master. Orlando will come to
your borders--to Roncesvalles--for the purpose of receiving the
tribute. Charles will await him at the foot of the mountains. Orlando
will bring but a small band with him: you, when you meet him, will have
secretly your whole army at your back. You surround him, and who
receives tribute then?"

The new Judas had scarcely uttered these words when his exultation was
interrupted by a change in the face of nature. The sky was suddenly
overcast, there was thunder and lightning, a laurel was split in two
from head to foot, and the Carob-tree under which Gan was sitting,
which is said to be the species of tree on which Judas Iscariot hung
himself, dropped one of its pods on his head.

Marsilius, as well as Gan, was appalled at this omen; but on assembling
his soothsayers they came to the conclusion that the laurel-tree turned
the omen against the Emperor, the successor of the Caesars, though one
of them renewed the consternation of Gan by saying that he did not
understand the meaning of the tree of Judas, and intimating that
perhaps the ambassador could explain it. Gan relieved his vexation by
anger; the habit of wickedness prevailed over all other considerations;
and the king prepared to march to Roncesvalles at the head of all his
forces.

Gan wrote to Charlemagne to say how humbly and submissively Marsilius
was coming to pay the tribute into the hands of Orlando, and how
handsome it would be of the Emperor to meet him half-way, and so be
ready to receive him after the payment at his camp. He added a
brilliant account of the tribute, and the accompanying presents. The
good Emperor wrote in turn to say how pleased he was with the
ambassador's diligence, and that matters were arranged precisely as he
wished. His court, however, had its suspicion still, though they little
thought Gan's object in bringing Charles into the neighborhood of
Roncesvalles was to deliver him into the hands of Marsilius, after
Orlando should have been destroyed by him.

Orlando, however, did as his lord and sovereign desired. He went to
Roncesvalles, accompanied by a moderate train of warriors, not dreaming
of the atrocity that awaited him. Gan, meanwhile, had hastened back to
France, in order to show himself free and easy in the presence of
Charles, and secure the success of his plot; while Marsilius, to make
assurance doubly sure, brought into the passes of Roncesvalles no less
than three armies, which were successi