OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE 181 memory of his father might recommend him to the Normans ; and he had already engaged their voluntary service to quell the revolt of Maniaces, and to avenge their own and the public in- jury. It was the design of Constantine to transplant this warlike colony from the Italian provinces to the Persian war ; and the son of Melo distributed among the chiefs the gold and manu- factures of Greece, as the first fruits of the Imperial bounty. But his arts were baffled by the sense and spirit of the conquerors of Apulia : his gifts, or at least his proposals, were rejected ; and they unanimously refused to relinquish their possessions and their hopes for the distant prospect of Asiatic fortune. After the means of persuasion had failed, Argyrus resolved to Leajne of the compel or to destroy : the Latin powers were solicited asrainst two empires. AD 1019-1054 the common enemy : and an offensive alliance was formed of the pope and the two emperors of the East and West. The throne of St. Peter was occupied by Leo the Ninth, a simple saint,^! of a temper most apt to deceive himself and the world, and whose venerable character Avould conseci'ate with the name of piety the measures least compatible with the practice of re- ligion. His humanity was affected by the complaints, perhaps the calumnies, of an injured people ; the impious Normans had inten-upted the payment of tithes ; and the temporal sword might be lawfully unsheathed against the sacrilegious ro])bers, who were deaf to the censures of the church. As a (lerman of noble birth and royal kindred, Leo had free access to the court and confidence of the emperor Henry the Third ; and in search of arms and allies his ardent zeal transported him from Apulia to Saxony, from the Elbe to the Tiber. During these hostile preparations, Argyrus indulged himself in the use of secret and guilty weapons ; a crowd of Normans became the victims of public or private revenge ; and the valiant Drogo was murdered ad. 105 in a church. But his spirit survived in his brother Humphrey, the third count of Apulia. The assassins were chastised ; and the son of Melo, overthrown and wounded, was driven from the viii. p. 426) very properly reads, or interprets, Sevesta/us, the title of Sebastos or Augustus. But in his Antiquities, he was taught by Ducange to make it a palatine office, master of the wardrobe. ■*^ A life of St. Leo IX., deeply tinged with the passions and prejudices of the age, has been composed by Wibert, printed at Paris, 1615, in octavo, and since inserted in the Collections of the Bollandists, of Mabillon, and of Muratori. [J. May, Untersuchungen iiber die .Abfassungszeit und Glaubwiirdigheit von Wiberts Vita Leonis IX. (Offenburg, 1889).] The public and private history of that pope is diligently treated by M. de St. Marc (Abr(5g(5, torn. ii. p. 140-210, and p. 25-95, second column).
