eath; but, respecting the
rights of hospitality, he forbore to take immediate vengeance, and even
bestowed upon him the customary gift of arms as he departed on the morrow,
but warned him never to return, lest he should lose his life at the
warriors' hands. On leaving the palace, however, Alboin bore away the image
of little Rosamund, Thurisind's fair granddaughter, whom he solemnly swore
he would claim as wife as soon as she was of marriageable age.

Alboin having thus received his arms from a stranger, the Langobards no
longer refused to recognize him as a full-fledged warrior, and gladly
hailed him as king when his father died.

[Sidenote: Alboin's cruelty.] Shortly after Alboin's accession to the
throne, a quarrel arose between the Gepidae and the Langobards, or
Lombards, as they were eventually called; and war having been declared, a
decisive battle was fought, in which Thurisind and his son perished, and
all their lands fell into the conqueror's hands. With true heathen cruelty,
the Lombard king had the skulls of the Gepidae mounted as drinking vessels,
which he delighted in using on all state and festive occasions. Then,
pushing onwards, Alboin took forcible possession of his new realm and of
the tearful young Rosamund, whom he forced to become his wife, although she
shrank in horror from the murderer of all her kin and the oppressor of her
people.

She followed him home, concealing her fears, and although she never seemed
blithe and happy, she obeyed her husband so implicitly that he fancied her
a devoted wife. He was so accustomed to Rosamund's ready compliance with
his every wish that one day, after winning a great victory over the
Ostrogoths, and conquering a province in northern Italy (where he took up
his abode, and which bears the name of his race), he bade her fill her
father's skull with wine and pledge him by drinking first out of this
repulsive cup.

[Sidenote: Rosamund's revolt.] The queen hesitated, but, impelled by
Alboin's threatening glances and his mailed hand raised to strike her, she
tremblingly filled the cup and raised it to her lips. But then, instead of
humbly presenting it to her lord, she haughtily dashed it at his feet, and
left the hall, saying that though she had obeyed him, she would never again
live with him as his wife,--a declaration which the warriors present
secretly applauded, for they all thought that their king had been wantonly
cruel toward his beautiful wife.

While Alb