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106 nor "clearings out of this establishment—any reasonable offer accepted."

128. But the second story, of a private Florentine citizen, is better still.

In that campaign against Pisa in which the florins were struck on the root of pine, the conditions of peace had been ratified by the surrender to Florence of the Pisan fortress of Mutrona, which commanded a tract of seaboard below Pisa, of great importance for the Tuscan trade. The Florentines had stipulated for the right not only of holding, but of destroying it, if they chose; and in their Council of Ancients, after long debate, it was determined to raze it, the cost of its garrison being troublesome, and the freedom of seaboard all that the city wanted. But the Pisans, feeling the power that the fortress had against them in case of future war, and doubtful of the issue of council at Florence, sent a private negotiator to the member of the Council of Ancients who was known to have most influence, though one of the poorest of them, Aldobrandino Ottobuoni; and offered him four thousand golden florins if he would get the vote passed to raze Mutrona. The vote had passed the evening before. Aldobrandino