From the Arabian conquest, Sicily had imbibed a deep tincture of oriental manners; the despotism, the pomp, and even the harem of a sultan; and a Christian people was oppressed and insulted by the ascendant of the eunuchs, who openly professed, or secretly cherished, the religion of Mohammed. An eloquent historian of the times, Falcandus,[m] has delineated the misfortunes of his country; the ambition and fall of the ungrateful Majo; the revolt and punishment of his assassins; the imprisonment and deliverance of the king himself; the private feuds that arose from the public confusion; and the various forms of calamity and discord which afflicted Palermo, the island and the continent, during the reign of William the First, and the minority of his son. WILLIAM THE GOOD (1166-1189 A.D.) [Sidenote: [1166-1194 A.D.]] The youth, innocence, and beauty of William II, endeared him to the nation; the factions were reconciled; the laws were revived; and from the manhood to the premature death of that amiable prince, Sicily enjoyed a short season of peace, justice, and happiness, whose value was enhanced by the remembrance of the past and the dread of futurity. The legitimate male posterity of Tancred de Hauteville was extinct in the person of the second William; but his aunt, the daughter of Roger, had married the most powerful prince of the age; and Henry VI, the son of Frederick Barbarossa, descended from the Alps to claim the imperial crown and the inheritance of his wife. Against the unanimous wish of a free people, this inheritance could only be acquired by arms.