and during their stay introduced much of the tropical vegetation which we still admire.  They were finally driven away by the insurgent natives in A.D. 975, but they left the impress of their occupation in many Arabic words which still mark the local patois; and as a number of the fugitives were captured and reduced to slavery, intermarrying in the course of time with the native population, the Moorish type is still very noticeable amongst the peasantry.  Freed from the Saracenic yoke, the Nicois lived in peace for nearly two centuries, being only disturbed from time to time by the unwelcome visitations of pirates.  Later on, toward the middle of the thirteenth century, like most other Southern and Italian cities, Nice fell a victim to the constant quarrels of the powerful families allied respectively to the Ghibelline and Guelphic factions.  Thus, the incessant broils between the Lascaris of Tenda, the Grimaldis of Monaco and the Dorias of Dolceacqua desolated the surrounding country, and often reduced the city to a state of siege.  The Nicois were compelled to keep up a perpetual guerilla, which, however inspiriting, was by no means conducive to their material prosperity.  In 1364 an invasion of locusts from Africa led to a famine, and ultimately a plague which destroyed two-thirds of the population.  The people, attributing their misfortunes to the intercession of the Jews with the powers below, rose up and massacred them:  only five Israelites out of over two thousand are said to have escaped their blind fury.  When order was at last re-established, and the Nicois began to settle down again, they perceived their impoverished and subordinate position to be so alarming that their only chance of safety was immediately to place themselves under the protection of the dukes of Savoy, who for a century and a half defended them from the attacks of their numerous enemies in a most valiant manner.  But in 1521, Francis I. of France wrenched the city and province from the beneficent rule of the Savoyards and proclaimed himself count of Nice.  In 1524 war broke out between Francis and the emperor Charles V., and the contending armies alternately devastated and pillaged Nice and its environs.  The pest reappeared, and with it a drought and famine of so fearful a character that many thousand persons perished, and others in their despair slew themselves.  Pope Paul III. undertook the difficult task of reconciling the belligerents, and even went so far as to travel to Nice for the purpose.  A marble cross which gives its name to a suburb of the town ("La Croix de Marbre”) still marks the spot where the conference took place in which Francis and Charles swore a peace in the presence of His Holiness which they took the first opportunity to violate.  In 1540 the war recommenced, and a number of dissolute young men of good family formed themselves into organized companies of bandits and overran the country, to the terror of the wretched peasantry and the utter ruin of many