se by a veritable epopee--the Frankish conquest of
Brittany, and, as fittingly, serves to introduce the next epopee--the
Northman's invasion of Gaul--dealt with in the following story, _The
Iron Arrow Head; or, The Buckler Maiden_.

DANIEL DE LEON.

New York, May, 1905.

PART I.

AIX-LA-CHAPELLE

CHAPTER I.

AMAEL AND VORTIGERN.

Towards the commencement of the month of November of the year 811, a
numerous cavalcade was one afternoon wending its way to the city of
Aix-la-Chapelle, the capital of the Empire of Charles the Great--an
Empire that had been so rapidly increased by rapidly succeeding
conquests over Germany, Saxony, Bavaria, Bohemia, Hungary, Italy and
Spain, that Gaul, as formerly during the days of the Roman Emperors, was
again but a province among the vast domains. The ambitious designs of
Charles Martel had been realized. Childeric, the last scion of the
Merovingian dynasty, had been got rid of. Martel's descendants took his
seat, and now the Hammerer's grandson wielded the sceptre of Clovis over
an immensely wider territory.

Eight or ten cavalry soldiers rode in advance of the cavalcade. A little
apart from the smaller escort, four cavaliers ambled leisurely. Two of
them wore brilliant armor after the German fashion. One of these was
accompanied by a venerable old man of a martial and open countenance.
His long beard, snow white as his hair that was half hidden under a fur
cap, fell over his chest. He wore a Gallic blouse of grey wool, held
around his waist by a belt, from which hung a long sword with an iron
hilt. His ample hose of rough white fabric reached slightly below his
knees and left exposed his tightly laced leather leggings, that ended in
his boots whose heels were armed with spurs. The old man was Amael, who
under the assumed Frankish name of Berthoald had, eighty years before,
saved the life of Charles Martel at the battle of Poitiers against the
Arabs, had declined the post offered him by Charles, as jailer of the
last descendant of Clovis, and, finally, smitten by conscience, had
renounced wealth and dignity under the Frankish enslavers of Gaul, and
returned to his people and country of Brittany, or Armorica, as the
Romans named it. Amael now touched his hundredth year. His great age and
his somewhat portly stature notwithstanding, he still looked full of
vigor. He handled with dexterity the black horse that he rode and whose
spirit seemed no wise abated by the long