She was thus impregnable, but could not exercise the least influence over Italy.
VIII.
Genoa, a more popular and more turbulent republic, subsisted only by her fleet and her commerce.

Hemmed in between barren mountains and a gulf without a shore, it was only a port peopled by sailors.

The marble palaces, built one above the other on the rocky banks, looked down on the sea, their sole territory.

The portraits of the doges and the statue of Andrea Doria constantly reminded the Genoese that from the waves had proceeded their riches and their renown, and that _there_ alone they could hope to look for them.

Its ramparts were impregnable, its arsenals full; and thus Genoa formed the stronghold of armed commerce.
The immense country of Tuscany, governed and rendered illustrious by the _Medici_, those Pericles of Italy, was learned, agricultural, industrious, but unwarlike.