During the last few days I have written thee several letters; this morning I received thine of the 18th and with it some letters received by thee from Florence; I have understood, &c. &c., and reply herewith. I see thou hast been at Florence and understand thou hast to go there again; the death of Francesco di Tomaso is a great loss, but if the plague increases I advise thee not to think of business but of saving thy life. The affairs of Lucca do not appear to turn out as we expected, which displeases me; and the money spent on Count Francesco [Sforza] was thrown away. Every one laughs at us because he could not remain on account of the plague, and only consumed the provisions of the people. It is clear that all that happened and is happening at Lucca has been done with the knowledge and by the orders of the Duke [of Milan], particularly as the principal fortresses are in his hands; it appears to me therefore that there is no hope of getting them by treaty or by any way save famine, and I suspect the Duke has known how to grasp fortune, and his troops being near, has provisioned Pietrasanta. The war will thus last longer than we wished, and all because we would not when we could. May God forgive those who are the cause. If some of the present Signori had not enough sense to be of the Ten of the Balia, instead of ten they should be made nine ... as I already told thee. It does not seem to me advisable to be one of the Ten of the Balia this time, partly to let others have their turn, partly because, on account of party divisions, I do not think the affairs of our city can prosper; things will go as they did before or even worse on account of events in Lombardy, for if the enemy is not attacked from there, it is useless to expect help from here. I am therefore writing to the Gonfalonier and to Antonio di Ser Tomaso to beg that neither Lorenzo[15] nor I should be nominated, and I advise thee to do the same. There are Messer Niccolò Valori and Luca di Messer Maso who would do well and be pleased. In my last I told thee that Lorenzo and the children were going to Venice, as there are some cases of plague here; now they are gone. If it continues I suppose we must also leave.... No more at present. Christ guard thee.--Verona, 21st October 1430.[16] Cosimo de’ Medici _to_ Averardo de’ Medici