Heroines of the Crusades

CHAPTER XVI.

LETTER FROM PROCIDA TO DON PEDRO, KING OF ARRAGON

* * * * * * * “Thou didst tell me in Arragon, that to restore Sicily to the house of Suabia, was the chimera of a maddened brain; that the strong arm of the church would be lifted to crush the Ghibellines in their final struggle; that gold was wanting to bribe the soldier to draw his sword in behalf of the doomed race, and that the enemies of Charles of Anjou could not be brought to act together against their common foe. Recall now the cruel words that drove Procida from thy court, a Mendicant, ‘Conquer these impossibilities, and the fleet of Arragon is ready to substantiate the claim of the daughter of Manfred to the throne of Sicily.’ Goaded by the mocking promise, the mendicant wanders in Sicily. Now, companion of the tax-gatherer, he wrings the last drachmè from the hard hand of toil, and now with the agents of tyranny, he hides the skins of stags or deer in the huts of the peasant, and then robs the goatherd as a penalty for the offence. Thus, he listens and observes. Thus, he tugs at the chain that festers in their shrinking flesh, to show his countrymen their thraldom. Anon, a shepherd or a herdsman, he traverses the valley, or scales the rock, joins the youthful throng that stealthily sport beneath the mountain chesnut, or mingles with the vexed vassals who wait their sovereigns’ will, and whispers in the ear of each repining soul, ‘The avenger of Manfred holds the vigils of Freedom in the cave of the forest of Palermo.’ At sunset, a traveller, he seeks the rendezvous: the husbandman is returning to his cottage, his reaping-hook hanging idly from his arm, the Frenchman has gathered the grain from his fields. The herdsman drives his lowing flocks across the lea – the kine and the goat have been robbed of their young, and their fleecy robes been stripped from the bleating tenants of the fold. The peasant of Hibla returns mourning the swarm which the wind bore beyond his reclaim, but still more the honied stores which during his absence the hand of the spoiler ravished from his unprotected apiary. There comes no voice from the vineyard – the vintagers have trodden the wine-press, but the ruby current flows in the goblets that enliven the banquets of their foreign masters. Oh my people, Sicilians! Listen to him who whispers in the ear of each, ‘Carry thy wrongs to the cave of the forest of Palermo.’ They come – barbarians, Arabs, Jews, Normans and Germans – those who rejoiced in the tolerant reign of the Suabians, those who have suffered from the tyrant French – Etna groans with the prescience of coming vengeance, and with her thousand tongues of flame, summons the guilty oppressor to abide the ‘judgment of God’ before the altar.

* * * * * * “A vessel sails from Brundusium, the mariners, hardy Calabrians, spread their sails and bend to their oars with patient purpose; but there is one among them who never leaves his post, in calm or in storm – one thought gives strength and vigor to his iron arm; and though a scorner of puerile beadsmen, he almost prays the God of the wind to speed him on his course. Should the Greek Emperor refuse his aid —he will tell him that, which will make him tremble for his throne and force the gold from the reluctant coffers. The crafty Paleologus hesitates, but he stands aghast, when Procida acquaints him that Venice hath lent her ships to D’Anjou, and another Dandolo is already embarked to repeat the Fifth Crusade! The Greek exclaims in despair, ‘I know not what to do.’ ‘Give me money,’ replies the mariner, ‘and I will find you a defender, who has no money, but who has arms.’ Michael Paleologus opens his treasures and satisfies even a Jew’s thirst for gold. Most of all, Paleologus desires a complete reconciliation with the pope; most of all Procida desires an interview with the sovereign pontiff.

“More swiftly returns the galley; and the ambassador of the Greek stands upon the prow, wrapped in courtly vestments; but not the less anxiously does he watch the winds and waves that return him to Rome. The feeble Nicholas trembles at thought of the vast undertaking, but Procida has fathomed the old man’s ambition for his house. He reminds him of the reply of D’Anjou, when the pope proposed a marriage between his neice and Charles’ son, ‘Does Nicholas fancy because he wears red stockings that the blood of Orsini can mingle with the blood of France?’ The stinging remembrance of the taunt determines the pontiff, and the treaty with Paleologus is delivered into the hands of the ambassador. Behold now, King of Arragon, ‘The impossibilities are conquered,’ and thou art bound by the very vow of thine unbelief to ‘substantiate the claim of the daughter of Manfred to the throne of Sicily.’”

Before the letter of Procida reached Don Pedro, Pope Nicholas died, and Charles had sufficient interest with the college of cardinals to procure the election of one of his own creatures to the Holy See.

These events darkened the horizon above the Sicilians: but the dauntless spirit of Procida rose superior to this alarming turn of affairs. Though aware that Charles had been made acquainted with his designs, he remained upon the island, stealthily riveting the links of the conspiracy, and binding the discordant interests of the various ranks in an indissoluble confederacy, for the overthrow of foreign oppression. The cave of the forest of Palermo was piled with bundles of faggots, in which were concealed the weapons that the inhabitants had forged in secresy and in darkness, for by the prohibition of the French no Sicilian was permitted to wear arms. The grand conspirator knew well the Sicilian character, ardent, gay, voluptuous, – he chose his time with his wonted sagacity, when the beautiful island rejoicing in the fullness of bloom, invites her children to banquet upon her charms; when the long abstinence of Lent being over, the senses, reanimated by flesh and wine, start from languor to revel in the enjoyment of luxury and the exhilaration of passion. Easter-Monday, March 30th, 1282, dawns upon Sicily with fair promise for the festal day. The citizens of Palermo look one upon another with furtive glances of restrained impatience, and prepared for the annual fête with busy alacrity, while the foreigners, made apprehensive by the gathering multitudes, come armed to assist in garlanding the very church of God.

At sunset a bride and bridegroom go forth, attended by all the inhabitants of the city, both men and women, up the beautiful hill Monréale, to present their vows at the altar of the blessed Virgin: – a traitor whispers the warning, “The Sicilians have arms beneath their robes.” The leader of the French hurries forward and seizes the weapon of the bridegroom – he lays his licentious hand upon the bride. Procida draws his sword, and with a cry of “Death to the French!” buries it in the heart of the brutal enemy. At the moment the sound of the Vesper bell floats from the temple of our lady, on the mount of Monréale. It is the appointed signal for vengeance, and “Death to the French!” echoes from lip to lip, through all the ranks of the Sicilians. Everywhere the tyrants are cut down – the houses of the foreigners bear each a fatal mark, and the Destroying Angel spares not even women and children, and the night spreads her solemn pall over the bodies of slaughtered thousands.

Intelligence of the accomplishment of Procida’s purpose soon reached Eleanora; but the horrors of the massacre were suppressed, nor did Agnes ever know the cruel part her father had played in the grand tragedy of the Sicilian Vespers. She learned, indeed, that the Queen of Arragon had rescued the only son of D’Anjou from his pursuers, and conveyed him away in safety from the island; but the insurrection had not reached its final triumph, when she left the court of England as the Duchess of Saxony; and it was from that time the care of her husband that her gentle spirit should not be pained by a knowledge of the sanguinary scenes that resulted in the death of D’Anjou, and in the re-establishment of the house of Suabia upon the throne of Sicily.

It would have been natural for Edward, in this struggle, to throw the weight of his influence on the side of his uncle D’Anjou; but the circumstance of his daughter’s betrothment to Alphonso of Arragon, held him neutral. He, however, negotiated a peace between the pope and Alphonso, by which D’Anjou’s son, Charles the Lame, was released from his captivity in Arragon, and permitted to assume his authority in Naples.

Eleanora’s love for her husband, not less than her delicate appreciation of excellence, had led her to weigh with wise discrimination the effect of political events upon his character; and the truth was reluctantly forced upon her, that ambition, nurtured by the uniform success of his enterprises, was gradually absorbing the nobler qualities of his nature, and steeling his heart against the claims of justice and humanity.

King Alexander III. of Scotland, the last direct heir in the male line from Maude, died 1285, and this circumstance was the precursor of that period, fatal to Edward’s honor, and to the long-established amity between the two kingdoms.

To avert the consequences which she foresaw would follow Alexander’s demise, she had influenced Edward to propose a matrimonial alliance between the Prince of Wales and the Maid of Norway, heiress of the Scottish crown. The states of Scotland readily assented to the proposition of the English, and even consented that their young sovereign should be educated at the court of her royal father-in-law. But, while Eleanora was anticipating the pleasant task of rearing the future Queen of England, she was overwhelmed with sorrow by the intelligence, that the tender frame of the priceless child, unable to sustain the rigors of the voyage, had fallen a victim to death at the Orkneys, on her way to England. Her loss was the greatest calamity that ever befell the Scottish nation, fully justifying the touching couplet,

The succession of the Scottish crown became at once a matter of dispute, and all the evils which Eleanora had foreseen began to darken the political horizon.

The line of Alexander being extinct, the crown devolved on the issue of David, Earl of Huntington, who figures as Sir Kenneth, in the “Talisman”. The earl had three daughters, from one of whom descended John Baliol, from another Robert Bruce; and the rival claims of these two competitors having for some time agitated the kingdom, it was agreed to submit the arbitration of the affair to Edward, in the same manner as Henry III. had made Louis IX. umpire of his difficulties upon the continent. But the noble virtues of the saintly monarch were poorly represented in the English king. Edward at once claimed the crown for himself as lord paramount of the country, appointed Baliol as his deputy, and sent six regents to take possession of Scotland. The brave men of the north resisted this aggression with a spirit that fully proved their Scandinavian origin, and Edward hastened to the Scottish border to enforce his claims.

Queen Eleanora was absent in Ambresbury, to witness the profession of her daughter Mary, who there, with the Welsh Princess Guendoline, was veiled a nun under the care of her royal mother-in-law, Eleanora of Provence. But no sooner was the ceremony concluded, than she complied with her husband’s earnest request, that she should follow him to Scotland.

Regardless of fatigue, she hurried forward, though sensible that an incipient fever preyed upon her strength. As the dangerous symptoms increased, she redoubled her speed, hoping at least to reach Alnwick castle, and die in her husband’s arms. But at Grantham, in Lincolnshire, her strength utterly failed, and in the residence of a private gentleman, who had belonged to their household in Palestine, she awaited the coming of the King of Terrors. A courier was immediately despatched to Edward, with news of her alarming illness. At the gentle call of conjugal love, all other considerations gave way in the heart of Edward. He turned southward instantly, and by forced stages, hurried towards Grantham. The dying Eleanora watched for his coming with an anxiety born of an intense devotion to the welfare of her husband and his subjects. She longed to repeat with her last breath the tender counsels that had ever influenced him to clemency and mercy, and which she had enforced by the strongest of all arguments, the daily example of a holy life. But the last sad duty to the cold remains of his beloved consort, was the only consolation left to the bereaved monarch, when he arrived at Lincolnshire. With a sorrow that found relief in every outward testimonial of woe, he followed her corpse in person during thirteen days in progress of the funeral to Westminster. In every town where the royal bier rested the ecclesiastics assembled, and in solemn procession conducted it to the high altar of the principal church, and at each resting-place, Edward set up a crucifix in memory of “La chere reine,” as he passionately called his lost Eleanora. Charing Cross, erected upon the site now occupied by the statue of Charles I., was the London monument of this saintly queen.

An English writer, in a tribute to her memory, thus enumerates her virtues, “To our nation she was a loving mother, the column and pillar of the whole realm; therefore, to her glory, the king her husband caused all those famous trophies to be erected, wherever her noble corpse did rest; for he loved her above all earthly creatures. She was a godly, modest and merciful princess; the English nation in her time was not harassed by foreigners, nor the country people by the purveyors of the crown. The sorrow-stricken she consoled, as became her dignity, and she made them friends that were at discord.”

Her sorrowing lord endowed the Abbey of Winchester with rich donations for the perpetual celebration of dirges and masses for her soul, and waxen tapers were burned about her tomb, till the light of the Reformation outshone the lights of superstition; but her imperishable virtues survive every monumental device, illume the annals of history, and illustrate the true philosophy of female Heroism.

NOTES

“The Lady Matilda.” – Hlafdigé, or lady, means the giver of bread. Few of the Queens of England can claim a more illustrious descent than this princess. Her father, Baldwin V., was surnamed the gentle Earl of Flanders: her mother Adelais, was daughter of Robert, King of France, and sister to Henry, reigning sovereign of that country, and she was nearly related to the Emperor of Germany, and most of the royal houses in Europe. —Queens of England, p. 24.

“Woden and Thor.” – Two of the most powerful deities in northern mythology. The ancient Saxons honored Woden as the God of War, and the Germans represented Thor as the God of Thunder.

“The Royal Children.” – The sons of Matilda and William the Conqueror, were Robert, afterwards Duke of Normandy, Richard, who died young, William and Henry, afterwards kings of England, Cicely, Agatha, Adela, Constance, Adeliza and Gundred. No two writers agree as to the order of their ages, except that Robert was the eldest and Henry the youngest son, Cicely the eldest and Gundred the youngest daughter. – Vide Queens of England, p. 33-82.

“The Mora.” – While the fleet destined to invade the Island waited in the port for a favorable wind, William was agreeably surprised by the arrival of his duchess at the port, in a splendid vessel of war called the Mora, which she had caused to be built, unknown to him, and adorned in the most royal style of magnificence for his acceptance. The effigy of their youngest son, William, in gilded bronze, most writers say of gold, was placed at the prow of this vessel, with his face turned towards England, holding a trumpet to his lips with one hand, and bearing in the other a bow with the arrow aimed towards England. —Queens of England, p. 40.

“William the Conqueror” was of low origin on the mother’s side. He was not ashamed of his birth, and drew around him his mother’s other sons. At first he had much difficulty in bringing his barons, who despised him, to their allegiance. He was a large, bald-headed man, very brave, very greedy, and very sage, according to the notions of the times, that is very treacherous. —Michelet’s History of France, p. 193.

“Edgar Atheling.” – Edward, the son of Edmund Ironside, being sent to Hungary to escape the cruelty of Canute, was there married to Agatha, daughter of the Emperor Henry II. She bore him Edgar Atheling, Margaret, afterwards Queen of Scotland, and Christina, who afterwards retired to a convent. —Hume, p. 115.

“The one keeping strict lenten fast.” – By a mixture of vigor and lenity, he had so soothed the mind of the English, that he thought he might safely revisit his native country, and enjoy the triumph and congratulation of his ancient subjects. He left the administration in the hands of his uterine brother, Odo, Bishop of Bayeux, and of William Fitz Osberne. That their authority might be exposed to less danger, he carried over with him all the most considerable nobility of England, who, while they served to grace his court by their presence and magnificent retinues, were in reality hostages for the fidelity of the nation. Among these, were Edgar Atheling, Stigand the primate, the Earls Edwin and Morcar, Waltheof the son of the brave Earl Siward, with others eminent for the greatness of their fortunes and families, or for their ecclesiastical and civil dignities. He was visited at the Abbey of Fescamp, where he resided during some time, by Rodulph, uncle to the King of France, and by many powerful princes and nobles, who having contributed to his enterprise, were desirous of participating in the joy and advantages of its success. His English courtiers, willing to ingratiate themselves with their new sovereign, outvied each other in equipages and entertainments; and made a display of riches which struck the foreigners with astonishment. William of Poictiers, a Norman historian, who was present, speaks with admiration of the beauty of their persons, the size and workmanship of their silver plate, the costliness of their embroideries, an art in which the English then excelled, and he expresses himself in such terms as tend much to exalt our idea of the opulence and cultivation of the people. But though everything bore the face of joy and festivity, and William himself treated his new courtiers with great appearance of kindness, it was impossible altogether to prevent the insolence of the Normans; and the English nobles derived little satisfaction from those entertainments, where they considered themselves as led in triumph by their ostentatious conqueror. —Hume, vol. 1, p. 184.

The celebrated Bayeaux tapestry, distinguished by the name of the Duke of Normandy’s toilette, is a piece of canvass about nineteen inches in breadth, but upwards of sixty-seven yards in length, on which is embroidered the history of the conquest of England by William of Normandy, commencing with the visit of Harold to the Norman court, and ending with his death at the battle of Hastings, 1066. The leading transactions of these eventful years, the death of Edward the Confessor, and the coronation of Harold in the chamber of the royal dead, are represented in the clearest and most regular order in this piece of needle-work, which contains many hundred figures of men, horses, birds, beasts, trees, houses, castles, and churches, all executed their proper colors, with names and inscriptions over them to elucidate the story. It appears to have been designed by Turold, a dwarf artist, who illuminated the canvas with the proper outlines and colors. —Queens of England, vol. 1, p. 54.

“Cicely, the betrothed of Harold.” – William also complained of the affront that had been offered to his daughter by the faithless Saxon, who, regardless of his contract to the little Norman princess, just before King Edward’s death, strengthened his interest with the English nobles by marrying Algitha, sister to the powerful Earls Morcar and Edwin, and widow to Griffith, Prince of Wales. This circumstance is mentioned with great bitterness in all William’s proclamations and reproachful messages to Harold, and appears to have been considered by the incensed duke to the full as great a villany as the assumption of the crown of England. —Queens of England, vol. 1, p. 35.

“Condemned her former lover.” – Brithric, the son of Algar, a Saxon Thane, is stated in Domesday, to have held this manor in the reign of Edward the Confessor; but having given offence to Maud, the daughter of Baldwin, Count of Flanders, previous to her marriage with William, Duke of Normandy, by refusing to marry her himself, his property was seized by that monarch on the conquest, and bestowed seemingly in revenge upon the queen. —Ellis’s History of Thornbury Castle.

“The terrible Vikings.” – Sea kings among the Danes or Normans; leaders of piratical squadrons who passed their lives in roving the seas in search of spoil and adventures. The younger sons of the Scandinavian kings and jarls, having no inheritance but the ocean, naturally collected around their standards the youth of inferior order, who were equally destitute with themselves. These were the same who, in England and Scotland, under the name of Danes, and on the continent under the name of Normans, at first desolated the maritime coasts, and afterwards penetrated into the interior of countries, and formed permanent settlements in their conquests. —See Encyclopedia.

“The Danes confided much in the Fylga or Guardian Spirit.” – They have certain Priestesses named Morthwyrtha, or worshippers of the dead.

Edgar Atheling, dreading the insidious caresses of William, escaped into Scotland, and carried thither his two sisters, Margaret and Christina. They were well received by Malcolm, who soon after espoused Margaret, the elder. —Hume’s History of England, vol. 1.

“The laying waste of Hampshire.” – There was one pleasure to which William, as well as all the Normans and ancient Saxons, were extremely addicted, and that was hunting; but this pleasure he indulged more at the expense of his unhappy subjects, whose interests he always disregarded, than to the loss or diminution of his own revenue. Not content with those large forests which former kings possessed in all parts of England, he resolved to make a new forest near Winchester, the usual place of his residence; and for that purpose he laid waste the country in Hampshire for an extent of thirty miles, expelled the inhabitants from their houses, seized their property even, demolished churches and convents, and made the sufferers no compensation for the injury. At the same time he enacted new laws, by which he prohibited all his subjects from hunting in any of his forests, and rendered the penalties more severe than ever had been inflicted for such offences. The killing of a deer or bear, or even a hare, was punished with the loss of a delinquent’s eyes; and that, at a time, when the killing of a man could be atoned for by paying a moderate fine. —History of England, vol. 1, p. 214.

“Odious Danegelt, and still more odious Couvrefeu.” – William, to prevent the people of the land from confederating together in nocturnal assemblies, for the purpose of discussing their grievances, and stimulating each other to revolt, compelled them to couvrefeu, or extinguish the lights and fires in their dwellings at eight o’clock every evening, at the tolling of a bell, called from that circumstance, the curfew or couvrefeu. —Queens of England, vol. 1, p. 57.

“Lanfranc will absolve thee from thy oath.” – Lanfranc exchanged his priory for the Abbey of St. Stephen, at Caen, in Normandy, and when William, the sovereign of that duchy, acquired the English throne by conquest, the interest of that prince procured his election, in 1070, to the Archbishopric of Canterbury, then become vacant by the deposition of Stigand. —See Encyclopedia.