was largely responsible for this general disorganization. It could not reasonably be supposed that these disturbers of public tranquillity, whose lives had been passed amidst the turmoil of religious and military revolution, would remain quiet under any government. While the Moslem factions with varying success were wasting their energies in suicidal conflicts, the Christian communities, many of which were respectable in wealth and numbers, were enabled by sufferance to enjoy a temporary respite. The conclusion of the war had accomplished one most beneficial result, an interchange of captives. From the dark vaults of noisome dungeons; from the galley, with its scourge and its clanking fetters; from the rice-fields, reeking with miasmatic vapors; from the gilded antechambers of the harem; the prisoners, who had long since abandoned hope, were now led forth to be restored to home and kindred. The struggle which for more than half a century had engaged alike the attention of Christian and Moslem throughout the world was ended. Mankind now began to cast anxious glances towards the new Mohammedan state which formed a stepping-stone by which the hordes of Africa might once more enter Europe. The passage of the Strait of Messina offered fewer obstacles to an invader than that of the Strait of Gibraltar. From the confines of Calabria it was a march of only a few days to Rome, and it was not forgotten that the banners of Islam had once been seen before the walls of the Eternal City. Numerous colonies of Moslems, most of which seemed to threaten permanent occupancy, were established in Southern Italy; the Moorish navy had asserted its power in the Adriatic; an intimate alliance existed between the Republic of Naples and the emirs of Sicily. Not without cause therefore did Christendom regard with unconcealed apprehension the presence of such implacable foes in close proximity to her capital. No adequate means of defence existed to ward off the impending danger. The court of Constantinople had retired discomfited from the field. Italy was distracted by the quarrels of a multitude of insignificant principalities. The Papacy had not yet attained to that commanding position in the political system of Europe which it subsequently occupied, and its temporal power was confined to the agitation of the mob of the capital, whose passions, once aroused, it was not always able to control. The dream of Musa, who boasted that the unity of God would be proclaimed in the Church of St. Peter, seemed now far more easy of realization, when the Saracen armies were separated from Rome by only a narrow channel and a few hours’ march, than when the project first awoke the ambition of that daring general beyond the intervening mountain barriers of the Pyrenees and the Alps.