But to proceed: this Galeas di St. Severino had an ambition to be a great man, and Ludovic, Duke of Milan (whose bastard daughter he had married), seemed ambitious of making him so, and took as much interest in him as if he had been his son, for his own children were not of age as yet. The Pisans had been cruelly treated by the Florentines, who used them as their slaves; for they had been conquered by them about one hundred years[300], much about the same time as the Venetians subdued Padua[301], which was their first acquisition upon the main land. These two cities were much alike; they had been long enemies to those who had the government of them; they were almost equal in power, and it was a great while before they could be conquered. The Pisans now called a council, and, finding themselves encouraged by so great a person, and being naturally desirous of liberty, as the king was going to mass, a great number of men and women cried out to him, “Liberty, Liberty,” begging of him, with tears in their eyes, that he would vouchsafe to restore it to them. There was at that time one Rabot[302] a counsellor of the parliament of Dauphiny, and then either actually Master of the Requests, or executing that office for somebody else, who (having promised to do so, or not well understanding the nature of their demands) acquainted the king (as he was walking before him) with the deplorable condition of the Pisans, and told his majesty he ought in pity to redress their wrongs, for never people had been so tyrannically dealt with. The king not understanding what they meant by that word liberty, and beginning to commiserate the afflictions of Italy, and the miseries the poor subjects endured, both under princes and commonwealths, replied, he was willing it should be so; though (to speak truth) he had no authority to grant it, for the town was not his own, and he was received into it only in friendship, and to relieve him in his great necessities. Monsieur Rabot told them the king’s answer, and the people began immediately to fill the streets with acclamations of joy; and running to the end of the bridge upon the River Arno, they pulled down a great lion, called Marzocchi, which stood upon a marble pillar, and represented the government of Florence, and threw it into the river. When they had so done, they caused a statue of the King of France to be set on the pillar, with his sword in his hand, and the Marzocchi, or lion, under his horse’s feet. After that, when the King of the Romans came to that town[303], they served the King of France’s statue as they had served the lion; for it is the nature of the Italians to side always with the strongest; but these Pisans were, and are still, so barbarously treated, that they ought to be excused for what they did. CH. X.—How the King departed from Pisa to go to Florence; and of the Flight and Destruction of Peter de Medicis.—1494.