UNDER HUNGARIAN SUPREMACY 173
own affairs, and not only had he no Hungarian representative in the town, but he did not even attempt to interfere indirectly with the Government. Ragusa was merely bound to pay him a tribute and to provide a naval contingent in time of war on the terms set forth in the treaty of Visegrad. She always remained the faithful friend and ally of Hungary, and was quite content to render this not very onerous allegiance; in her relations with that Power there was no trace of the constant recriminations and bickerings that there were with Venice. The reason of this difference of feeling towards the two Powers lies in the character of Venetian as compared with Hungarian policy. Venice was ever extending her influence down the Adriatic coast, consolidating her dominion, and destroying local autonomies. Above all, Venice was a great maritime Power and could swoop down on Ragusa or any other Adriatic town with her swift galleys at any moment; commercial rivalry, too, had its effect, for Venice aspired to the monopoly of the same trades as those in which Ragusa dealt. Hungary, on the other hand, was purely a military State. Its aims were internal consolidation and the security of its own immediate frontiers. It did not aspire to distant dominions, as it had no powerful navy, and it merely desired to possess Dalmatia so as to secure a wider outlet to the sea than the Croatian coast; and it had no sea-borne trade to interfere with that of Ragusa. On the land side it wished to secure the allegiance of the Bosnian Banus, but there was little danger of its establishing an absolute sway over the Slave lands immediately behind Ragusa.