for his hypocrisy, which is, moreover, full of spiritual pride, by emptying our own purses. Even the secret cells of the brethren in the cloister he fills with the balls of his coat-of-arms! His palace might bear a comparison with the Colosseum. Who would not build splendidly could he but employ other people’s money for it? It was said that the money-boxes at the city gates were emptied in the house of the Medici. When Cosimo, says a contemporary, advanced to the commune far greater sums than he took, nothing was remarked upon it. He did this certainly, but he kept an exact account of it, and it could hardly be said that the partnership between the State and the Medici was solely to the advantage of the former. One morning the doors of Cosimo’s palace were found stained with blood.[88] Such things occurred long before the time we are now considering. Cosimo had meanwhile no wish to remain passive after his haughty partisans had received a wholesome lesson. The license to which the lower classes inclined more and more, might have risen to such a point that his own authority would be endangered. He himself did not appear, but the tool was readily found. On July 1, 1458, Luca Pitti undertook the office of Gonfalonier. Three days before, King Alfonso had died; from his son—Ferrante—who had a difficult position in Naples on account of his illegitimate birth, and who did not, like his father, command the powers of Sicily and Aragon—there was for the time nothing to fear. Neither reform of registers nor drawing the magistrates by lot were to the taste of the new Gonfalonier; and urged by his friends, but with consideration for Cosimo, who wished to avoid open violence, he sought to induce priors and colleges to proceed to new elections, and choose new magistrates. When he met with opposition in this, he determined to employ the usual violent means. On August 9 he caused the palace and square to be surrounded by mercenaries, had the neighbouring streets secured, and summoned the people by ringing the great bell. That the Gonfalonier could do this in opposition to the priors, or at least to the majority of them, is an evident sign how weak the laws were. The Parliament, however it might be composed, granted to the Senate, and 250 of the burghers proposed by the party, the extraordinary powers demanded. These now proceeded to the new elections, and appointed a commission of eight citizens to preside at all elections for the future. It is easily understood that all actual authority was now more than ever in the hands of the heads of the faction, who filled the offices at their pleasure, and when the priors of the guild were after this called priors of freedom, it was in bitter irony. All opponents of the measures, several of whom endured torture, and a number of people who were either not trusted, or of whom one or other of the new wielders of power had to complain, were banished. In the months next following, exile and exclusion from office were but