar's conspiracy in 1617-18 revealed to Venice the full extent of the peril which this harborage of ruffians involved; for though grandees of the distinction of the Duke of Ossuna were involved in it, the main agents, on whose ambition and audacity all depended, sprang from those French, English, Spanish, and Italian mercenaries, who crowded the low quarters of the city, alert for any mischief, and inflamed with the wildest projects of self-aggrandizement by policy and bloodshed.