Goffi sputavan su la prosternata Gregge: di dietro al battistero un fulvo Picciol cornuto diavolo guardava E subsannava. This church, so full of poetic and historic interest, was lately going to be destroyed, but the priest, Don Luigi Zattini, appealed to the Inspector of Monuments for the province of Forli, who had recourse to the _Deputazione Storica Romagnola_. Efforts were made to save it, and instead of being pulled down, it is now only to be restored, which may be as fatal. The castle of Guido da Polenta, husband of Francesca da Rimini and brother of Paolo, is now ruined, but a cypress on a plateau of the grounds is still called Francesca's cypress. It was about this era that the Comacines began their many emigrations, and spread throughout Italy. The church-building Longobards, being subjugated themselves, had no longer the power to employ them, so this large guild had to look further afield for their work. Hitherto they seem to have been almost exclusively employed in the Lombard kingdom and its dukedoms, except the few who went to England and Germany in the seventh century. But Charlemagne had a wider rule in Italy; and good architecture was needed in other parts. Some documents quoted by Professor Merzario[74] not only prove these travelling days of the _Magistri_, but connect them with many of the finest and most interesting churches in Central and South Italy. One is a deed of gift for the weekly distribution of bread and wine to the poor at Lucca in 805. It begins--"Ego Natalis, homo transpadanus, magister casarius, Christo auxiliante, ædificavi Ecclesiam in honori Dei et Mariæ et B. Petri Apostoli, intra hanc civitatem"--"I, Natalis, a man from beyond the Pò, being a master builder, by Christ's help have constructed within this city, a church in honour of God, of Mary, and of the blessed apostle Peter."[75] Here we see the Comacine Master settled as leading architect in Lucca, far from his native land beyond the Pò, and so flourishing that he can dispense large charities. He seems to have done some public works too; there was a canal called the Fossa Natale, which ran through the city, and had a bridge over it. There must have been others of the guild in Lucca, before Natalis, working at the churches of S. Frediano and S. Michele.