Page:The Song of Roland.djvu/34

 That Emperour does with the morning rise; Matins and Mass are said then in his sight. Forth goes that King, and stays beneath a pine; Barons he calls, good counsel to define, For with his Franks he’s ever of a mind. AOI.

That Emperour, beneath a pine he sits, Calls his barons, his council to begin: Oger the Duke, that Archbishop Turpin, Richard the old, and his nephew Henry, From Gascony the proof Count Acolin, Tedbald of Reims and Milun his cousin: With him there were Gerers, also Gerin, And among them the Count Rollant came in, And Oliver, so proof and so gentil. Franks out of France, a thousand chivalry; Guenes came there, that wrought the treachery. The Council then began, which ended ill. AOI.

“My Lords Barons,” says the Emperour then, Charlès, “King Marsilies hath sent me his messages; Out of his wealth he’ll give me weighty masses. Greyhounds on leash and bears and lions also, Thousand mewed hawks and seven hundred camels, Four hundred mules with gold Arabian chargèd, Fifty wagons, yea more than fifty drawing. But into France demands he my departure; He’ll follow me to Aix, where is my Castle; There he’ll receive the law of our Salvation: Christian he’ll be, and hold from me his marches. But I know not what purpose in his heart is.” Then say the Franks: “Beseems us act with caution!” AOI.