There was now no resistance made except by the Bardi, who remained undaunted, notwithstanding the failure of their friends, the union of the people against them, and the little chance of success which they seemed to have. They resolved to die fighting, and rather see their houses burned and plundered than submit to the power of their enemies. They defended themselves with such obstinacy that many fruitless attempts were made to overcome them, both at the Ponte Vecchio and the Rubaconte; but their foes were always repulsed with loss. There had in former times been a street which led between the houses of the Pitti, from the Roman road to the walls upon Mount St. George. By this way the people sent six gonfaloniers, with orders to assail their houses from behind. This attack overcame the resolution of the Bardi, and decided the day in favour of the people; for when those who defended the barricades in the street learned that their houses were being plundered, they left the principal fight and hastened to their defence. This caused the Ponte Vecchio to be lost; the Bardi fled in all directions and were received into the houses of the Quaratesi, Panzanesi, and Mozzi. The people, especially the lower classes, greedy for spoil, sacked and destroyed their houses, and pulled down and burned their towers and palaces with such outrageous fury that the most cruel enemy of the Florentine name would have been ashamed of taking part in such wanton destruction. The nobility being thus overcome, the people reformed the government; and as they were of three kinds, the higher, the middle, and the lower class, it was ordered that the first should appoint two seigniors, the two latter three each, and that the gonfalonier should be chosen alternately from either party. Besides this, all the regulations for the restraint of the nobility were renewed; and in order to weaken them still more, many were reduced to the grade of the people. The ruin of the nobility was so complete, and depressed them so much, that they never afterwards ventured to take arms for the recovery of their power, but soon became humbled and abject in the extreme. And thus [adds Macchiavelli] Florence lost the generosity of her character and her distinction in arms.[i] THE GREAT PLAGUE [Sidenote: [1344-1346 A.D.]] For more than thirty years the heavy chain of misfortune had been falling, link after link, on the devoted city of Florence; wars, sickness, poverty, famines, floods, fires, and sanguinary revolutions had successively tried the spirit of her sons; yet so great was its elasticity that they still rose superior, and still held on their wonted course of national enterprise. It was hoped that misfortune had at length exhausted her quiver, when they were again stricken in common with all the world by her most deadly shaft, the great and desolating plague of 1348. [Illustration: ITALIAN ARMS, FOURTEENTH CENTURY]