BERNARDO TANUCCI.

85

thirty-five years old. Simple and unassuming in hismanners and appearance, he had acquired a just reputation^ior integrity and wisdom, far above any of his cotempora-ries in the legal profession. Don Carlos named him,“auditor” of the army and councillor of state. It is notfor me to recount here the particulars of the campaignwhich terminated in the expulsion of the Austrians fromNaples; the crowning of Don Carlos as king; and hisconquest of Sicily . This island had, in 1718, been wrestedfrom the Spaniards, through the assistance of an English fleet commanded by Admiral Byng . After the ceremony ofa coronation at Palermo, Charles returned to Naples, wherehe seriously commenced the reform of innumerable abuses.The king, or rather his all-influential councillor Tanucci,began with the laws and courts of justice. Naples was atthat time cursed with eleven different codes of law, the ancientRoman ; the Longobardian; the Norman ; the Suabian ;the Anjouian ; the Aragonese ; the Austro-Spanish ; theAustro-German; the Feudal ; the Ecclesiastical, whichruled the huge foul mass of priests and their inordinatepossessions, and the Greek of the eastern empire, whichlatter had more or less hold on the prejudices and practiceof the cities of Naples, Amalfi, Gaeta, and other maritimeplaces, which had been governed by prefects of theEmperors of Constantinople . Besides these various legisla-tions, there was an unwritten law, such as we of Englandare cursed with; founded on the caprice and dicta of thejudges for the time being.

Many good ancient usages prevailed, somewhat ana_logous to those attributed to the British Alfred. A judge,in every district ; a tribunal in every province ; three in everycity, but the confusion of laws was a perpetual bar to justice,and the number of lawyers hatched from the chaotic massof confused and uncertain legislation, and preying on the