Page:Cliff Castles and Cave Dwellings of Europe.djvu/138

 am not minded to set down here, kept brigands in their service, who were every whit as bad. What is more strange is that, when these ruffians went into the cities, Paris, or anywhere else, everybody knew them and pointed them out, but none durst lay hands on them."

The condition of Germany was but little superior to that of France. The central authority, if that can be called central which was always shifting its position, was unequal to restrain the violent. Its pretensions were in inverse proportion to its efficiency. The Emperor was too far off to see to the policing of the Empire, too weak to enforce order; and his long absences in Italy left the German lords and lordlings to pursue their own courses unrestrained. When the Emperor Frederick Barbarossa visited the Baron van Kingen in his castle near Constance, the freiherr received him seated, because, as he said, he held his lands in fee of none but the sun. Although he was willing to receive the Emperor as a guest, he refused to acknowledge him as his lord. If this was the temper of the petty nobility in a green tree, what must it have been in the dry. After that the great houses of Saxony and Swabia had been crushed out by the policy of the Papacy, it was to the interest of the electors to keep the Emperor weak; and the fact that the Imperial Crown was elective enabled the electors to sell their votes for extended privileges. At last, against the raids of the petty nobles, whom the Emperor could not control, the cities leagued together, took the matter in hand, attacked the fortresses, levelled them and gave to the inmates short shrift, a halter and a tree. In Italy the towns proceeded in a less summary manner. Surrounded as they were on all sides by a serried rank of castles, where the nobles held undisputed sway over their serfs and controlled the arteries of trade, the cities were compelled to proceed against them; but instead of sending them to the gallows, they contented