The historian Falcandus writes at the moment and on the spot, with the feelings of a patriot, and the prophetic eye of a statesman. “Constanza, the daughter of Sicily, nursed from her cradle in the pleasures and plenty, and educated in the arts and manners of this fortunate isle, departed long since to enrich the barbarians with our treasures, and now returns with her savage allies to contaminate the beauties of her venerable parent. Already I behold the swarms of angry barbarians; our opulent cities, the places flourishing in a long peace, are shaken with fear, desolated by slaughter, consumed by rapine, and polluted by intemperance and lust. I see the massacre or captivity of our citizens, the rapes of our virgins and matrons. In this extremity (he interrogates a friend) how must the Sicilians act? By the unanimous election of a king of valour and experience, Sicily and Calabria might yet be preserved; for in the levity of the Apulians, ever eager for new revolutions, I can repose neither confidence nor hope. Should Calabria be lost, the lofty towers, the numerous youth, and the naval strength of Messina, might guard the passage against a foreign invader. If the savage Germans coalesce with the pirates of Messina; if they destroy with fire the fruitful region, so often wasted by the fires of Mount Ætna, what resource will be left for the interior parts of the island, these noble cities which should never be violated by the hostile footsteps of a barbarian? “Catana has again been overwhelmed by an earthquake; the ancient virtue of Syracuse expires in poverty and solitude; but Palermo is still crowned with a diadem, and her triple walls enclose the active multitudes of Christians and Saracens. If the two nations, under one king, can unite for their common safety, they may rush on the barbarians with invincible arms. But if the Saracens, fatigued by a repetition of injuries, should now retire and rebel, if they should occupy the castles of the mountains and sea coast, the unfortunate Christians, exposed to a double attack, and placed as it were between the hammer and the anvil, must resign themselves to hopeless and inevitable servitude.” We must not forget, that a priest here prefers his country to his religion; and that the Moslems, whose alliance he seeks, were still numerous and powerful in the state of Sicily.[m] [Illustration: A NORMAN WARRIOR OF THE TWELFTH CENTURY]