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420
UNIVERSAL HISTORY.—THE MODERN WORLD.
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marked by much pomp and ceremony. He became a reformer of abuses in the kingdom, abrogating oppressive taxes, regulatin£_the French municipalities, and framing..new codes pf laws. Until a late date the shade-tree was still standing in the Bois de Vincennes under which Saint Louis was wont to sit, hearing the complaints of the poor, and redressing the grievances of those who had suffered yrflflg-
As it respected integrity ot character and sincerity of purpose, Louis IX. enjoyed the best reputation of all the monarchs of hiaage. So great was his fame for justice and probity, that neighboring princes, when involved in difficulties among themselves, were accustomed
to refer the matters in dispute to the calm temper and impartial judgment of Louis.1
To this epoch belongs the establishment of a French dynasty in Sicily and Naples. The crown of this kingdom had fallen into the hands of the imperial family of Germany by the marriage of the daughter of the last Norman king of the Two Sicilies to the father of Frederick II., and when this Emperor died the kingdom was seized by his illegitimate »on Manfred. Pope Urban IV., regarding the accession of this pseudo prince as a scandal to Christendom, and offended at the additional power thus gained by the Ghibellines, set up 'Charles of Anjou. brother of Louis IX.. as king of the Two Sicilies, and in 1265 the
1 One of Saint Louis’s maxims may well be repeated: “It is good policy to be just; inasmuch as a reputation for probity and disinterestedness gives a prince more real authority and power than any accession of territories.”
CHAMBER or HOKBOlift—TUI INQUISITION.
claims of the latter were successfully asserted by the defeat of Manfred in battle. Charles, however, was a man very different in character from his brother, the king of France. His life and reign were marked by personal ambition, selfishness, and cruelty. His name and that of his country became forever afterwards odious in the kingdom which he ruled. Two years after his accession to the throne the German princes, under the lead of Conradin, son of Conrad IV., and last representative of the House of Hohenstaufen, made an attempt to expel the French from Italy, but they were decisively defeated. Conradin was taken prisoner, carried to Naples, and put to death by order of King Charles. When about to be executed, he threw down his glove from the scaffold, appealing to the crowd to convey it to any of his kinsmen in token that whoever received it was invested with his rights, and charged with the duty of avenging his death.
In the year 1258 Philip, eldest son of Saint Louis, received in marriage the Princess Isabella, daughter of the king of Aragon. When this union was affected, it was agreed by the kings of France and Spain that the latter should surrender to the former the towns which he held in the south of France, and that Louis should give in exchange to the king of Aragon those districts of Spain which had been wrested by Charlemagne from the Mohammedans. About the same time the French monarch secured a large portion of the province of Champagne by purchase from Count Thibault, who in virtue of his mother’s right had acceded to the throne of Navarre.
Having completed the disposition of affairs in his kingdom. Louis IX. at last found himself in readiness to renew the war with the Turks and Mamelukes. How the expedition with which be left Franoe in the year 1270 waa diverted into a campaign agaiust Tunis, how the plague broke out in the French army encamped on that sun-scorched shore, how many thousands perished in anguish and despair, and how the aged king himself sickened and died, have already been recounted in a preceding chapter.1
Saint Louis )eft as his successor his son Philip by Margaret of Prtfrence. This prince was with his father in the siege of Tunis, and
1 See ante, p. 395.