h emir consulted his
safety by a hasty and separate retreat. At the dawn of the day, the
stillness of a hostile camp was suspected by the victorious Christians:
on the report of their spies, they ventured to explore the riches of the
vacant tents; but if we except some celebrated relics, a small portion
of the spoil was restored to the innocent and lawful owners. The joyful
tidings were soon diffused over the Catholic world, and the monks of
Italy could affirm and believe that three hundred and fifty, or three
hundred and seventy-five, thousand of the Mahometans had been crushed by
the hammer of Charles, [32] while no more than fifteen hundred
Christians were slain in the field of Tours. But this incredible tale is
sufficiently disproved by the caution of the French general, who
apprehended the snares and accidents of a pursuit, and dismissed his
German allies to their native forests.

The inactivity of a conqueror betrays the loss of strength and blood,
and the most cruel execution is inflicted, not in the ranks of battle,
but on the backs of a flying enemy. Yet the victory of the Franks was
complete and final; Aquitain was recovered by the arms of Eudes; the
Arabs never resumed the conquest of Gaul, and they were soon driven
beyond the Pyrenees by Charles Martel and his valiant race. [33] It
might have been expected that the savior of Christendom would have been
canonized, or at least applauded, by the gratitude of the clergy, who
are indebted to his sword for their present existence. But in the
public distress, the mayor of the palace had been compelled to apply
the riches, or at least the revenues, of the bishops and abbots, to
the relief of the state and the reward of the soldiers. His merits were
forgotten, his sacrilege alone was remembered, and, in an epistle to
a Carlovingian prince, a Gallic synod presumes to declare that his
ancestor was damned; that on the opening of his tomb, the spectators
were affrighted by a smell of fire and the aspect of a horrid dragon;
and that a saint of the times was indulged with a pleasant vision of the
soul and body of Charles Martel, burning, to all eternity, in the abyss
of hell. [34]

[Footnote 31: Gens Austriae membrorum pre-eminentia valida, et gens
Germana corde et corpore praestantissima, quasi in ictu oculi, manu
ferrea, et pectore arduo, Arabes extinxerunt, (Roderic. Toletan. c.
xiv.)]

[Footnote 32: These numbers are stated by Paul Warnefrid, the deacon
of Aquileia