but there was no
question in the matter of monotony or of danger. The journey was made
on foot because it was the most laborious way, and the most humble.]

[Footnote 18: See farther on, p. 110, the analogies with English
arrangements of the same kind.]

"In one of the earliest years of the eleventh century, about forty
of these religious travellers, having returned from the Holy Land,
chanced to have met together in Salerno at the moment when a small
Saracen fleet came to insult the town, and demand of it a military
contribution. The inhabitants of South Italy, at this time, abandoned
to the delights of their enchanted climate, had lost nearly all
military courage. The Salernitani saw with astonishment forty Norman
knights, after having demanded horses and arms from the Prince of
Salerno, order the gates of the town to be opened, charge the Saracens
fearlessly, and put them to flight. The Salernitani followed, however,
the example given them by these brave warriors, and those of the
Mussulmans who escaped their swords were forced to re-embark in all
haste.

"The Prince of Salerno, Guaimar III., tried in vain to keep the
warrior-pilgrims at his court: but at his solicitation other companies
established themselves on the rocks of Salerno and Amalfi, until,
on Christmas Day, 1041, (exactly a quarter of a century before the
coronation here at Westminster of the Conqueror,) they gathered
their scattered forces at Aversa,[19] twelve groups of them
under twelve chosen counts, and all under the Lombard Ardoin, as
commander-in-chief." Be so good as to note that,--a marvellous
key-note of historical fact about the unjesting Lombards, I cannot
find the total Norman number: the chief contingent, under William
of the Iron Arm, the son of Tancred of Hauteville, was only of three
hundred knights; the Count of Aversa's troop, of the same number, is
named as an important part of the little army--admit it for ten times
Tancred's, three thousand men in all. At Aversa, these three thousand
men form, coolly on Christmas Day, 1041, the design of--well, I told
you they didn't _design_ much, only, now we're here, we may as well,
while we're about it,--overthrow the Greek empire! That was their
little game!--a Christmas mumming to purpose. The following year, the
whole of Apulia was divided among them.

[Footnote 19: In Lombardy, south of Pavia.]

I will not spoil, by abstracting, the magnificent following history
of Robert Guiscard, t