powerless hands;[286] but still the Ghibellines could not give up the hope that one day he would wake again, and lead them to the victory they looked for. This expectation was much strengthened by a prophecy then current under the name of the Abbot Joachim. ‘There cometh an Eagle, at whose appearing the Lion shall be destroyed: yea a young Eagle who shall make his nest in the den of the Lion. Of the race of the Eagle shall arise another Eagle called Frederick. He shall reign indeed, and shall stretch his wings till they touch the ends of the earth. In his days shall the chief Pontiff and his clergy be despoiled and dispersed.’[287] On the other side a Guelf poet, whose name we do not know, associated Frederick II. with Arthur in the following lines: ‘Cominatur impius, dolens de jacturis Cum suo Britonibus Arturo Venturis.’[288] The collection called the _Cento Novelle Antiche_ reflects this myth very plainly; for, in the strange tales then told of Frederick and his court, we seem to see these personages already transported to a kind of fairyland, where the laws of earthly life no longer hold good. The scene is unmistakably laid in the Avalon of Arthur and amid his shadowy court. One of the most striking incidents which marked the long funeral procession of Frederick II. through the southern provinces of Italy was furnished by the grief of a faithful band of Saracens, who, with dishevelled hair and cries of sorrow, accompanied the body of their great benefactor to its last resting-place. It is probable indeed that these people, of whom Frederick had not a few both in Sicily and in various colonies on the mainland, may have joined very heartily with their Christian neighbours in giving currency to the latest application of the Arthurian legend. In all essential features it must already have been familiar to them as a form of myth long known in the East. Even the romance of Nectanebus already noticed had a certain historical basis. In the fourth century before Christ a king called Nekhtneb reigned in Egypt. He was defeated by the Persians, and fled into a distant province of Ethiopia. Thus the ancient national dynasty of the Pharaohs came to an end, but the people long refused to believe that their king was dead. They consulted an oracle, which told them he would return, as a young man, to conquer the enemies of his country. This prophecy was engraved on the base of the royal statue and served long to sustain the national hope. The same dreams appeared in connection with the much more recent Mohammedan power. The _Shi’ah_ and _Sunnee_ sects of Islam held firmly to the idea that the twelfth Imam was not really dead, but would return to earth. This mysterious person was _El Mohdy_, the last incarnation of the Deity, as they supposed. He was said to dwell in a cave near Bagdad, whence he would one day reappear to oppose _Ed Dejal_, the Moslem Antichrist, in a time of great trouble, when he would overthrow him