--the noble lady, Mathalgarde (she was one of
the numerous concubines of Charles) also called twice on the same
errand. She awaits your orders."

"Let the petitioners come in," answered Charles to the chamberlain, who
immediately left the room. Addressing the young clerk, now bishop, with
a jovial yet impressive air, Charles pointed to the curtain of the door,
near which his usual seat was located, and said: "Hide yourself behind
that curtain, young man; you are about to learn the number of rivals
that the death of a bishop raises. It will aid your education."

The young clerk had barely vanished behind the curtain, before the
chamber was invaded by a large number of the palace familiars, officers
and seigneurs at court. Urging their own claims, or the claims of the
clients whom they recommended, the mob deafened the Emperor's ears with
their clamor. Among these was a bishop magnificently robed, and of
haughty, imperious mien. He elbowed himself forward into Charles'
presence as fast as he could.

"This is the bishop of the rat," Eginhard whispered to the Emperor. "The
price he paid the Jew was ten thousand silver sous. The Jew scrupulously
reported the amount to me, as you ordered."

"Bishop of Bergues, have you not enough with one bishopric?" Charles
cried out to the haughty prelate. "Do you come to solicit a second?"

"August Prince--I have come to pray you that you grant me the bishopric
of Limburg, just vacant, in exchange for that of Bergues."

"Because the former is richer?"

"Yes, seigneur; and if I obtain it, the share of the poor will only be
all the larger."

"Now, all of you, listen to me attentively," the Emperor cried, pointing
his finger at the bishop and in a tone of severity: "Knowing the
passionate love of this prelate for frivolous and ruinous curiosities,
which he purchases at prodigious prices, I ordered the Jew Solomon to
catch a rat in his house, the vilest looking rat ever caught in a
rat-trap, to embalm the beast in precious aromatics, to wrap it up in
oriental materials embroidered in gold, to offer it to the Bishop of
Bergues as a most rare rat imported from Judea upon a Venetian vessel,
and to sell it to the prelate as the most prodigious and miraculous of
rats."

A loud outburst of laughter broke from the throats of all the
dignitaries in the audience, except the Bishop of Bergues, who
shamefacedly cast down his eyes. "Now, then," proceeded Charles, "do you
know what price the Bis