was almost
instantly ablaze with the passionate quarrel between the Whites and the
Blacks (Bianchi and Neri). The flames burned so high that the Pope,
Boniface VIII., intervened to quench them. His intervention was vain.

It was just at this time that Dante became prior. The need of action to
restore peace to the city was imperative, and the priors took the step
of banishing the leaders of both divisions. Among those of the Bianchi
was Dante's own nearest friend, Guido Cavalcante. The measure was
insufficient to secure tranquillity and order. The city was in constant
tumult; its conditions went from bad to worse. But in spite of civil
broils, common affairs must still be attended to, and from a document
preserved in the Archives at Florence we learn that on the 28th April,
1301, Dante was appointed superintendent, without salary, of works
undertaken for the widening, straightening, and paving of the street of
San Procolo and making it safe for travel. On the 13th of the same month
he took part in a discussion, in the Council of the Heads of the twelve
greater Arts, as to the mode of procedure in the election of future
priors. On the 18th of June, in the Council of the Hundred Men, he
advised against providing the Pope with a force of one hundred men which
had been asked for; and again in September of the same year there is
record, for the last time, of his taking part in the Council, in a
discussion in regard "to the conservation of the Ordinances of Justice
and the Statutes of the People."

These notices of the part taken by Dante in public affairs seem at first
sight comparatively slight and unimportant; but were one constructing an
ideal biography of him, it would be hard to devise records more
appropriate to the character and principles of the man as they appear
from his writings. The sense of the duty of the individual to the
community of which he forms a part was one of his strongest convictions;
and his being put in charge of the opening of the street of San Procolo,
and making it safe for travel, "eo quod popularis comitatus absque
strepitu et briga magnatum et potentum possunt secure venire ad dominos
priores et vexilliferum justitiae cum expedit" (so that the common people
may, without uproar and harassing of magnates and mighty men, have
access whenever it be desirable to the Lord Priors and the
Standard-Bearer of Justice), affords a comment on his own criticism of
his fellow-citizens, whose disposition to