An attempt at compromise between the two factions and a settlement of the differences of the nobility and the burghers was made by appointing two Knights of the Order of the Virgin Mary to the joint exercise of the office of Podestà. With these _fratres gaudentes_ was associated a Council of thirty, selected from the trading classes. The arrangement was made with the consent of Pope Clement IV., and accepted by the threatened Ghibellines as an expedient. It was soon discovered, however, that a real reconciliation was impossible, and that the Pope was pursuing extensive political schemes that were agreeable to no party. On November 11, nearly nine months after the battle of Benevento, an insurrection against a tax, forced the Ghibellines and Germans to evacuate Florence. The Knights of Mary were replaced by two knights from Orvieto, who were respectively appointed Podestà and Capitano. Again efforts were made at a reconciliation by the recall of the more moderate among the exiles, and by offers of family alliances, but without success. Charles of Anjou, now King of Sicily and Naples, was striving, like Manfred, to strengthen his influence in Tuscany, and being secretly incited by Guelf leaders he sent a troop of 800 armed men to Florence, under Guy de Montfort, in 1267. The Ghibellines proved irreconcileable, and left the city on the night of Good Friday in that year. Further endeavours at pacification were alike unavailing. The party spirit was too strong, and resisted the authority of Pope Gregory X. in the spring of 1273, as steadily as that of Cardinal Latino Malabranca (a nephew of Pope Nicholas III.), in February 1279. Nor was the influence of the two holders of supreme power of much avail even after the accession of Rudolf of Hapsburg to the throne of Germany had altered the relations between Church and State.