Page:Readings in European History Vol 1.djvu/167

 Charlemagne 131 Theodoric, which was on the other side of the mountain. The Frankish loss was greater than mere numbers, for two of the ambassadors, Adalgis and Geilo, were killed, also four counts, and twenty other noble and distinguished men, together with those who followed them, because they would rather die with them than live after them. When the king heard of this disaster he decided not to delay, but made haste to gather an army, and marched into Saxony. There he called to his presence the chiefs of the Saxons, and inquired who had induced the people to rebel. They all declared that Widukind was the author of the trea- son, but said that they Could not produce him because after the deed was done he had fled to the Northmen. But the others who had carried out his will and committed the crime they delivered up to the king to the number of, four thousand and five hundred ; and by the king's command they were all beheaded in one day upon the river Aller in the place called Verden. When he had wreaked vengeance after this fashion, the king withdrew to the town of Diedenhofen for winter quarters, and there he celebrated the Nativity of our Lord and Easter as he was wont to do. III. How CHARLEMAGNE WAS MADE EMPEROR A.D. 799 As Pope Leo [III] was riding from the Lateran in Rome to service in the church of St. Lawrence, called " the Grid- iron," he fell into an ambush which the Romans had set for him in the neighborhood of this church. He was dragged from off his horse and, as some would have it, his eyes put out, his tongue cut off, and he was then left lying in the street, naked and half dead. Afterward the insti- gators of this deed ordered that he should be taken into the monastery of the holy martyr Erasmus to be cared for. His chamberlain Albinus succeeded, however, in letting him down over the wall at night, whereupon Duke Winigis of Spoleto, who had hurried to Rome on hearing of this deed 56. Circum- stances of Charle- magne's coronation as emperor. (From the so-called Annals of Einhard.) Maltreat- ment of Pope Leo by the Romans.