one of them gave him a thrust with his lance in the throat,
which was a mortal blow, and then left him there for dead; the monks
of the said convent carried him into the abbey, and some said that
before he died he gave himself into their hands as a penitent, and
some said that they found him dead; and the next morning he was buried
in San Salvi with little honour and but few present, for fear of the
commonwealth. This M. Corso Donati was among the most sage, and was a
valiant cavalier, and the finest speaker, and most skilled, and of the
greatest renown and of the greatest courage and enterprise of any one
of his time in Italy, and a handsome and gracious cavalier in his
person; but he was very worldly, and in his time caused many
conspiracies and scandals in Florence to gain state and lordship; and
for this cause have we made so long a treatise concerning his end,
forasmuch as it was of great moment to our city, and after his death
many things followed thereupon, as may be understood by the
intelligent, to the end he may be an example to those which come
after.

[Sidenote: 1308 A.D.]

Sec. 97.--_How the church of the Lateran at Rome was burned._ Sec.
98.--_How the magnates of Samminiato destroyed their Popolo._ Sec.
99.--_How the Tarlati were expelled from Arezzo, and the Guelfs
restored._ Sec. 100.--_How the Ubaldini returned to submission to
the commonwealth of Florence._

Sec. 101.--_After what manner Henry, count of Luxemburg, was elected
emperor of Rome._

[Sidenote: 1308 A.D.]

In the said year 1308, the King Albert of Germany being dead, as we
afore said, by the which death the Empire was left vacant, the
electors of Germany were at great discord among themselves concerning
the election; and when the king of France heard of the said vacancy,
he thought within himself that now his purpose would be carried out
with little difficulty, by reason of the sixth promise which Pope
Clement had secretly made to him when he promised to make him Pope, as
we afore made mention; and he assembled his secret council with M.
Charles of Valois, his brother, and there he revealed his intention,
and the long desire which he had had that the Church of Rome should
elect as king of the Romans M. Charles of Valois, even while Albert,
king of Germany, was living, by means of his forces and power and
money, and with the aid of the Pope and the Church; for at other times
of old the election had passed from the Greeks to the Fre