sympathies, he owed his election to the clerical partisans of France acting under papal influence, and he was accompanied in his march by legates whom the Pope had authorised to confer upon him the imperial crown in Rome. It was no empty pretence of moderation, but the expression of a real policy, when Henry professed that he belonged to neither faction and intended to act as a mediator between them. And his actions corresponded with his professions. As he passed through the Lombard cities he insisted on the return of all political exiles, whichever party they belonged to. In Milan, where he received the iron crown of Lombardy (January 6, 1311), he recalled Matteo Visconti without overthrowing the rule of Guido della Torre. But the Italians themselves had no sympathy with his impartiality. Henry VII., like most of his German predecessors, was in need of money, and the attempt to levy a contribution of 100,000 ducats provoked a rising in Milan. The rising was suppressed, but it resulted in an inevitable alliance between the Emperor and the Ghibellines. Guido della Torre and his family were driven into exile, and an attempted rebellion in the Guelf cities was suppressed. Brescia alone made any lengthy resistance to the German army. Before leaving Lombardy, Henry appointed imperial vicars in the chief cities, and in Milan he intrusted the office to Matteo Visconti, thus finally establishing the dynasty which ruled Milan for a century and a half, and at one time seemed likely to unite the whole of northern Italy under its sway.