iburtius. How Deusdona was "squared," and what
he got for his not very valuable complicity in these transactions, does
not appear. But at last the relics were sent off in charge of Lunison,
the brother of Deusdona, and the priest Hunus, as far as Pavia, while
Ratleig stopped behind for a week to see if the robbery was discovered,
and, presumably, to act as a blind, if any hue and cry was raised. But,
as everything remained quiet, the notary betook himself to Pavia, where
he found Lunison and Hunus awaiting his arrival. The notary's opinion of
the character of his worthy colleagues, however, may be gathered from
the fact that having persuaded them to set out in advance along a road
which he told them he was about to take, he immediately adopted another
route, and, travelling by way of St. Maurice and the Lake of Geneva,
eventually reached Soleure.

Eginhard tells all this story with the most naive air of unconsciousness
that there is anything remarkable about an abbot, and a high officer of
state to boot, being an accessory, both before and after the fact, to a
most gross and scandalous act of sacrilegious and burglarious robbery.
And an amusing sequel to the story proves that, where relics were
concerned, his friend Hildoin, another high ecclesiastical dignitary,
was even less scrupulous than himself.

On going to the palace early one morning, after the saints were safely
bestowed at Seligenstadt, he found Hildoin waiting for an audience in
the Emperor's antechamber, and began to talk to him about the miracle of
the bloody exudation. In the course of conversation, Eginhard happened
to allude to the remarkable fineness of the garment of the blessed
Marcellinus. Whereupon Abbot Hildoin observed (to Eginhard's
stupefaction) that his observation was quite correct. Much astonished at
this remark from a person was supposed not to have seen the relics,
Eginhard asked him how he knew that? Upon this, Hildoin saw he had
better make a clean breast of it, and he told the following story, which
he had received from his priestly agent, Hunus. While Hunus and Lunison
were at Pavia, waiting for Eginhard's notary, Hunus (according to his
own account) had robbed the robbers. The relics were placed in a church;
and a number of laymen and clerics, of whom Hunus was one, undertook to
keep watch over them. One night, however, all the watchers, save
wide-awake Hunus, went to sleep; and then, according to the story which
this "sharp" ecclesi