having taken the town of Lodi and burnt it to the ground, for no other
crime than that it had yielded him allegiance. After him marched a
powerful army, nearly one hundred and twenty thousand strong, at the
very sight of whose myriad of banners most of the Lombard cities
submitted without a blow. Milan was besieged. Its resistance was by no
means obstinate. The emperor's principal wish was to win it over to his
side, and probably the authorities of the city were aware of his lenient
disposition, for they held out no long time before his besieging
multitude.

All that the conqueror now demanded was that the proud municipality
should humble itself before him, swear allegiance, and promise not to
interfere with the freedom of the smaller cities. On the 6th of
September a procession of nobles and churchmen defiled before him,
barefooted and clad in tattered garments, the consuls and patricians
with swords hanging from their necks, the others with ropes round their
throats, and thus, with evidence of the deepest humility, they bore to
the emperor the keys of the proud city.

"You must now acknowledge that it is easier to conquer by obedience than
with arms," he said. Then, exacting their oaths of allegiance, placing
the imperial eagle upon the spire of the cathedral, and taking with him
three hundred hostages, he marched away, with the confident belief that
the defiant resistance of Milan was at length overcome.

He did not know the Milanese. When, in the following year, he attempted
to lay a tax upon them, they rose in insurrection and attacked his
representatives with such fury that they could scarcely save their
lives. On an explanation being demanded, they refused to give any, and
were so arrogantly defiant that the emperor pronounced their city