Norman Sicily exhibited, to all intents and purposes, a prolongation, under happier auspices, of that dominion to which the island owed its prosperity and its fame. The influence of Moorish thrift, capacity, and skill was everywhere manifest and acknowledged. Its silent operation facilitated its progress and increased its power. The maritime interests of the island were in the hands of the Moslems; they controlled the finances; they negotiated treaties; to them was largely confided the administration of justice and the education of youth. Their integrity was acknowledged even by those whose practices appeared most unfavorable by contrast; their versatile talents not infrequently raised them to the highest and most responsible posts of the Norman court. That court is declared by contemporary historians to have equalled in splendor and culture those of Cairo and Bagdad. This comparison, while the highest encomium that could be pronounced upon its grandeur and brilliancy, also denoted unmistakably the Oriental influence which pervaded it. Great dignitaries, with pompous titles and retinues imposing in numbers and magnificence, exercised the principal employments of the crown. A rigid system of subordination and accountability was established, governing the conduct of the minor officials in their relations to their superiors and to the sovereign. The gradations in rank of these civil magistrates were numerous, and their respective duties plainly and accurately defined. The system of fiefs had never obtained in Northern Italy, owing to the extraordinary growth of maritime enterprise, the mutual jealousies engendered by commercial rivalry, the prejudices of the Lombard population, hostile to the restraints and abuses which the adoption of that system implied, the foundation of many independent and wealthy communities,--conditions naturally incompatible with the maintenance of an establishment based upon obligations of military service and baronial protection. In Apulia and Northern Sicily, however, Norman domination transplanted, to some extent, the laws and customs of Western Europe, which found a congenial soil in provinces already familiar with the exactions of Saracen despotism. But the feudal system of Norman rule had lost much of its original severity, and had been curtailed of those oppressive privileges with difficulty endured even in countries for centuries accustomed to the suffering and degradation they entailed. These modifications were so extensive and radical as to be almost revolutionary in their nature. The disputes of lord and vassal, of noble and suzerain, were decided by a court of judicature. Villeinage, as recognized elsewhere in Europe, was practically unknown. While the villein was attached to the glebe and passed with its transfer, he could not be persecuted with impunity; he could own property and alienate it, make wills, ransom his services, and, in many other