"What a war! What a war! I have fought against the Northmans, when they attacked our fortified camps at the confluence of the Somme and the Seine. Those accursed pirates are terrible foes. They are as dashing in attack as they are cautious in retreat, and they ever find a safe shelter in the light craft in which they come over the seas of the North as far south as Gaul. But by St. Martin! these accursed Bretons are fuller of the devil, and harder to get at than even the pirates! They were a source of trouble to Charles the great Emperor; they have become the desolation of his son!" And Neroweg repeats dejectedly: "What a war! What a war!"
The monk turns upon his saddle, and stretching out his hand in the direction traversed by the Frankish troop, says to Neroweg:
"Look toward the west!"
Turning his eyes in the direction indicated by the priest, the Frankish chief notices behind him tall columns of ruddy smoke rising at intervals from the hills that the army has left behind it. "Look yonder! Everywhere a conflagration marks our passage. The burgs and villages, abandoned by the fleeing inhabitants, have, at my orders, been delivered to the flames. The Bretons have not, like the Northman pirates, the resource of vessels on which to flee with their booty back to the ocean. We are driving the fleeing population before us. The two other army corps of Louis the Pious are, from their side, following similar tactics. Accordingly, we and they will meet to-morrow morning at the village of Lokfern. There we will find, driven back and heaped together, the populations that have been attacked from the south, the east and the north during these last days. There, surrounded by a circle of iron, they will be either annihilated or reduced to slavery! Ah! This time without fail, Brittany, never before overcome, will be subjected to the Catholic Church and to the power of the Franks. What if your soldiers have been decimated in the struggle for the triumph of the faith and royalty! The troops that you still have, will, when joined to the other army corps, suffice to exterminate the Bretons!"
"Monk," answers Neroweg impatiently, "your words do not console me for the death of so many brave Frankish warriors whose bones have been left to bleach in the defile of Glen-Clan and on the hills of this accursed country!"
"Rather envy their fate. They have died for religion; they are now in paradise, in the midst of a chorus of seraphim."
Neroweg shrugs his shoulders with an air of incredulity, and after a moment of silence proceeds: "You promised to point out to me where these pagans conceal their treasures."
"On the other side of the marsh of Peulven which we are now to traverse, lies a vast forest in which a large number of druid stones are found. Have the earth removed at their foot, and you will find large sums of money in silver and gold, and many precious articles that have been hidden there since the beginning of the war."
"When will we arrive at that forest?"
"This evening before nightfall."