Page:Val d'Arno (Ruskin, 1890).djvu/228

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196
VAL D'ARNO.

put to death before his eyes. And among the pieces of heraldry most significant in the middle ages, the asp on the shield of the Guelphic viscounts is to be much remembered by you as a sign of this merciless cruelty of mistaken religion; mistaken, but not in the least hypocritical. It has perfect confidence in itself, and can answer with serenity for all its deeds. The serenity of heart never appears in the guilty Infidels; they die in despair or gloom, greatly satisfactory to adverse religious minds.

235. The French Pope, then, Urban of Troyes, had sent for Charles of Anjou; who would not have answered his call, even with all the strength of Anjou and Provence, had not Scylla of the Tyrrhene Sea been on his side. Pisa, with eighty galleys, (the Sicilian fleet added to her own,) watched and defended the coasts of Rome. An irresistible storm drove her fleet to shelter; and Charles, in a single ship, reached the mouth of the Tiber, and found lodgings at Rome in the convent of St. Paul. His wife meanwhile spent her dowry in increasing his land army, and led it across the Alps. How he had got his wife, and her dowry, we must hear in Villani's words, as nearly as I can give their