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objection to a proposal that tended to replenish his military chest: and even the Florentine Government, deeming it better to receive him amicably as Pacificator, (for such was the new invented title given him by the wily Pontiff (1)) than to push him into an alliance with the exiled faction, invited him within their walls. He therefore entered the City in procession on the first of November 1301; or nearly six months after the Whites had obtained the ascendancy (2). Charles had come unarmed as a peace-maker; but his concealed pretensions became visible enough in a short time; for only 4 days later, (November 5) a solemn Council of the Magistrates being held in one of the Churches, and authority conferred on him by it to reform and pacify the city, the assembly no sooner broke up than it beheld the whole French force drawn up armed in the great square and

M. A. Salvi Delle Hist. di Pistoia, Vol. 1. p. 171) date Charles' visit before, not after his expedition: which shows that they are of small authority with regard to any occurrences without the walls of their own city. We may rely on them when they speak of the rich presents made to the needy Frenchman and his Lady-assai moneta, drappi, e porpora di seta a lui e alla sua Donna.

(1) Un titre nouveau, Pacificateur de la Toscane. Sismondi, Hist. des Répub. Ital. Vol. iv. p. 115.

(2) This ascendancy was precarious enough, and many Blacks were concealed in the town and some even in the administration. Nothing more brilliant than the reception of Charles; to whom however, ere entering the gates, an oath was tendered that he would obey the laws of the Republic. He took it without hesitation; although his determination was to break it as soon as possible in every particular. It reminds one of Cæsar's remark, as repeated by Lord Clarendon: Galli ridentes fidem fregerunt. Life, Vol. 4. p. 10.

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apparently preparing for a sack (1). Nor was this force inconsiderable; for besides his own 800 horse, there came 200 from Perugia, a pretended guard of honor, some Lucchese and Sienese with divers gentlemen from Romagna, who already were beginning the profession of condottieri, and each of whom brought with him 8 or 10 horse under pretext of paying court; to not one of whom the Government dared to deny entrance: so that the whole amounted to an army of at least 1200 chosen warriors (2). The people however, indignant at the sight, rushed spontaneously to arms and quick

forced the strangers to lay down theirs. This enthusiasm was for once not factious, but the independent legitimate disdain of a foreign yoke. That it was quite clear from undue partiality to the Whites, is demonstrated from the fact of their exiled rivals, who came gallopping into the town during the confusion, encountering no obstacle. Yet so sure of the contrary was the Gonfalonier, the elder Cerchi, that, being informed of their approach, he refused to have the gates closed or to permit the Captain of the city to attack them in any way for us to go against them is superfluous' (he cried); 'let them come in freely, and

(1) A dì 5 ... fu data autorità al Principe Carlo di riformare la terra con pace: ma appena escì dalla Chiesa, che si vide tutta la gente Francese armata, e in forma di voler correr la città. Priorista Fior. p. 44.

(2) Dino Compagni, Lib. 2. p. 34 - Sismondi, Hist. des Répub. Ital. Vol. 1v. p. 122.

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the populace themselves will fall upon them.' But the populace is as light as a leaf, remarks the Priorist; those who enjoy power often abuse it, and oftener still are accused of doing so; or rather as, I have said, the courtly, popular manners of the Blacks had really made them favourites with the lower classes; so no sooner did Messer Corso Dona. ty ride in at the head of his friends, than instead of being opposed, he was received with vehement plaudits and cries of long life to the Baron (1).' The first step of Messer Corso was, in the usual style of those times, to break open the jail, liberate its inmates without distinction, overturn the existing Government, and let slip his troops, who joined by the unchained felons, set about slaying and plundering at discretion. This sacking of the City lasted five days; and then a similar dole was dealt out to the country round, with huge ruin, rapine, and combustion (2): ' while Charles remained inactive, pretending to know nothing that was doing; and seemed to take the fires for feux-dejoie, or, at most, for an accident befallen some

(1) The oath which Charles had taken ere entering Florence, he repeated still more solemnly before the Council in the Church of S. Maria Novella even while his troops were getting under array to break it. A similar oath had been received from him, on confiding to him the keys of one of the town gates, that he would not open it to any one in disobedience to the laws; nevertheless during that very night he let in a strong party of the exiled Blacks, and connived at the arrival of Corso Donati and the rest of them the morning after.

(2) Cum magna ruina, magnisque incendiis et populationibus. Benvenuti Imol. ap. Mur. Antiq. Ital. Vol. 1. p. 1041.

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peasant's hut. The Whites however were not actually banished on this occasion; so that it is not to it that Ciacco alludes as the period when their rivals shall again prevail' (che l'altra surmonti, V. LXVII): but they maintained themselves in their towers and houses for almost two years in daily murderous encounters with their antagonists. On the twenty-fifth of December 1301, after Charles had been in Florence above six weeks, a particularly bloody contest took place on one of the bridges: so little advance had he made in his emprize of reforming and pacifying the city. On the twenty-seventh of January following Dante (who had been for some time at Rome negociating to prevent the entrance of the French into Florence, and still continued in his post of Ambassador to the Holy See) was sentenced to exile; not indeed for being a White, as Machiavelli imagined, but on an accusation of peculation and other vague misdemeanors (1). This accusation was only a pretext: the real cause was his opposition to the injustice and corruption of the French Prince; who, far from

(1) Pelli (Mem. p. 89) quoting the sentence writes: Messer Palmieri degli Altoviti and Dante Alighieri being accused by public report were proceeded against for being opponents of Charles' perchè con. tradissero Carlo‘and for having committed peculation'-quod fece. runt baratterias et acceperunt quod non licebat. This latter was the more ostensible, the former the real charge. If they delayed to pay the fine to which they were sentenced - bona devastentur et mittantur in commune: and even paying it nihilominus stent iu exilio extra fines Tuscia duobus annis. Bib. Magliabechiana, Cod. 44.

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acting as a pacificator, employed himself in amassing treasure by the most iniquitous sale of places and immunities (1). On the tenth of March, issued the second and most barbarous sentence rendering Dante's exile perpetual, and condemning him and 14 others to be burnt alive if caught within Tuscany (2). During the next month, it is true, some of the Cerchi, and other Whites also, were put to ban by Charles, under colour of having engaged in a plot against him; but the existence of that

(1) Charles was a vast spendthrift and therefore by necessity, as well as taste, a prodigious robber. His various modes of extortion would fill a volume. One luckless gentleman had been so civil as to invite him on a hunting party to his country-house; on which his royal Guest had him seized by some of his satellites, and threatened to send him prisoner into Puglia, if he did not ransom himself with 4000 florins; and at last by the intercession of friends the matter was adjusted by a payment of 800. One seems to be reading the feats of the modern Roman banditi. Similar violence was perpetrated every moment, not only against rich men, but against minors of both sexes, but particularly the weaker. In all this Cante di Agobbio, the new Podestà, was an inimitable auxiliary; for he twisted the laws to the same purposes, pronouncing a sentence of exile against more than 600 persons, all of whom were also condemned to pay from eight to ten thousand florins each, or to have their entire property confiscated. Even the Priors themselves were not secure; and knowing their assassination was intended, only escaped by the utmost personal circumspection and the surrendering of large sums of money. So, of money Charles amassed a profusion; well justifying the Pope's assurance that in sending him to Florence he had put his hand into the fountain of gold.' Dino Compagni, Lib. 2. p. 37–47.

(2) Tiraboschi ( T. 2. p. 494 ) gives this sentence verbatim from a copy taken from the Archives of Florence. It is regularly authenticated by the Magistrates, and dated 1 302, March 10. It is in most barbarous Latin. Il semble (writes Sismondi ) qu'on ait choisi à dessein le langage le plus barbare pour condamner le poëte qui fondait la littérature Italienne. Hist. des Répub. Ital. Vol. iv. p. 184.