long the victory hung in the balance. The Pisans had already grappled
for boarding, the battle was yet to win, when the Genoese reinforcements
sailed out from the island straight for the Pisan Admirals. The battle
was over. Flight--it was all that was left for Pisa. Ugolino himself was
said to have given the signal.

There fell that day five thousand Pisans, with eleven thousand captured,
and twenty-eight galleys lost to Genoa. There was no family in Pisa but
mourned its dead: for six months on every side nothing was heard but
lamentations and mourning. If you would see Pisa, it was said, you must
go to Genoa.

Pisa had lost the sea. In Tuscany she stood with Arezzo facing the
Guelph League. She elected Ugolino her Captain-General.[29] A man of the
greatest force and ability, he was ambitious rather for himself than for
Pisa. Having many Guelph friends, his business was to beat Genoa and the
Guelph League. He succeeded in part. He bribed Florence with certain
strongholds to leave the League, and he expelled the Ghibellines from
Pisa. Then he offered Genoa Castro in Sardinia as ransom for the Pisan
prisoners; but they sent word to the Council that they would not accept
their freedom at the price of the humiliation of their city. Such were
the Pisans. And, indeed, they threatened that if at such a price they
were set free, they would return only to punish those who had thought
such treason. Ugolino for his part cared not.[30] He proceeded to bribe
Lucca with other strongholds. In the city all was confusion. Ugolino was
turned out of the Dictatorship, he became Captain of the People. Not for
long, however, for soon he contrived to make himself tyrant again.

Now the Genoese, seeing they were like to get nothing out of their
prisoners by this, were anxious for a money ransom. But Ugolino, fearing
those brave men, broke the truce with Genoa, urging certain pirates of
Sardinia to attack the Genoese; and, in order to make sure of this,
while he himself went to his castle in the country, he arranged with
Ruggieri dei Ubaldini, the Archbishop, to expel the Guelphs, among them
his own nephew, from Pisa. The plot succeeded; but Pisa desired that the
Archbishop should for the future divide the power with Ugolino. To this
Ugolino would not agree, and in a rage he slew the nephew of the
Archbishop. Meanwhile, Ugolino's nephew, Nino Visconti, was plotting
with him to return. This came to the ears of Ruggieri, who called the
Ghibell