m off their sandals and depart. Sandra's retreat was a sad omen, and
soon the family dissensions, long with difficulty suppressed, sprang
forth to open view; the storm that had been threatening from afar broke
suddenly over the town, and the thunderbolt was shortly to follow.

On the last day of August 1344, Joan rendered homage to Americ, Cardinal
of Saint Martin and legate of Clement VI, who looked upon the kingdom of
Naples as being a fief of the Church ever since the time when his
predecessors had presented it to Charles of Anjou, and overthrown and
excommunicated the house of Suabia. For this solemn ceremony the church
of Saint Clara was chosen, the burial-place of Neapolitan kings, and but
lately the tomb of the grandfather and father of the young queen, who
reposed to right and left of the high altar. Joan, clad in the royal
robe, with the crown upon her head, uttered her oath of fidelity between
the hands of the apostolic legate in the presence of her husband, who
stood behind her simply as a witness, just like the other princes of the
blood. Among the prelates with their pontifical insignia who formed the
brilliant following of the envoy, there stood the Archbishops of Pisa,
Bari, Capua, and Brindisi, and the reverend fathers Ugolino, Bishop of
Castella, and Philip, Bishop of Cavaillon, chancellor to the queen. All
the nobility of Naples and Hungary were present at this ceremony, which
debarred Andre from the throne in a fashion at once formal and striking.
Thus, when they left the church the excited feelings of both parties made
a crisis imminent, and such hostile glances, such threatening words were
exchanged, that the prince, finding himself too weak to contend against
his enemies, wrote the same evening to his mother, telling her that he
was about to leave a country where from his infancy upwards he had
experienced nothing but deceit and disaster.

Those who know a mother's heart will easily guess that Elizabeth of
Poland was no sooner aware of the danger that threatened her son than she
travelled to Naples, arriving there before her coming was suspected.
Rumour spread abroad that the Queen of Hungary had come to take her son
away with her, and the unexpected event gave rise to strange comments:
the fever of excitement now blazed up in another direction. The Empress
of Constantinople, the Catanese, her two daughters, and all the
courtiers, whose calculations were upset by Andre's departure, hurried to