lia against Manfred, as we shall hereafter relate. We will now
leave the doings of Florence, and of the Guelf refugees, and turn to
the things which came to pass in those times between the Church of
Rome and Manfred.

Sec. 87.--_How Manfred persecuted Pope Urban and the Church with his
Saracens of Nocera, and how a crusade was proclaimed against them._

[Sidenote: 1261 A.D.]

[Sidenote: Cf. Par. xxii. 16-18.]

By reason of the discomfiture of the Florentines, and of the other
Guelfs of Tuscany at Montaperti, as we have afore said, King Manfred
rose to great lordship and state, and all the imperial party in
Tuscany and in Lombardy greatly increased in power, and the Church and
its devout and faithful followers were much abased in all places. It
came to pass that a very little while after, in the said year 1260,
Pope Alexander passed from this life in the city of Viterbo, and the
Church was vacant without a pastor for five months through the
disputings among the cardinals; afterwards they elected Pope Urban
IV., of the city of Troyes, of Champagne in France, the which was of
low origin, being son of a cobbler, but was a man of worth, and wise.
But his election was in this fashion: he was a poor clerk which came
to the court of Rome to plead a cause about his Church, which had been
taken from him, which brought in twenty pounds tournois a year. The
cardinals, by reason of their disputes, locked the doors when they
were shut up, and made among themselves a secret decree that the first
clerk which knocked at the door should be Pope. As it pleased God this
Urban was the first, and where he came to plead for the poor church of
twenty pounds tournois revenue, he received the Universal Church,
after the ordinances of God, as fixed in the election of the blessed
Nicholas. Because the election was miraculous, therefore have we made
mention and record thereof. And he was consecrated the year of Christ
1261. Finding the Church much beaten down by the power of Manfred,
which was occupying the greater part of Italy, and had stationed the
host of his Saracens of Nocera in the lands of the patrimony of S.
Peter, the said Urban preached a crusade against them; wherefore many
faithful people took the cross and marched in the army against them.
For the which cause, the Saracens fled into Apulia, but Manfred did
not therefore cease to molest the Pope and the Church in their
followers and troops, and he abode now in Sicily and now in A