Hitherto, the Romans, encouraged by the Pope, had made an heroic resistance, and the besiegers had suffered incredibly from their desperate sallies, as well as from the diseases that decimated them.

But the fidelity of the citizens was beginning to totter beneath the protracted warfare, and many sighed for a period to their calamities.

Henry failed not to profit by these dispositions, and poured in thirty thousand golden florins to inflame them.
The horizon grew darker and darker--the Pope more winning, more eloquent, more determined.

Matilda did not fail him in this crisis.

The knight of the azure cross had already won the confidence of the princess by his valor, his prudence, and his piety, and she now selected him as the instrument of her generosity.