MARRIAGE OF BONA WITH SIGISMUND. 81

education of her daughter Bona, and to the good of her subjects, by whom she was so much beloved that the city voluntarily gave up part of their dues to her.*

In 1517 Bona was married by proxy to Sigismund, King of Poland, and the magnificence of her entry into Naples, where she met the Polish Ambassadors, astonished the Neapolitans. She was married on the 6th of December, and afterwards there was a grand banquet, at which she presided, dressed in blue Venetian satin covered with bees in beaten gold, and her cap all covered with pearls and precious stones. The banquet lasted nine hours, from two in the afternoon till eleven at night, and Giuliano Passero in his giornale gives a quaint list of the dishes.†

* Deliberazione decurionale del di 30 Marzo 1513.

In primis pignolata in quattro con natte, et attonata jelatina.

Insalata d'herbe.

Lo bollito, et bianco magnare con mostrada con l'ordine suo.

Li coppi di picciune.

Lo arrusto ordinario con mirrausto, et salza de vino agro.

Le pizze sfogliate.

Lo bollito salvaggio con putaggio ungaresco, et preparata.

Li pasticci de carne.

La pagoni con sua salza.

Le pizze fiorentine.

Lo arrusto salvaggio, et strangolapreiti.

Le pasticcelle de carne,

La zuppa nauma.

On the 26th of December Queen Bona left Naples for Manfredonia, whence she embarked on the 3rd of February, and reached Cracow on the 10th of April, 1518, where the King received her with great pomp and another banquet, which lasted eight hours. Isabella of Arragon died in 1524, leaving the Duchy to her daughter, who, when left a widow in 1548, insisted, in spite of the entreaties of her son and daughters, on returning to Bari. Here she held a brilliant court frequented by learned men and artists; among the former was Scipione Ammirato, who spent some time with her, on his way from Lecce to Florence. Queen Bona died in November, 1558, and bequeathed the Duchy of Bari and its appurtenances to Philip II., King of Spain and Naples.

Lo arrusto de fasani.

Almongiavare.

Li capuni copierti.

Le pizze bianche, et appresso gelatina ingotti.

Conigli con suo sapore.

Li guanti.

Le starne con lemoncelli sane.

Li pasticci di cotogne.

Le pizze pagonazze.

Le pasticcelle di zucchero.

Le tartelle.

Alla tavola della signora Regina fo fontana de adure, fo misso

castagne di zuccaro con lo scacchiero, le nevole, et procassa, Levaro la prima tavola, e l'aqua a mano di buon odore,

Confietti.

CH

Coin of Bari.

CHAPTER VII.

BARI AND ITS NEIGHBOURHOOD.

WE went to Bari full of hope, as whenever we had hinted elsewhere that a room might be swept out or a table-cloth washed, we were told, "Ah! you should see Bari; Paris is nothing in comparison. Here we are only provincials; wait till you get to Bari." It was the sole place where the hotel was really bad and the beds inhabited; the people, too, are not at all" simpatici," as the Italians say, and it was the only town where I was pestered by beggars. No fish was to be had, which, remembering Horace's "Bari moenia piscosi, we thought rather hard.

But the priory of San Niccolò da Bari amply repaid any small inconvenience. It is an immense building like a fortress, with its big towers guarding each side of the west front. The doorway is flanked by two elegant pillars resting on queer monsters, which support the usual pointed hood. On either side of the doorway stands a fine column, taken from some classical building and used merely as an ornament. The interior of the church is very picturesque; divided into three aisles by columns of perfectly classical design, the side aisles vaulted, while the centre one is spanned by immense arches at irregular distances, built, they told me, at various periods to support the roof which had suffered in successive earthquakes. A gallery runs all round the centre aisle, and the ceiling is painted and richly gilt. Behind the high altar is the tomb of Queen Bona, executed many years after her death in 1593, by order of her youngest daughter, Anna Jagellona, wife of Stephen I. of Poland. On a sarcophagus of black marble kneels the Queen in prayer and a female figure above life-size stands on either side, one with a royal crown representing Poland, the other with a ducal crown, Bari. In niches behind are figures of St. Stanislas and St. Nicholas.

THE PRIORY OF SAN NICCOLÒ DA BARI. 85

Three thrones also stand behind the altar, the oldest said to have been used by Roger on his coronation. Another is for the King, who by right is the first canon of the church, and the most remarkable one is the state throne of the prior, supported by three crouching human figures and a lion with a Saracen's head between his paws.

But who can describe the crypt! Pillars, apparently innumerable, with capitals richly carved in every conceivable design, glowing colour with dark shadows, and devout kneeling figures, made a picture not easily forgotten. The original pavement has been raised on account of infiltrations from the sea, so that the twenty-eight pillars appear to spring straight out of the ground. One of them is in a cage of iron bars to prevent the devout from scraping and filing it away to nothing. The legend runs that St. Nicholas turned it into iron, but I could not find out what his object was.

The silver altar, underneath which lie, or rather swim, in the " Manna di San Niccolò," the bones of the Saint, was made by Domenico Marinelli in 1684, and replaced the one given by Urosius, "King of Rascia, Dioclea, Albania, Bulgaria, and all the coast of the Adriatic as far as the Danube," about 1319, which was probably melted down, as well as the lamps, candlesticks,