coronation here at Westminster of the Conqueror,) they gathered their scattered forces at Aversa,[1] 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.
I will not spoil, by abstracting, the magnificent following history of Robert Guiscard, the most wonderful soldier of that or any other time: I leave you to finish it for yourselves, only asking you to read together with it, the sketch, in Turner's history of the Anglo-Saxons, of Alfred's long previous war with the Norman Hasting; pointing out to you for foci of character in each
- ↑ In Lombardy, south of Pavia.
