Page:Val d'Arno (Ruskin, 1890).djvu/233

for England; but the good romeo's match-making ended ill for it; and for Rome, and Naples also. For Beatrice of Provence resolved to be a queen like her three sisters, and was the prompting spirit of Charles's expedition to Italy. She was crowned with him, Queen of Apulia and Sicily, on the day of the Epiphany, 1265; she and her husband bringing gifts that day of magical power enough; and Charles, as soon as the feast of coronation was over, set out to give battle to Manfred and his Saracens. "And this Charles," says Villani, "was wise, and of sane counsel; and of prowess in arms, and fierce, and much feared and redoubted by all the kings in the world;—magnanimous and of high purposes; fearless in the carrying forth of every great enterprise; firm in every adversity; a verifier of his every word; speaking little,—doing much; and scarcely ever laughed, and then but a little; sincere, and without flaw, as a religious and catholic person; stern in justice, and fierce in look; tall and nervous in person, olive coloured, and with a large nose, and well he appeared a royal majesty more than other men. Much he watched, and little he slept; and used to say that so much time as one slept, one lost;