128 Philip III. and very clever, and soon completely ruled her husband. Up to this time the favourite and prime minister of Philip had been Pierre de la Brosse, who is said to have been surgeon to Louis IX. The queen hated De la Brosse, and he, on his part, did not hesitate to whisper his complaints against her into the king's ear. Two years after the second marriage Philip's eldest son by his first wife died suddenly-Pierre de la Brosse said from poison; and he spread the report that the queen had instigated the crime in order to secure the succession to her own children. The rumour reached the king, who sought superstitiously to learn the truth from a reputed prophetess. The woman entirely cleared the queen, and Mary's relations vowed vengeance on De la Brosse for the accusation. A packet of letters was secretly conveyed by them to Philip. Their contents were never known, but De la Brosse must have been accused of some great offence, for he was privately tried, and, as the court was composed of his declared enemies, of course condemned. He was hung 1278 at Montfaucon on the 30th of June, 1278.

PIERRE DE LA BROSSE-JOHN OF PROCIDA.

A. D.

The feeble-minded Philip, thus a prey to suspicion and prejudice, could not be the real head of the royal family which he represented. Its actual chief was Charles of Anjou, the murderer of Conradine, and now the acknowledged king of Naples and Sicily. The ambition of Charles seemed likely to meet with no check, more especially after he had contrived to secure the election to the papal throne of a Frenchman, Martin IV., who became his complete slave; but his tyranny and cruelty had rendered him A.D. hateful to his people, and in the year 1282 the storm which had long been gathering burst forth, and Sicily was lost to him for ever.

1282

John of Procida, a physician, who had been the friend and confidant of Conradine's grandfather, the emperor Frederick II., was the person mainly instrumental to this event. He was shrewd and

selfish, a man of cool judgment but earnest purpose. After the death of Frederick II. he had entered the service of Manfred of Naples, and when Manfred was killed at Benevento, John of Procida sought the court of Pedro of Aragon, the husband of Manfred's daughter Constance. Here he found Roger Loria, a famous Sicilian admiral, with several other distinguished exiles. Pedro was urged by them to assert the claims of his wife against the usurper Charles; but the suggestion was listened to coldly, and John of Procida then sold all he possessed in Spain and disappeared. It is said that in the dress of a Franciscan friar he journeyed from place to place stirring up enmity against Charles of Anjou. The Franciscans were popular. They lived on little, had a great reputation for piety, and as preachers, messengers, even political envoys, made themselves generally useful. Procida appeared at length at Constantinople and gave the Greek emperor minute intelligence of the plans which

Philip III.

PLANS OF PEDRO OF ARAGON--SICILIAN VESPERS.

129

Charles of Anjou was forming for his overthrow. Troops were assembling at Durazzo. Galleys and transport vessels would follow. The Venetians were certain to lend then.' Michael Palæologus asked in despair what was to be done. Give me money,' was the answer; 'I will find you a defender who has no money, but who has courage and arms.'

เ

The Greek emperor agreed, and Procida returned to Aragon, and succeeded in kindling the ambition of king Pedro. The Pope, Martin IV., enquired of Pedro the object of his armaments. 'If intended to act against the infidels, they would,' he said, receive his blessing.' Pedro, in reply, implored the prayers of the Pope on his design, but added that if his right hand knew his secret he would cut it off, lest it should betray it to his left.

So the course of events flowed on with an undercurrent of conA.D. spiracy until March 1282. It was the 30th day of the month, and 1282 Easter Monday. In Sicily summer had already begun. The air was warm, the trees were covered with foliage, the ground was bright with flowers, and the inhabitants of Palermo, in their holiday costume, were pouring out of the town to attend the vesper service at the church on the summit of Monreale. Worship ended, merriment began games and dances for the young, refreshments for their elders, who seated themselves at tables under the trees. French soldiers mingled with the people, pretending to keep the peace, but in reality behaving rudely. The young Sicilians indignantly bade them go their way.' 'These rebellious Sicilians must have arms,' exclaimed the Frenchmen, ' or they would not venture to speak to us so insolently,' and they began to search some of the peasants. At that moment a beautiful girl, the daughter of Robert Mastrangelo, drew near the church. She was walking with the young man to whom she was betrothed. A Frenchman named Druot went up to them, searched the young Sicilian, and roughly laid his hands on the girl. In her terror she fainted away. 'Death to the French!' was the indignant cry of the Sicilian. A youth stepped forward, stabbed Druot to the heart, and was himself cut down. Then rose the shriek 'Death to the French!' not from one, but from hundreds of voices. Not one Frenchman on the spot escaped alive. The crowd rushed back to the city. Every house was stormed; whoever did not, like the Italians, pronounce ce as che was marked as French and killed on the spot. Neither age, nor sex, nor infancy was spared. The insurrection spread throughout the island, marked by similar cruelties, and the massacre of the Sicilian vespers has gone down from generation to generation as a byword of horror for the maddened wrath of an injured people.

When the news of the insurrection reached Charles of Anjou at

K

130

Philip III.

SIEGE OF MESSINA-CHARLES'S FLEET DESTROYED.

Naples, he sat silent for a time, glaring fiercely around him, gnawing the top of his sceptre and bursting forth into terrific vows of vengeance. He then with his forces crossed over to Sicily.

Messina prepared for a desperate resistance to the enraged king. A wall was built in three days, and the first attacks of Charles were bravely repulsed. The words of an old song record the efforts of the female population. 'Alas for the women of Messina, mounting ladders, carrying stones! He who shall injure Messina, may God give him trouble and toil.' Now was the moment for the interference of Pedro of Aragon. A deputation from the parliament of Palermo offered him the throne of Sicily, and he accepted it. The relief of Messina was his first object. Accompanied by the Sicilian fleet, under Roger de Loria, he reached Trapani, where he landed, and men crowded to his banner. Ambassadors were sent to Charles, who postponed an audience for two days and then received them, seated on his bed covered with silk drapery. Throwing aside on his pillow the letter of the king of Aragon, he awaited the address of the envoys. It was simply a command that he should depart from his kingdom, and Charles again bit his sceptre in wrath. Yet one sentence in his proud reply indicated a sense of weakness. 'He might,' he said, retire for a short time to Calabria to refresh his weary troops, but it would only be to come back and wreak a fiercer vengeance.' In accordance with these words he recrossed the straits and returned to Naples during the night, leaving behind him his tents and provisions.

Only a very short time had elapsed after his departure when a fleet of ships, scattered apparently by a tempest, appeared at daybreak before the harbour of Messina. 'It is the fleet of king Charles,' exclaimed the citizens. They have conquered the galleys of Aragon, and now they will turn upon us.' The news was carried to Pedro of Aragon, who had taken up his abode in the city. Early though it was, yet, according to his custom, in winter as in summer, he was already dressed. He called for his horse and left the palace followed by about ten persons. The shores of the harbour were crowded with despairing men, women, and children. Fear nothing, good people,' exclaimed Pedro. "They are our vessels; they have seized the fleet of king Charles.'' God grant it may be so,' exclaimed the people, and Pedro rode on beyond the town repeating the same words. Yet a misgiving was in his mind, and he was heard to say, 'God, who has led me hither, will not abandon me, nor these unhappy people. Thanks and praise be rendered to Him.' An armed vessel bearing the ensign of Aragon was now seen approaching the shore. Pedro's nobles and knights gathered round him. A messenger landed from the vessel, and drawing near to Pedro said, 'My lord king, these are your galleys, which bring you those of your enemies.' The king dismounted

Philip III.

PROPOSED ROYAL DUEL-DEATH OF PHILIP III.

131

from his horse and knelt on the ground, the people following his example, and a thanksgiving was poured forth to God, who had given them this victory and saved them in the hour of their peril. 'Such cries of joy were uttered,' writes an old chronicler, that you may believe my word when I say they were heard at Calabria.'

Charles of Anjou had watched from the opposite coast the destruc tion of his fleet, and as he realised in this defeat the overthrow of his hopes for the conquest of Constantinople, he is said to have repeated the prayer which he uttered at the tidings of the Sicilian vespers. O Lord God, if it be Thy will to give me evil fortune, grant that I may descend gently and slowly from my greatness.' He now took the resolve of offering single combat himself to the king of Aragona hundred knights from each kingdom sharing the struggle. It was arranged that the two kings should meet and fight at Bordeaux, under the protection of Edward I. of England. As the appointed time drew near, Pedro of Aragon, well mounted, travelling by night, and guided by a trader in horses who knew all the passes of the Pyrenees, made his journey with some armed companions to Bordeaux. On the very day fixed for the combat he appeared before the gates of the city and summoned the English seneschal. Demanding to see the lists, he rode down them in slow state, then having obtained an attestation that he had appeared at the appointed time, he made a protest to the effect that the troops of France being so near Bordeaux, it was not safe for him to remain there longer, and turning his horse's head rode off on his way to Aragon.

Charles was furious. He was actually in Bordeaux at the time, and yet the challenge had been in vain. He denounced Pedro as a recreant and a dastardly craven, and prepared for vengeance; but on his return to Italy he was met by the disastrous tidings that on the preceding day Roger de Loria had again defeated his fleet, and that his son, Charles the Lame, prince of Salerno, was a prisoner. Why did he not rather die?' was the reply of the proud king, and he consoled himself by hanging a hundred and fifty Neapolitans. But he had in reality been crushed by this new calamity. He A would fain have made another attack upon Sicily, but he was unable 1.55 to carry out his plans, and early in the month of January 1285 he died. Pope Martin IV. lived only three months longer.

Philip of France laid claim to Pedro's dominions for his second son, Charles of Valois, to whom they had been given by Pope Martin. He entered Aragon and besieged Gerona, but his soldiers suffered severely from the heat of the climate, and he was obliged to retreat with his whole army. They managed to pass the Pyrenees, but the king was attacked on the road by malignant fever, and soon after reaching Perpignan he also died, October 5th, 1285, at the age of forty.

132 Philip IV.

NAPLES AND SICILY DIVIDED-PHILIP'S POLICY.

Pedro fell a victim to the same disease on the 11th of November following. Thus one year saw the death of the four principal persons concerned in the invasion of Sicily.

CHAPTER XVIII.

PHILIP IV. LE BEL (THE FAIR).

A.D. 1285-1314.

PHILIP IV., the eldest son of Philip the Bold, found himself, on his accession to the throne, embarrassed by the war with Aragon. Alfonso, the successor of Pedro, had married the daughter of Edward I. of England. Edward endeavoured to make peace between his son-in-law and the king of France, but he only succeeded in obtaining the release of Charles the Lame, the son of Charles of Anjou, who had been taken prisoner in the last naval engagement, and who was recognised as Charles II. of Naples. The struggle A.D. between France and Aragon went on for several years, but in 1291 1291 Charles of Valois resigned all claim to Aragon, and agreed to marry Marguerite, the daughter of Charles II. of Naples, receiving as her dowry the counties of Anjou and Maine. Alfonso of Aragon, on his part, promised that Sicily should be given up to Naples; but the Anjou family had made themselves so hated in the island that the inhabitants would not accept Charles, and in the end Sicily became an independent state under the government of a younger branch of the royal house of Aragon.

Peace for France might now have been expected, but Philip IV., eminently handsome, as may be known by his name Philippe le Bel (the Fair), was ambitious, selfish, and cruel, and the last monarch to secure peace. His evil tendencies were aggravated by those of his wife, Jeanne of Navarre, who was as vindictive and cruel as himself. The king's great object during the whole of his reign was to become the absolute master of his people for the furtherance of his own objects, and though he encouraged the middle classes, it was that they might assist him in opposing the nobility. Probably with this view his goldsmith, Ralph, was raised to the rank of a noble, and persons of low birth were allowed to purchase fiefs by which they attained the rank of baron. Philip's interference with all classes must indeed have been a source of constant annoyance. He made sumptuary laws regulating the number of dresses his subjects were to have, and the expense of each dress. He settled how many dishes might be had for dinner and supper-one dish of soup and two dishes of meat being allowed for dinner at half-past eleven, and for supper between four and five in the afternoon; and when the strict