by death--were pardonable on payment of a
proportionate fine, and oaths, in many cases, might be absolved in the
same way. Thus a large revenue was received, which was generally divided
equally between the State, the procurator fiscal, and the King.

[Illustration: Fig. 253.--The Extraction of Metals.--Fac-simile of a
Woodcut in the "Cosmographie Universelle" of Munster, folio: Basle, 1552.]

War, which was almost constant in those turbulent times, furnished the
barbarian kings with occasional resources, which were usually much more
important than the ordinary supplies from taxation. The first chiefs of
the Visigoths, the Ostrogoths, and the Franks, sought means of
replenishing their treasuries by their victorious arms. Alaric, Totila,
and Clovis thus amassed enormous wealth, without troubling themselves to
place the government finances on a satisfactory basis. We see, however, a
semblance of financial organization in the institutions of Alaric and his
successors. Subsequently, the great Theodoric, who had studied the
administrative theories of the Byzantine Court, exercised his genius in
endeavouring to work out an accurate system of finance, which was adopted
in Italy.

Gregory of Tours, a writer of the sixteenth century, relates in several
passages of his "History of the Franks," that they exhibited the same
repugnance to compulsory taxation as the Germans of the time of Tacitus.
The _Leudes_ considered that they owed nothing to the treasury, and to
force them to submit to taxation was not an easy matter. About the year
465, Childeric I., father of Clovis, lost his crown for wishing all
classes to submit to taxation equally. In 673, Childeric II., King of
Austrasia, had one of these _Leudes_, named Bodillon, flogged with rods
for daring to reproach him with the injustice of certain taxes. He,
however, was afterwards assassinated by this same Bodillon, and the
_Leudes_ maintained their right of immunity. A century before the _Leudes_
were already quarrelling with royalty on account of the taxes, which they
refused to pay, and they sacrificed Queen Brunehaut because she attempted
to enrich the treasury with the confiscated property of a few nobles who
had rebelled against her authority. The wealth of the Frank kings, which
was always very great, was a continual object of envy, and on one occasion
Chilperic I., King of Soissons, having the _Leudes_ in league with him,
laid his hands on the wealth amassed by his father,