Napo was a wise and prudent man, but in this step he went too far. The Della Torre fortune was even then on the wane. The Milanese might rejoice in the peace which despotism bestowed, but they loudly resented being called upon to pay for it by new and heavy taxation, and all the lovers of liberty feared the novel and arrogant title of Imperial Vicar. Among the supporters of the ruling House themselves, the long course of power enjoyed by the Torriani had bred envy and enmity. Dissensions arose, and the discontented were punished by spoliation and banishment. Numbers abandoned the party and joined Otto Visconte. Tumults shook the city once more, and sedition secretly gathered head. Napo, feeling his power slipping from him, used the cruel and tyrannous measures of despair to save himself and his House. Otto and the exiles, on the other hand, braced by adversity and clinging together in a determined band, were daily gaining strength. They were aided by the other Ghibellines of Lombardy, especially by the Pavesi, and with continual attacks and raids upon the Milanese territory they strove to vex and weaken the party in power. Nevertheless, for some years still their cause seemed hopeless. The Della Torre, who had cast off Oberto da Pellavicino when they were strong enough to do without him, had reconciled themselves with the Papacy in 1274, and their great prestige was apparently strong enough to defy defections and subdue discontent. But time and circumstance were steadily undermining the great House, and with a sudden crash it fell. On a certain January night in 1277, the wife of Matteo Visconte was delivered, we are told, of her first son, who, because he was born _ad cantu galli_, as the cocks were crowing—heralding a false dawn, as their habit is in winter midnights—was named _Galeazzo_, first of the many of that name who were to crow over Milan. It was at this very moment that Otto Visconte—who, with his great-nephew, father of the new-born babe, and the rest of his kinsmen, had been making desperate attacks upon various points in the Milanese country, with little success so far—was creeping stealthily in the darkness, at the head of a strong body of fighting men, towards Desio, a village ten miles from Milan, where the Della Torre, disdainful of their oft-beaten foe, were sleeping encamped, with but a small force and under a careless watch. Awakened by the noise of attack, these latter rushed to arms; but too late. The enemy was in their midst. Francesco della Torre, son of Napo, fell pierced with wounds. The chief himself, overthrown in his weighty armour, lay grieving helplessly upon the ground, and with a crowd of sons and kinsmen was made captive. All was over. Otto Visconte rode victorious at last into Milan, where the citizens, who had heard of the discomfiture of their lords as they were starting with the Caroccio to the rescue, suited their faith to the occasion, and with immense applause and jubilee proclaimed the prelate