III.—CHARLEMAGNE.
From the accession, in 768, of Charlemagne, eldest son of Pepin le Bref may be dated the establishment of clerical power, the rise of chivalry, and the foundation of learning in the Empire of France. He was a man of extraordinary foresight and strength of character, and possessed not only the valor of a hero and the skill of a general, but the calm wisdom of a statesman, and the qualities of a judicious sovereign. Ambitious of conquest as Alexander or Darius, he nevertheless provided as conscientiously for the welfare of his subjects and the advancement of letters, as did Alfred the Great of England about a century afterwards. He founded schools and libraries—convoked national assemblies—revised laws—superintended the administration of justice—encouraged scientific men and professors of the fine arts—and, during a reign of forty-six years, extended his frontiers beyond the Danube, imposed tribute upon the barbarians of the Vistula, made his name a terror to the Saracen tribes, and added Northern Italy to the dependencies of France. Notwithstanding these successes, it appears that the conquest and conversion of the Saxons (a nation of German idolaters, whose territories bordered closely upon his chosen capital of Aix-la-Chapelle) formed the darling enterprise of this powerful monarch. From 770 to 804, his arms were constantly directed against them; and in Wittikind, their heroic leader, he encountered a warrior as fearless, if not as fortunate, as himself. The brave Saxons were, however, no match for one whose triumphs procured him the splendid title of Emperor of the West, and who gathered his daring hosts from dominions which comprised the whole of France, Germany, Italy, Hungary, Bohemia, Poland, and Prussia, and were only bounded on the east by the Carpathian mountains, and on the west by the Ebro and the ocean. Year after year he wasted their country with fire and sword, overthrew their idols, leveled their temples to the ground, erected fortresses amid the ruins of their villages, and carried away vast numbers of captives to the interior of Gaul. To this forced emigration succeeded a conversion equally unwelcome. Thousands of reluctant Saxons were compelled to subscribe to the ceremony of baptism; their principalities were portioned off among abbots and bishops; and Wittikind did homage to Charlemagne in the Champs-de-Mars.
It was about this period that the Danes and Normans first began to harass the northern coasts of Europe. Confident of their naval strength, they attacked the possessions of Charlemagne with as little hesitation as those of his less formidable neighbor, Egbert of Wessex; descended upon Friesland as boldly as upon Teignmouth or Hengesdown; and even ventured with their galleys into the port of a city of Narbonnese Gaul at a time when the emperor himself was sojourning within its walls. Springing up, as they did, toward the close of so prosperous a reign, these new invaders proved more dangerous than Charlemagne had anticipated. He caused war barks to be stationed at the mouths of his great rivers, and in 808 marched an army to the defense of Friesland. On this occasion, however, he was glad to make terms of peace; and it is said that the increasing power of the Baltic tribes embittered his later days with presentiments of that decay which shortly afterward befell his gigantic empire. From the conclusion of this peace to the date of his death in the year 814, no event of historical importance occurred; and the great emperor was buried at Aix-la-Chapelle, in that famous cathedral of which he was the founder.
The race of Carlovingian kings took their name, and only their name, from this, their magnificent ancestor. Weak of purpose as the descendants of Clovis, and endued, perhaps, with even a less share of animal courage, they suffered their mighty inheritance to be wrested from them, divided, subdivided, pillaged and impoverished. No portion of French history is so disastrous, so unsatisfactory, and so obscure as that which relates to this epoch. Indeed, toward the commencement of the tenth century, an utter blank occurs, and we are left for many years without any record whatever.—A. B. E.