The narrow streets were filled with the hum of busy industries. Fine palaces and comfortable dwellings abounded, with wells and mills and all the necessaries of a prosperous existence. But wealth and its pleasant habits were causing the Milanese to forget the liberty for which they had once made all sacrifice. That word of sinister omen—_Signore_—was heard without protest among them. They had granted the title voluntarily to Martino della Torre, and both he and Filippo called themselves Perpetual Lords of Milan. The people preferred a domination which at least secured them peace, to the loss and suffering caused by continual civil struggles. Moreover, absorbed in trade and in peaceful industry, they had no time or inclination for the rapidly developing art of war, and a class of highly trained professional soldiers, fully equipped with weapons and armour, who engaged themselves for hire to any Commune, were superseding more and more the old city militia, composed of all the able-bodied men. These mercenaries, who owned no allegiance except to the master who paid them, lent enormous power to the ruler of a city, who, by means of them, was able to overawe discontent in the people. Thus, aided by the conditions of the times, the Torriani gradually established a virtual despotism over Milan, though careful not to alarm the popular mind by any grander sounding titles. It was not long, however, before they abandoned even this degree of caution, and in 1273 Napo persuaded the Emperor Rudolph to grant him the title of Imperial Vicar of Milan, thus obtaining a legal sanction for his usurpation.
Napo was a wise and prudent man, but in this step he went too far. The Della Torre fortune was even then on the wane. The Milanese might rejoice in the peace which despotism bestowed, but they loudly resented being called upon to pay for it by new and heavy taxation, and all the lovers of liberty feared the novel and arrogant title of Imperial Vicar. Among the supporters of the ruling House themselves, the long course of power enjoyed by the Torriani had bred envy and enmity. Dissensions arose, and the discontented were punished by spoliation and banishment. Numbers abandoned the party and joined Otto Visconte. Tumults shook the city once more, and sedition secretly gathered head. Napo, feeling his power slipping from him, used the cruel and tyrannous measures of despair to save himself and his House. Otto and the exiles, on the other hand, braced by adversity and clinging together in a determined band, were daily gaining strength. They were aided by the other Ghibellines of Lombardy, especially by the Pavesi, and with continual attacks and raids upon the Milanese territory they strove to vex and weaken the party in power. Nevertheless, for some years still their cause seemed hopeless. The Della Torre, who had cast off Oberto da Pellavicino when they were strong enough to do without him, had reconciled themselves with the Papacy in 1274, and their great prestige was apparently strong enough to defy defections and subdue discontent.
