belonged to a distinguished family, the name of which occurs in various offices since the beginning of the thirteenth century; he was opposed to the Albizzi in the political movements of 1378, but afterwards became attached to them. Bernardo had not been eligible because he owed taxes, but Rinaldo cancelled the debt, and made him his tool.[68] On September 7 Cosimo de’ Medici was summoned before the Signoria.[69] He had been at his villa in Mugello, from whence he was recalled to town under the pretext that his counsel was desired, and he was in fact appointed a member of a commission (_pratica_) for affairs of the commonwealth. As he passed the Or San Michele, Alamanno Salviati warned him that evil was intended, but he replied that he must obey the Signoria. Arrived at the palace, he was confined as a prisoner in a chamber of the upper storey called _La Berberia_. The principal accusation concerned treasonable machinations in the Lucchese war. That his life was aimed at is scarcely to be supposed, though certainly possible: that the prisoner feared it, is certain. The waves of party feeling ran so high, tongues were so sharp, and even the assemblies held in churches, ostensibly for purposes of Divine worship, were so openly employed for political ends, and for manœuvring against the Government, that it was not difficult by inquisitorial proceedings to justify the severest measures. The city was in the power of the opponents of the Medici; Lorenzo, his brother, who was in the country, seems to have tried in vain to bring about a rising. Niccolò da Tolentino, the general of the Republic, and a friend of Cosimo’s, rode with a squadron from Pisa to the village of Lastra, on the Arno, seven miles from the city, but hesitated to proceed farther, and declared that he appeared in support of the public peace. It was an anxious time of suspense.