been attended with complete success. Similar trials have also been made in Ireland, but the result has not yet answered the expectations of the patriotic projectors.

SECTION V. The Monarchy of the Franks, under the Merovingian Dynasty.

THE history of the Franks properly begins with the establishment of a large body of that nation in Belgic Gaul, under a chief named Mere-wig, from whom the dynasty received the name Merovingian. He was succeeded by his son Hilderik, a brave warrior, but the slave of his passions. An insult that he offered to the wife of one of his officers occasioned a revolt; Hilderik was dethroned, and a Count Egidius, or Giles, proclaimed king. After an exile of eight years, Hilderik was restored, and the remainder of his reign appears to have passed in tranquillity. Hlodo-wig was the next sovereign: his harsh German name was softened by the Latins into Clodovecus, or Clovis, the origin of the modern Ludovicus, or Louis. At his accession (A.D. 481), Clovis had scarcely reached his twentieth year; the ardour of youth combined with the circumstances of his position to urge him to foreign conquests; for the fertility of the Belgic soil, the purity of its waters, and its atmosphere, continually attracted fresh hordes to the lower Rhine, who sought admission into the Belgic colony. Clovis found it necessary to enlarge his frontiers, and invaded the Roman province. Near Soissons he encountered Syagrius, the son of his father's rival, Egidius, and gained a decisive victory. Syagrius sought refuge with the Visigoths, but that nation had lost much of its martial spirit; Alaric II. sent the unfortunate general bound to Clovis, by whom he was beheaded.

The neighbouring princes now eagerly sought the alliance of the conqueror; he chose for his queen Hlodohilde, or Clotilda, whose uncle was king of the Burgundians. Clotilda was a

Christian; she laboured earnestly to convert her husband, and especially urged him when his crown and life were endangered by an invasion of the Germanic confederation of tribes, called the Allemans. Clovis, persuaded that he owed the great victory of Tolbiac to the prayers of Clotilda, became a convert, and received the sacrament of baptism from the bishop of Rheims (A.D. 496). He gave the prelate, as a fee, all the land he could ride round while he himself slept after dinner, a gift very characteristic of à conqueror, who felt that he had only to wake and acquire new

1 The other Franks were named Ripe-warians; that is, inhabitants of the banks of the Rhine.

dominions. Soon afterwards he undertook new conquests. Advancing in the direction of Genabum (Orleans), he crossed the Loire, spreading everywhere the terror of his name. The Bretons, long subject to the Romans, consented without reluctance to a change of masters. Clovis, having traversed their country, entered Aquitaine, pillaged the houses, laid waste the fields, plundered the temples, and returned to Paris, 'leaving,' as the contemporary historian says, 'nothing to the wretched inhabitants but the soil, which the Franks could not take away.'

The kingdom established by Clovis extended from the Rhine to the Pyrenees, from the Alps to the ocean; but its security was very uncertain. Wherever the conqueror appeared, he met nothing but submission from the various races settled in Gaul; as soon, however, as he passed onwards, his nominal subjects closed upon his rear, retaining no more trace of his march than the furrowed wave does of a vessel's keel. Neither was the Frankish

monarch absolute over his own soldiers; his army was composed of free men, who disdained to submit to despotic rule. They gave to their monarch his share of the booty, and nothing more. When they disapproved of the expedition for which they assembled, they abandoned it without scruple; or if the monarch refused to undertake a war which they deemed advisable, they forced him to comply with their wishes, not merely by menaces, but by actual force.

On the death of Clovis (A.D. 511), his dominions were divided between his four sons, Hildebert (Childebert), Hlodomer (Chlodomer), Hlodher (Clotaire), and Theodoric, who respectively occupied the capitals of Paris, Orleans, Soissons, and Metz. This distribution gave rise to a new geographical division; all the districts between the Rhine, the Meuse, and the Moselle received the name of Oster-rike, or Austrasia; and the country between the Meuse, the Loire, and the ocean was named Ni-oster-rike, or, as it was Latinized, Neustria. All that was not comprised in this division retained its ancient name of Gaul.

Chlodomer and Theodoric engaged in war with Gundumer, king of the Burgundians. In a great battle fought near Vienne (A.D. 523) Chlodomer was slain,' but Theodoric gained a decisive victory, and added the Burgundian kingdom to his own dominions.

1The brothers joined their forces at Veserancia, a place situated in the territory of the city of Vienne, and gave battle to Gundumer. The Burgundian having taken to flight with his army, Chlodomer pursued him, and, when he was at a distance from his friends, the Burgundians, imi

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tating the signals of the Franks, exclaimed, "Come this way, we are thine." He believed them, and spurred his horse into the midst of the enemy. They surrounded him, cut off his head, and fixing it on a pike displayed it to their pursuers.'-GREGORY OF TOURS.

Clotilda took the guardianship of her infant granchildren, but the favour she showed to the three sons of Chlodomer provoked the resentment of Childebert, king of Paris. He secretly proposed to his brother Clotaire that they should secure the persons of the young princes, shave their heads,' and divide their dominions. Clotaire readily joined in the project, and put the two eldest of his nephews to death; the third, saved by faithful servants, cut off his hair with his own hands, and, entering into a monastery, spent a life of celibacy. Ten years after this event Theodoric died, and was succeeded by his son, Theodobert, who took the title of king of Austrasia. His uncles attempted to deprive Theodobert of his dominions, but being daunted by the mere display of his power, they turned their arms against Spain, laid waste Aragon, Biscay, and Catalonia, stormed Pampeluna, besieged Saragossa, and were only induced to retire by a present of the tunic of St. Vincent, a relic which, in that superstitious age, was deemed an invaluable treasure.

The fame of Theodobert extended to Constantinople; Justinian endeavoured to win his friendship by the cession of the nominal claims which the empire retained over Provence, but the Austrasian monarch entered into an alliance with Totila, the emperor's enemy, crossed the Alps, and quickly subdued the greater part of northern Italy. After his return, the army he left behind met with some reverses, and the inflated vanity of Justinian led him to issue a medal, on which he styled himself Conqueror of the Franks. Theodobert was so enraged at this arrogance, that he prepared to lead an army through Hungary into Thrace and assail Justinian in his capital, but this daring enterprise was frustrated by his sudden death; he was killed by the fall of a tree (A.D. 548), while hunting the wild buffalo, a dangerous sport, to which he was passionately addicted.

Theodobald succeeded to the Austrasian throne, but died after an inglorious reign of seven years. Childebert soon followed him to the tomb, and thus Clotaire acquired the sole, but not the undisturbed, possession of Neustria and Austrasia. His own son, Chramnè, headed a revolt of the turbulent Bretons, but he was defeated and barbarously put to death, with his entire family, by

1 To shave the head was the form of dethroning a sovereign at this period. Among the early Franks the crown of hair was as much a symbol of royalty as the crown of gold.

2 The two armies having come to an engagement, the count of the Bretons ran away, and was slain in flight, after which Hram (Chramnè)

began to fly towards the ships he had prepared on the sea, but whilst he was endeavouring to save his wife and children he was overtaken by his father's army, made prisoner, and bound. When the news was brought to Clotaire, he ordered that the prince, together with his wife and daughters, should be burned. They shut them

command of his cruel father. The chroniclers add, that Clotaire died the next year (A.D. 561), at Compiegne, on the anniversary of his son's death, and at the precise hour of the horrid butchery. Clotaire left four sons,-Charibert, Gontram, Chilperic, and Sigebert, who shared his dominions. The turbulent period that followed is principally remarkable for the troubles occasioned by the crimes of two infamous women, Brunilda and Fredegonda, the wives of Sigebert and Chilperic. Fredegonda had won her way to the throne by murdering Galswintha, the sister of her rival. During the long period over which their resentments spread it is difficult to distinguish anything but murders and assassinations. Fredegonda procured the death of Sigebert, and afterwards of Chilperic and his two sons, being chiefly enraged against Merovée, who had married Brunilda.

Childebert inherited the kingdom of his father, Sigebert, and that of his uncle, Gontram; aided by his mother, Brunilda, he maintained a long and sanguinary struggle against Fredegonda and her young son Clotaire; but he died early, leaving two children to divide his distracted dominions. Both of these were destroyed by Brunilda, whose hatred they had provoked by remonstrating against her crimes, and after a dreary scene of confusion France was again united into a single monarchy, under Clotaire II., son of Chilperic and Fredegonda (A.D. 613). His first care was to punish Brunilda, the ancient enemy of his mother and his house; she was exhibited for three days, mounted on a camel, to the derision of the army, subjected to the most cruel tortures, and finally fastened to the tail of a wild horse, which tore her wretched carcass to pieces in the presence of the soldiers.

Clotaire published a code of laws, which enjoys some reputation; but his administration was deficient in vigour, and during his reign several encroachments were made on the royal power by the ambitious nobles. His son, Dagobert I., succeeded (A.D. 628), and had the mortification to see his authority weakened by the growing greatness of the mayors of the palace: he died after a feeble and dissolute reign (A.D. 638), but was, strangely enough, canonised as a saint.

The successors of Dagobert were mere phantoms of royalty; the entire sovereignty was possessed by the mayors of the palace, who finally acquired absolute possession of half the monarchy as dukes of Austrasia. Pepin d'Heristal, the greatest of these nominal ministers and real monarchs, governed France in the name of

up in a poor hut, where Iram, extended on a bench, was strangled; they then set fire to the house, and

it was consumed, with all its inmates.'-GREGORY OF TOURS.

several successive kings. After his death (A.D. 714), his power descended to his grandson, Theodobald, a child only eight years of age, who was thus appointed guardian to a king that was not yet sixteen. Karl, the natural son of Pepin, better known in history by the name of Charles Martel, set aside this absurd arrangement, and succeeded to more than his father's power. His numerous victories over the Saxons, Burgundians, Frisians, &c., have rendered his name illustrious; but he is more justly celebrated for his triumph over the Saracenic invaders of France (A.D. 732), between Tours and Poictiers, by which he delivered Christendom from the imminent danger of being subjected to the Mohammedan yoke. His son, Pepin, finally compelled Chilperic III. to abdicate (A.D. 732), and the crown of France was thus transferred to the Carlovingian dynasty from the descendants of Clovis.

SECTION VI. The Lombard Monarchy.

THE Lombards were encouraged to settle on the frontiers of the empire by Justinian, who deemed that they would prove a check on the insolence of the Gepida. While these barbarous tribes were engaged in war, Thrace enjoyed comparative tranquillity; but when Alboin became head of the Lombard tribes, he entered into alliance with the Avars for the extirpation of the Gepidæ, purchasing their aid by a tithe of his cattle, and a promise of all the conquered lands. The emperor, Justin II., unwisely abandoned the Gepida to their fate; Cunimund, their monarch, hastened to encounter Alboin before he could join the Avars, but he fell in the field, which proved fatal to the existence of his nation, and his skull was formed into a drinking-vessel by his barbarous enemy. Rosamond, the daughter of the slaughtered king, became the prize and spouse of the victor; the bravest of the surviving Gepida were incorporated in the army of the Lombards. Though the Avars had contributed but slightly to the success of the war, they received a large share of the spoils; the greater part of ancient Dacia was resigned to them, and in this country their chagans ruled for more than two hundred years. Alboin's ambition was fixed on a higher object; fifteen years before, a body of Lombards had served under Narses in the conquest of Italy, and they still preserved a vivid remembrance of the wealth and fertility of the peninsula. Alboin encouraged them to hope that this fair land might yet own their sway, and, to stimulate their ardour, produced some of its finest fruits at a royal feast. When his designs became known, adventurers flocked to his standard from the neighbouring Sclavonic and German tribes. Having made every preparation for the