The Strozzi were the next owners of Petraja, and we can fancy the pleasure Palla Strozzi took in spending some of his wealth on laying out terraces and beautiful gardens and filling his villa with costly works of art and valuable manuscripts. He occupied several high offices in Florence and took a leading part in the affairs of the city; unfortunately he joined the Albizzi against the Medici and was exiled in 1435. His son Messer Lorenzo di Palla Strozzi seems however to have still owned Petraja in 1438, as is shown by a deed executed by him before a public notary dated “from my villa of Petraja.” Whether it came into the possession of the Medici when the estates of Palla were confiscated by the Republic of Florence after the return of Cosimo the Elder from exile, or whether it was confiscated in consequence of the rebellion of Filippo Strozzi against the government of Cosimo, is not ascertained. Palla Strozzi was sixty-six years old when he was driven into exile, and although he carefully avoided the society of other Florentine malcontents and lived entirely with learned men, his sentence of banishment was renewed. He lost one son after another, and died in 1462 without seeing his beloved Florence again. Cosimo de’ Medici died two years later at the age of seventy-six, the Republic inscribed the glorious title of “Pater Patriae” on his tomb, and he was universally mourned as the most sagacious man in Italy. “His financial genius,” says Galluzzi, “was such that when Alfonso, King of Naples, joined the Venetians against the Republic of Florence, he caused so great a dearth of coin by drawing bills as to compel them to come to terms. There are few examples in history of a citizen who, without arms, and solely by the admiration excited by his virtues, became the master of his fatherland.”[40] “Nothing is denied to him,” exclaimed Pius II, “he is a judge of war and peace, a moderator of the laws; not so much a citizen as the lord of the country. The policy of the Republic is settled in his house, he gives commands to the magistrates.” “Write in private to Cosimo,” was the advice Sforza’s envoy gave to his master, “if you want anything particularly.... Cosimo does everything.... Without him nothing is done.”[41] The most eminent men in Florence were among his intimate friends: Antonino the saintly archbishop, Fra Angelico the holy painter, and the learned monk Ambrogio Traversari, who set aside one of the cells of St Marco for his use. Cosimo invited Argyropulos the Greek to Florence, and made him one of the teachers of his son Piero and of his grandson Lorenzo. Marsilio Ficino was brought up in his house, and the last year of his life he spent in studying the translation made by his protegé of Plato’s _On the highest good_.