citizens were already so heavily burdened that this new impost was more than small fortunes could support. The people were already weary of misgovernment, and much irritated by the count's action in stripping the Communal palace of its armoury to enrich his own castle at Poppi; also being encouraged by commercial success and increasingly hostile to the Ghibellines, they now made vigorous protest, and clearly showed their readiness to fly to arms. Then the Council of Thirty-six tried to pacify the citizens, and acting as mediators, proposed to undertake the collection of the new tax, levying it in such wise as to make it fall chiefly on the rich and powerful. Just then, however, the nobles, emboldened by the arrival of reinforcements, thought the moment had arrived for a decisive blow, and rose to arms in the city. The Lamberti took the initiative by rushing to the Piazza, sword in hand, shouting, "Out with these thieves, the Thirty-six; let us cut them to pieces!" At this outcry all shops were closed; the Thirty-six broke up their council, and the people rising in revolt took their orders from them and from the consuls of the guilds, with Giovanni Soldanieri as their leader-in-chief. The latter was a patrician, urged by personal ambition to join the riot at the head of the people. Concentrating in Piazza St. Trinità, they were soon attacked by Count Guido and his cavalry, who thought to make short work of them. But, on the contrary, the crowd threw up barricades and made a stubborn resistance, while such a storm of stones and darts rained down from windows and roofs that the Germans began to lose heart, and the count, stricken with dismay, ordered his standards to withdraw, retreated to Piazza St. Giovanni, and then hurrying to the two _Gaudenti_ in the Communal palace, demanded the keys of the town in order to effect his escape. Neither his friends' supplications nor the wrath of his followers could persuade him that the danger was not serious, and that he might safely remain in the town. He was so bewildered by fear that, having obtained the keys, he insisted on being escorted by three of the Thirty-six, lest he should be shot from some window by the way. So, on St. Martin's Day, November 11, 1266, he left Florence by the so-called Gate of the Oxen, and fled with his followers to Prato.