Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire vol 5 (1897).djvu/309

 or THE ROMAN EMPIRE 287 the fairest kingdoms of Europe were the patrimony or conquest of a prince who reigned at the same time in France, Spain, Italy, Germany, and Hungary.^^^ I. The Roman province of Gaul had been transformed into the name and monarchy of France ; but, in the decay of the Merovingian line, its limits were contracted by the independence of the Britons and the revolt of Aqititain. Charlemagne pursued, and confined, the Britons on the shores of the ocean ; and that ferocious tribe, whose origin and language are so different from the French, was chastised by the imposition of tribute, hostages, and peace. After a long and evasive contest, the rebellion of the dukes of [ad. 769] Aquitain was punished by the forfeiture of their province, their liberty, and their lives. Harsh and rigorous would have been such treatment of ambitious governors, who had too faithfully copied the mayors of the palace. But a recent discovery ^i- has proved that these unhappy princes were the last and lawful heirs of the blood and sceptre of Clovis, a younger branch, from the brother of Dagobert, of the Merovingian house. Their ancient kingdom was reduced to the duchy of Gascogne, to the counties of Fesenzac and Armagnac, at the foot of the Pyrenees ; their race was propagated till the beginning of the sixteenth century ; and, after surviving their Carlovingian tyrants, they were reserved to feel the injustice, or the favours, of a third dynasty. By the re-union of Aquitain, France was enlarged to its present boundaries, with the additions of the Netherlands and Spain, as far as the Rhine. II. The Saracens had been Spain expelled from France by the grandfather and father of Charle- magne ; but they still possessed the greatest part of Spain, from the rock of Gibraltar to the Pyrenees. Amidst their civil divisions, an Arabian emir of Saragossa implored his protection [a.d. 777] in the diet of Paderborn. Charlemagne undertook the expe- dition, restored the emir, and, without distinction of faith, im- [a.d. "S] partially crushed the resistance of the Christians, and rewarded the obedience and service of the Mahometans. In his absence ^li After a brief relation of his wars and conquests (Vit. Carol, c. 5-14), Egin- hard recapitulates, in a few words (c. 15), the countries subject to his empire. Struvius (Corpus Hist. German, p. 118-149) has inserted in his Notes the texts of the old Chronicles. "2 Of a charter granted to the monastery of Alaon (a.d. 845) by Charles the Bald, which deduces this royal pedigree. I doubt whether some subsequent links of the i.xth and xth centuries are' equally firm ; yet the whole is approved and de- fended by M. Gaillard (torn. ii. p. 60-81, 203-206), who affirms that the family of Montesquieu (not of the president de Montesquieu) is descended, in the female line, from Clotaire and Clovis — an innocent pretension !