The Florentine troops directed their march to Monte Gemmoli, an almost impregnable rock, which they blockaded and besieged.

The banditti issued forth from their strongholds, and skirmished with overmuch confidence in their vantage ground.

At this crisis, the Florentine cavalry, having ascended the hill, dismounted from their horses, pushed forward on the banditti before they could retreat into their fortress, and drove them, sword in hand, within its inmost circle.

The Florentines thus possessed themselves of Monte Gemmoli, and, in like manner, of several other strongholds.

There were others which they could not take by storm, but they laid waste the plains and cities which supplied the robbers with provisions; and, after having done great damage to the Ubaldini, they returned safe and sound to Florence.
While Petrarch was at Mantua, in February, 1350, the Cardinal Guy of Boulogne, legate of the holy see, arrived there after a papal mission to Hungary.