and bitter was the war which ensued, but Charlemagne saved France
to the Franks and to the true faith. But King Karl and his men were not
content with merely saving France from the infidels. At one time the
Frankish hosts crossed the Pyrenees and conquered nearly all of northern
Spain. For seven long years King Karl and his Franks warred in the
peninsula. Keep and castle went down before the Christians; city after
city capitulated to them; the land was theirs from mountain to sea,
except the single town of Saragossa, in which the Moslem king,
Marsilius, together with a powerful army, had taken refuge.

The beautiful Saracen city of Cordres was the last to fall before the
arms of Charlemagne. Long and stoutly did the besieged stronghold hold
out against the conqueror, but at last its gates were carried and its
towers and walls battered to earth.

"Not a heathen did there remain,
But confessed him Christian, or else was slain."

In celebration of the taking of Cordres, Charlemagne shortly afterwards
held court with great pomp and splendor in a beautiful orchard in the
heart of the conquered city.

It was the custom of the emperor to take counsel of his peers and
knights in all matters of import, and he now desired to discuss with
them how best to bring to a happy close this long and bitter war,--for
Marsilius was still in possession of Saragossa. With the fall of Cordres
the end seemed near at hand; and Charlemagne rejoiced, for he had grown
old and weary of strife, and he longed to return to his own again. No
less relieved at heart, his warriors gathered about him that day, eager
to plan some means of ending their cruel exile.

The sky was fair, as with the promise of yet fairer things; and the
olive-trees of Cordres spread out their branches above and about the
Christian hosts as if in token of the peace they so earnestly craved.

Seated upon a throne of beaten gold was the Emperor of ample France.
Proud, and mighty of frame was he, but the curls that rested on his
shoulders and the beard that flowed over his bosom were white as the
snow-caps of the Sierra Nevadas. Small wonder the Moslems believed that
two hundred winters had piled their snows upon his head!

The flower of Frankish chivalry pressed about him--fifteen thousand
doughty knights of France. Gorgeous carpets were spread upon the
greensward, upon which the cavaliers sat at games or practised fencing
with light arms. But nearest to the great Ch