The precise birth-place of the greatest man of the middle ages is unknown; neither have any records come down to us of his education, nor any particulars of those early years which are generally ornamented by the imagination of after biographers, even when the subject of their writing has left his infancy in obscurity. Eginhard, who possessed the best means of knowledge, frankly avows that he was himself ignorant; and the manuscript of a contemporary author, whose propensity to anecdote gives a value to his details, which neither the style of his composition, nor the accuracy of his statements, could bestow, is defective in that part which might have afforded some information, however vague, regarding the youth of Charlemagne. The year of his birth, however, as ascertained by computation from other data, seems undoubtedly to have been AD 742, about seven years before his father, Pepin the Brief, assumed the name of King.

His mother was Bertha, daughter of Charibert, Count of Laon; and concerning her early union with Pepin, a thousand pleasant fables have supplied the place of all accurate information. Although one of the papal epistles to Charlemagne insinuates that Pepin at one time contemplated a separation from Bertha, for the purpose of marrying another woman, it is evident that she was loved and honored by her husband, from the fact of her having shared in the new and solemn spectacle by which Pepin attempted to consecrate, in the eyes of the people, his usurpation of the supreme authority.

To the forms usually observed on the accession of a new monarch of the Francs, Pepin added various ceremonies which had never before been used in Gaul. Amongst these, the most striking, from its novelty, was the unction which bad been instituted for the kings of Israel, and which was readily performed for the Frankish usurper by the famous Boniface, Archbishop of Metz. In all the solemnities which dignified the elevation of her husband, Bertha was a partaker; and many have been the laborious struggles of historians to discover, or invent, various complex and political motives for so very natural an occurrence; but it would seem, that the simple desire of distinctly marking that his personal elevation to the royal station implied the elevation of his whole family, and the permanence of the kingly office in his race, was the sole view of the new sovereign of the Francs. The influence which she exercised over her husband, and the reverence which her children always displayed towards her, render it probable that to Bertha herself was entrusted the early education of Charlemagne. Still it is greatly to be regretted, that we do not possess any details of the tuition under which the mind of that prince put forth, between infancy and manhood, those grand and splendid qualities which, hidden in the darkness that overhangs his youth, shine out immediately on his accession to the throne, like the rising of a tropical day, which, we are told, bursts forth at once in its splendor, unannounced by the slow progress of the dawning twilight.

Nevertheless, although nothing is known of the minute particulars either of his domestic instruction or his early habits, there was a grander species of education to which he was subject, and of which we have better means of judging: I mean the education of circumstances. It is a common influence of troublous times, not alone to bring forward, but to form great intellect. The familiarity with scenes of danger and excitement—the early exercise of thought upon great and difficult subjects—the habit of supporting, encountering, and vanquishing, the very proximity of mighty schemes and mighty changes,—must necessarily give expansion, vigor, and activity, to every faculty of the mind, as much as robust exercises and habitual hardships strengthen and improve the body. In the midst of such uncertain and eventful times, and surrounded by such grand and animating circumstances, was passed the youth of Charlemagne, and though we cannot discover whether paternal or maternal care afforded the means of cultivating his intellect or directing his pursuits, to a mind naturally great and comprehensive, like his own, the world was a sufficient school—the events by which he was surrounded sufficient instructors.

CORONATION OF HIS FATHER

The first act performed before his eyes was the consummation of all his ancestor’s ambitious glory, by the mighty daring of his own father: and this instance of the ease with which great deeds are achieved by great minds, was a practical lesson and a powerful incitement. The first act of his own life—a task which combined both dignity and beneficence—was to meet, as deputy for his father, the suppliant chief of the Roman church, and to conduct him with honor to the monarch’s presence. The event in which he thus took part, and which afterwards affected the current of his whole existence, originated in the unhappy state of Rome, which I have before slightly noticed, and in the continual and increasing pressure of the Lombards upon that unstable republic which had arisen in Italy, after its separation from the empire of the East. The second and third Gregory had in vain implored the personal succor of Charles Martel to defend the Roman territory from the hostile designs of their encroaching neighbors; and Zacharias, who had succeeded to the authority and difficulties of those two pontiffs, had equally petitioned Pepin for some more effectual aid than remonstrances addressed to the dull ear of ambition, and menaces which began to be despised.

Under Stephen, who followed Zacharias, and ascended the papal chair soon after the elevation of Pepin to the sovereign power, the danger of Rome became still more imminent; for Astolphus, the Lombard King, contemning alike the threats of an avenger who did not appear, and the exhortations of a priest who had no means of resistance, imposed an immense tribute on the citizens of Rome, and prepared to enforce the payment by arms. But by this time the popes or bishops of Rome had established a stronger claim upon the rulers of France than that which they had formerly possessed. The instability of Pepin’s title to the crown, had made him eager to add a fictitious authority to the mutable right of popular election; and, having, as we have before seen, joined to the voice of the people the sanction of the Pope, he divided between two, a debt which might have been dangerous or burdensome while in the hands of one. By this means, however, he gave to the Roman pontiffs a claim and a power; and Stephen now resolved to exert it in the exigency of his country.

In the moment of immediate danger, when Rome was threatened by hostile armies, and her fields swept by invading barbarians, the prelate, with a worthy boldness, set out from the ancient queen of empires, as a suppliant, determined to apply, first for justice and immunity at the court of Astolphus, the King of the Lombards, and, in case of rejection, then for protection and vengeance, at the hands of the new monarch of the Francs. Astolphus was deaf to all petitions, and despised all threats. Ravenna had fallen, and Rome he had determined to subdue. But the Pope pursued his way in haste; and, traversing the Alps, set his foot with joy on the territories of a friend and an ally. The French monarch was then returning from one of his victorious expeditions against the Saxons; and the messengers from Stephen met him on the banks of the Moselle.

The most common of all accusations against the human heart, and, I might add, against the human mind, is ingratitude. But in an uncivilized state of society, where rights are less protected, and mankind depend more on the voluntary reciprocation of individual benefits and assistance, than on fixed rules and a uniform government, the possession of such emotions as gratitude and generosity, would seem to be more necessarily considered as a virtue, and the want of them more decidedly as a crime, than in periods or in countries, where the exertions of each man is sufficient for his own support, and the law is competent to the protection of all.

CHARLES SENT TO WELCOME STEPHEN II ON HIS ARRIVAL IN FRANCE

Besides a feeling of obligation towards the Roman pontiffs, which the new sovereign did not hesitate a moment to acknowledge and obey, the call of the Pope was perfectly consonant to Pepin’s views and disposition, as a man, a king, and a warrior. To welcome the Bishop of Rome, therefore, the monarch instantly dispatched his eldest son Charles, then scarcely twelve years of age, and every honor was paid to the head of the Catholic church that reverence or gratitude could inspire.

This is the first occasion on which we find Charlemagne mentioned in history; but the children of the Francs were trained in their very early years to robust and warlike exercises; and there is every reason to believe that great precocity, both of bodily and mental powers, fitted the prince for the office which was entrusted to him by his father.

From the distinction with which Pepin received the prelate, and from the bold and candid character of that monarch, little doubt can exist that he at once determined to protect the Roman state from the exacting monarch of the Lombards, by the effectual and conclusive interposition of arms. The King of the Francs, however, had still something to demand at the hands of the Pope; and the remonstrance of Astolphus, who pleaded hard by his envoys against the proposed interference, raised Pepin to the character of umpire and judge, enhanced the value of his mediation, and gave him a claim, not likely to be rejected, for some return on the part of Stephen. In regard to many of the particular circumstances of this time, contemporary historians are silent; and Anastasius, who lived at a later period, when the papal power had obtained, in a great measure, the ascendancy which it so long possessed, is so evidently incorrect in regard to several of the numerous details he gives, that great caution is necessary in receiving his account.

CHARLEMAGNE IS CROWNED WITH HIS FATHER

With those anxious fears for the stability of his authority which must always attend usurpation, Pepin eagerly sought every means of strengthening his title to the throne of France; and, not content with the pontifical sanction already given, determined on obtaining from the Pope, during his visit of supplication, some new act of recognition and consecration. On a positive promise of aid from the monarch of the Francs, Stephen formally absolved him for the breach of his oath of allegiance to Childeric; and repeated the ceremony of his coronation in the church of St Denis. Nor were precautions wanting, to guard against any future exercise of the same popular power, which had snatched the crown from one monarch, and bestowed it on another. The Pope launched his anathema at all those who should attempt to deprive the Carolingian line of the throne they had assumed; and Charles and Carloman, the two sons of Pepin, were crowned together with their parents, by the hands of the Roman pontiff.

As he had chosen by the papal sanction to prop his authority, originally raised upon the sandy foundation of popular election, the French monarch was of course moved by every principle of prudence, as well as by the remembrance of his promise, to strengthen and support the Roman church. Almost immediately on the arrival of the Pope, Pepin dispatched messengers to Astolphus, requiring him to abandon his demands upon the city of Rome, and to cease his aggressions on the Roman territory. Astolphus refused to comply; but, as he well knew the power of the Frankish nation, he sought to avert the storm which threatened him before he prepared to encounter it. Carloman, the brother of Pepin, who had resigned his inheritance in France, abandoned the world, and sought the best desire of human nature, peace, in the shade of the cloister, was at that time dwelling in a monastery, within the limits of the Lombard dominions. The eye of Astolphus immediately fell upon him, as a fit messenger to his brother; and he was compelled by the orders of his abbot to journey into France, and to oppose, at the court of the French monarch, the wishes and designs of the pontiff.

A custom, which must be more particularly noticed hereafter, existed at this time amongst the Francs, of determining upon war or peace, at the great assembly of the nation, in what was called a Champ de Mars; and though the Maires of the Palace had frequently violated this ancient institution, Pepin, who courted popularity, called upon his people, in almost all instances, to sanction any warfare he was about to undertake.

In the present case, where greater and more important interests were involved, he did not fail to add the consent of the nation to his own determination; and, at the Champ de Mars, held after his coronation, he announced to the nobles of the land his resolution of defending Rome from her enemies by force of arms. In the same assembly, his brother Carloman is said to have remonstrated publicly against this purpose; but the assertion is founded on the faith of after historians, whose evidence is doubtful, if not inadmissible. In the dim obscurity which hangs over these far ages, the more important facts only appear distinct; and those which are clearly known, in regard to the transactions of which we speak, are simply, that the nobles of France, concurred completely in the views of the king, and that Pepin marched with an immense army towards the frontiers of Italy; leaving Bertha, his wife, and Carloman, his brother, at Vienne, in Dauphiny, where Carloman died before the monarch’s return from his Italian expedition.

THE OPPRESSION OF THE LOMBARDS

The Lombards, warned of the approaching invasion, immediately occupied the passes of that mountain barrier, which nature has placed for the defence of the Italian peninsula. A battle was fought amongst the hills; the Lombards were defeated; and the Francs poured down into the ancient territories of the Romans. Pepin marched forward with that bold celerity, which distinguished all his race; and at once laid siege to Pavia, within the walls of which Astolphus had taken refuge. The war was carried on by the Francs with all the unsparing activity of a barbarous nation: and, while the Lombard capital was invested on all sides, bands of plunderers were spread over the country to ravage, pillage, and destroy.

Astolphus at length submitted to the power he was in no condition to resist; and, opening a negotiation with Pepin, he agreed to yield the exarchate, and the Pentapolis, which the monarch of the Francs had pledged himself to reannex to the territories of Rome. Forty distinguished hostages were given to ensure the performance of the treaty; and Pepin retired from Italy, satisfied that he had compelled the restitution of possessions which had been unjustly withheld.

Perhaps the most important point of discussion in the history of the middle ages is now before us, and one, in regard to which, a greater variety of different opinions has been offered and maintained, than any other question has elicited. The formal and distinct connection of the exarchate of Ravenna, and the territories of the Pentapolis, with the Roman domains, forms the basis of the temporal throne of the Popes, and, consequently, has been a subject of warm contestation in all its parts, between the friends and the enemies of the Romish church.

It is neither necessary nor fitting here, to state even the most prominent of the many conclusions to which authors have come upon this question; nor to endeavor to refute errors or correct mistakes, farther than by a simple statement of the ascertained facts, and a few deductions from them.

When Italy threw off the dominion of the Emperors of the East, its language was more submissive than its actions; and the authority of the empire was acknowledged long after its arms were resisted, and its power was at an end. As some sort of government, however, was absolutely necessary, the Romans, as I have already stated, recalled many of the forms of the old republic, and though tacitly submitting to their Popes, or Bishops, who led, counseled, and protected them, they still, as a senate and people, named their own governors, and entrusted that portion of their freedom which they were obliged to sacrifice for defence, to whomsoever their own wisdom or necessities might dictate. The office of exarch, which had been instituted by the Emperors for the government of their Italian provinces, was still continued by the Roman people as a means of obtaining protection; and the persons who filled it were by them elected, under the names, which had become synonymous, of Exarch or Patrician.

By fraud or violence, and probably by both, the Lombards, who had first armed in defence of the Romans against the Emperors, took possession of Ravenna and its dependencies; but the Popes never ceased to claim that territory, originally in behalf of the Roman people, and ultimately in the name of the Roman church.

UNION OF THE EXARCHATE AND PENTAPOLIS TO ROME

The rulers of the Francs, beginning with Charles Martel, had been successively elected by the senate and people of Rome to the post of Patrician, or Exarch; and, consequently, were bound, by the fact of accepting that office, to maintain the integrity of the Roman territory. Pepin, therefore, in his expedition against Astolphus, was only fulfilling one of the duties of the exarchonate, and reannexed the recovered tract to the rest of the appendages of Rome, rather as an act of restitution, than of donation. As the separation of Italy from the empire of the East had originated in an ecclesiastical dispute, the interests of the state became identified with that of the church. Gradually, in after ages, the Popes acquired the supreme power over the whole territory; and, anxious to find a title of more weight than mere possession, they assumed that the act of Pepin was the gift of a province, conquered by the Frankish king, directly bestowed upon the see of Rome, rather than a successful campaign of the exarch for the recovery of a province belonging to the republic. They afterwards attempted to support this pretence by a supposititious donation of a part at least of the same district by Constantine; and the Pontiff, in their letters, alluded more and more strongly, as the progress of years obscure the memory of realities, to fictitious rights which fictitious gifts had created.

Whatever was the nature of Pepin’s restoration of the Exarchate and Pentapolis, the terms in which it was expressed were verbal; and even in the famous letter of Pope Adrian to Charlemagne, wherein he boldly declares the donation of Constantine, which was supposed to have taken place in remote and indistinct times, he touches most tenderly upon those after gifts of the same territory which were subject to immediate examination and refutation.

Individual ambition continually defeats its purpose by hurrying too rapidly towards its object; but a number of men, in long succession, conducting a permanent establishment, in which their own personal interests are entirely merged, often acquire a fearful superiority to those around them, by the calm regularity of their progress in advance, and the passionless caution by which they secure each advantage as it is obtained. The march of the papal power was slow and gradual. The Exarchate was reannexed to Rome; the Pontiffs subsequently chose to believe it bestowed upon the church, and on that hypothesis founded their temporal dominion, while, by similar means, they extended the limits of their spiritual authority. Nevertheless events, which will soon come under review, will show that the monarchs of the Francs looked upon the whole transaction in a different light, and considered all the temporal, and part even of the ecclesiastical, power in the provinces which they had restored to Rome, as still vested in themselves in their quality of Patrician, or Exarch. Although the youth of the Frankish nation were often permitted to bear arms at a very early period of life, it does not appear whether Charlemagne did, or did not, accompany his father in the first expedition against the Lombards. Several years follow, in the records of that period, without mention of the future monarch. During that lapse of time, Pepin again invaded Lombardy, in order to enforce the execution of the treaty which Astolphus had entered into the year before, and which he had unscrupulously broken, as soon as the sword of the Franc was withdrawn from his throat. The Lombard king was again driven to submission, and forced to begin the restitution which was demanded; but he did not live to complete it; and, after his death, which took place in consequence of a fall from his horse, Desiderius, who had commanded a part of his troops, was elected King of the Lombards, by the influence and support both of Pepin and the Pope,—a subject of which I must necessarily speak more hereafter.

In the mean time, Charlemagne continued to advance towards manhood. Successive wars, the fruits of a barbarous and unsettled state of society, where rights were undetermined, and law was in its infancy, afforded a continual school for the acquisition of that military knowledge and that corporeal strength, which, in those times, supplied the place of science in government, and talent in command. Early taught by his father all that was then known of warfare as an art, Charlemagne had but too frequent opportunities of gaining practical experience. It is more than probable, from the known habits of his nation, that he accompanied his father in most of his campaigns; but the first occasion on which he is decidedly stated by the chronicles to have followed the King to any of the many military expeditions which consumed the reign and the talents of Pepin, was on the renewal of the war with Waifar, Duke of Aquitaine, whose ambitious turbulence neither clemency could calm, nor punishment repress.

WAR IN AQUITAINE

This struggle with the Dukes of Aquitaine, which continued with greater or less activity during two hundred years, is worthy of some attention. At that time, as already remarked, the right of succession was, in most cases, vague and undefined, and in none more so than in the transmission of the crown. Indeed, there are many reasons for believing that the chiefs of the Francs were originally elective, t as was the case also with the Lombards,  and that the royal office became hereditary by the progress of gradual innovation and customary submission. However this might be, it seems clear, that the Dukes of Aquitaine had some immediate connection with the Merovingian Kings of France, and some collateral claim upon the throne itself—the existence of which claim and connection, has caused much greater disputes amongst the antiquaries of modern times, than it did amongst the princes of their own day.

It does not appear, in any degree, that this title was put forth, or considered of consequence, in the times to which this book refers. Pepin was seated safely on the throne; the Dukes of Aquitaine are never found to have disputed his right; and their consanguinity with the Merovingian Kings would be unworthy attention, were it not necessary to show, that they stood in a different relationship to the French monarchs from the other dukes or governors of provinces, and claimed the territory they possessed, not indeed as independent sovereigns, but as hereditary, though subordinate princes, holding their feof,—or beneficium, as it was called under some circumstances,—not by the will of the reigning monarch, but in right of clear descent.

On various occasions, the Merovingian Kings themselves endeavored to restrict the power of the Dukes of Aquitaine to the same limits as that enjoyed by the simple governors of a province; and the charter of Charles the Bald expressly states, many years afterwards, that they only possessed the duchy of Aquitaine in the name of the Kings of France. Nevertheless, it is beyond doubt, that Dagobert, to end the continual claims of the children of his brother Charibert, granted to his nephews the whole of Aquitaine as a perpetual lordship, on condition of tribute and homage; which is the first clear instance of a direct hereditary feof. Standing thus in a position totally different from that of any other of the French noble of the time, the Dukes of Aquitaine were continually trying the new and unascertained power which they held, against the monarchs by whom it had been conceded, and still more frequently against the maires of the palace, who afterwards governed in their name.

In the time of Charles Martel, Eudes, Duke of Aquitaine, was constantly in revolt, whatever phantom king shadowed the Merovingian throne; and all the moderation of the hero of that age, could never bind the turbulent prince to his alliance, nor all the exercise of his tremendous power, awe him to obedience and to peace. Continually defeated, Eudes still rose from his temporary submission, and, the moment that the presence of his conqueror was removed, allied himself to anyone who would aid him in the breach of those promises and treaties which fear and necessity had alone extorted. Charles, on the contrary, still triumphed and forgave; and, although the Duke of Aquitaine had even leagued with the Saracens, at once the enemies of his faith and his country, their defeat was followed by his pardon.

After the death of Eudes, the same turbulent spirit descended with the inheritance; and, though the territories he left were divided between his three sons, the rulers of the French found that the enmity of the Dukes of Aquitaine was transmitted entire. Hunald, who, as eldest of the three, had received Aquitaine for his portion, was soon forced to submit, by Charles Martel, and did homage, not to the Kings of France, but to the Maire of the Palace. Yet the spirit of revolt subsisted still; and no sooner had death unnerved the hand of the victor, than Hunald was once more in arms, plundering the provinces of Pepin and Carloman. Again subdued, the courage of the Duke sank. Remorse for having blinded his brother Hatton, operated, together with superstition and disappointment, to give him a temporary disgust to the world; and, resigning his territories to his son Waifar, he retired into the cloister,

No greater degree of tranquility accrued to France from this change in the government of Aquitaine; for Waifar proved still more rebellious and turbulent than his predecessor; and Pepin had soon to take arms, in order to put an end to his incursions. Several of these expeditions against Aquitaine are mentioned in the chronicles of the time; but that in which Charlemagne first appears in a military character, is marked as having been preceded by two years of peace,—an extraordinary duration of tranquility, in times when the scepter ever implied the sword.

The nominal cause of warfare, on the present occasion, was the plunder of church property by Waifar; and, on the approach of Pepin, the Duke promised immediate restitution, at the same time giving hostages for his future conduct. In those days, falsehood seems to have been sufficiently frequent to teach caution to the most unsuspecting; yet credulity—always a quality of an infant state of society—was carried to a very extraordinary height. Pepin, after having been repeatedly deceived, again trusted his rebellious subject; and Waifar, who, by his apparent submission, had alone sought to gain time for preparation, forgot his promises as soon as he could collect an army; threw off his allegiance; and, adding outrage to revolt, advanced into the territories of France, ravaging the country with fire and sword.

But the vengeance of the monarch was prompt and powerful. Accompanied by his eldest son, Pepin took the field, entered Aquitaine at the head of immense forces, and, with rapidity almost incredible, subdued the whole province, from Auvergne to Limoges. Here Charlemagne had one of those examples of grand and extraordinary celerity in the movement of immense armies, which he afterwards so often practiced himself with magnificent success. In the course of a very few weeks, many hundred miles of an enemy’s territory were conquered. Speed set preparation at defiance, and surprise changed resistance into terror. In this, as in almost all other wars, the people were made the expiatory sacrifice, to atone for the faults of their rulers. Blood and flame wrapped one of the finest districts in France, and ruin and destruction marked the consequences of the vassals’ revolt, and the vengeance of the sovereign.

DEATH OF REMISTAN

During four years Pepin pursued the war against Aquitaine, displaying many instances of extreme clemency and extreme rigor, the causes of which dissimilarity of conduct, at different times, must remain in darkness; as the chronicles of that age do not explain the motives, and the historians of after years have only substituted hypotheses for facts. The greater part of the revolted country at length submitted, and Remistan, the uncle of Waifar, himself joined the party of the king, and bound himself, by the most solemn oaths, to aid the monarch as a vassal and a friend. His engagements, though voluntary, were as frail as those of the rest of his family and but a short time elapsed before he was again in arms against the sovereign who had trusted him, pursuing his designs with all the acrimonious virulence of conscious treachery.

The territory of Limoges and Bourges, where Pepin had built himself a palace, and established his residence, was ravaged by the orders of this faithless ally; and, not content with simple aggression, Remistan had the criminal boldness to appear, with hostile purposes, within sight of the monarch he had insulted, and the friend he had betrayed.

The fate he courted soon overtook him. Not long after he had presented himself before Bourges, he was taken in an ambush laid by some of the officers of the king, and was brought bound into the royal presence.

The character of Pepin might doubtless have derived a fictitious air of magnanimity in the eyes of after ages, from a display of clemency on this occasion; but it can hardly be denied, that mercy to Remistan, after the gross treachery he had committed, and the blood he had caused to flow, would have been anything but mercy to the rest of France.

The justice of his execution, which has been denied, depended upon whether he maintained rights as an independent monarch, and was a conquered king, rather than an arrested subject. The fact, however, is clear, that, whatever were his original claims to royalty, his ancestors had renounced them in a thousand instances; and also that, whatever force had been used to compel that renunciation on their part, he himself had acknowledged voluntarily the sovereignty of Pepin, and had actually served him as his liegeman. Unless, therefore, rights are to be looked upon as mere matters of caprice, and obedience to an established government is to be granted and withdrawn, at the pleasure of each individual, Remistan was in reality the treacherous and revolted vassal of the French king; and, while his pardon would have been an act of folly, his punishment was but a deed of justice.

No clemency was shown: Remistan was instantly condemned and hung; and the war of Aquitaine was soon after terminated for the time, by the death of Waifar, who appears to have been slain by the hands of his attendants, probably instigated by Pepin himself. On this point, it is true, we have no certain information, the only passage in the ancient chronicles which hints at the agency of the French monarch in the death of his rebellious vassal, leaving the matter still as a doubtful report.

Such means of destroying an enemy were but too common at that period; and, though the frequency of the fact can in no degree be brought forward to justify or even palliate a great moral offence, it at all events gives more probability to the rumor of its having been committed.

Pepin had many motives for seeking to bring the war in Aquitaine to as speedy a conclusion as possible, amongst which was the defection of Tassilo, Duke of Bavaria, who, but a short time before, had sworn allegiance to him, and acknowledged himself in the most solemn manner a vassal of the crown of France. The precise duties which he took upon himself by this oath and acknowledgment, we do not discover; nor is it easy to distinguish what was the distinction at that time between this higher class of vassals, and the inferior nobles more immediately within the jurisdiction of the monarch. The feudal system, the seeds of which had been long sown, was beginning to rise in different directions; but was far from possessing that great and extraordinary form which it afterwards assumed. Each particular age in the world’s history brings forth the peculiar institution suited to the character of society at the time; but it does so slowly and by degrees, as necessity prompts the desire of alteration, and experience presents the mode. No sudden and general changes have ever been attended with permanent success, for although, by reiterated experiment, and the accumulated experience of many, it is impossible to say what degree of perfection may be ultimately reached, it would seem that the mind of man is incapable of conceiving at once any great and universal system. Each age may improve upon the last; and each individual epoch may produce and perfect the scheme of society necessary for itself,—at once the consequence of its existence, and the type of its character. But still the creation of great institutions is like the sculpture of a statue, and a thousand slight blows from Time's chisel are required, to change the marble ruggedness of the mass into the perfect and harmonious form.

At the time of which I now speak, the feudal system, the chief institution of the middle ages, was yet in its first rudeness, and a number of accidental circumstances were still required to give it consistency, solidity, and extent. It is impossible, and would be of little use, to trace all the events which contributed to that effect. The revolt and subjection of vassals—the power of some monarchs and the weakness of others—the rights of different orders, mutually wrung from each other—and the imperative necessity of some fixed barrier, however frail, between the claims of various classes,—gradually produced a state of society fitted to those times, and those times alone.

Amongst these causes were such insurrections as those of Waifar and of Tassilo. But though Pepin succeeded in subduing the former, and in annexing almost the whole of Aquitaine to the crown, the complete subjection of the dukedom of Bavaria was reserved for his successor.

DEATH OF PEPIN

On his return from his last and most successful expedition against Waifar, the monarch of the Francs was seized with a low fever at Saintes, which preyed severely upon a constitution shaken by mighty cares and never ceasing activity. His first resource under the depression of sickness, was a humble petition for aid at the shrine of St Martin of Tours, which had been rendered famous as a place of marvelous cure, by the folly and ignorance of the age, and the impudence and talent of its prelates. But the malady of the King was not one of those in which mental medicine can prove efficacious; and, however great might be his faith or superstition, Pepin returned, weaker and nearer to death than he went. He then proceeded to Paris; and took up his abode in the monastery of St Denis, where his sickness each day advanced more and more rapidly. At length, the period came when the approach of death forced itself upon his conviction; and after having, with the consent of the principal men of the kingdom, divided his whole dominions between his two sons, Charles, (afterwards called Charlemagne,) and Carloman the younger, he died at the age of fifty-three.

Between Pepin and his father, Charles Martel, there existed a strong point of resemblance in their excessive promptitude of resolution, and their wonderful rapidity of execution, which qualities combined, formed the great secret of their power and their success. In other respects they differed from each other essentially. Charles Martel, despising the superstition of the day, oppressed the church; and, contented with his own power, contemned and circumscribed that of the nobility. Pepin, on the contrary, with greater ambition and greater piety, courted both the clergy and the nobles; and easily did away the phantom king, under the shadow of whose name Charles Martel had been satisfied to rule severely the other orders of the state.

Charles Martel left to his sons the regal power. Pepin transmitted to his children both the power and the name,—which is in all ages a great addition. As in war, an earthen mound, which an infant could crawl over with ease while unopposed, becomes, when defended, an important post; so in policy a mere title, which, abstractedly considered, is but air, very often becomes, in the struggle of contending parties, a mighty barrier and a strong defence.

In assuming the hereditary title of his Merovingian predecessors, however, Pepin unfortunately adopted also their system of dividing the succession—a system which had distracted the dominion of their race, and proved the destruction of his own