At this point in his narrative the biographer relates the scrape into which “the little old fellow” got in connexion with his secret study of Vergil, already described on page 2. As a further instance of Alcuin’s remarkable knowledge of what was going on, he adds the interesting little story about a present of wine to Cormery which will be found on p. 223. Then comes the following amusing account, with its revelation of a dislike of Karl’s favourites the foreigners, a dislike which Eginhard thus frankly reports in his vivid picture of the great King,[48] “He loved foreigners, and took great pains to attract them to him and to maintain them, so much so that the multitude of them not unreasonably seemed a heavy burden, not to the palace only but to the kingdom. His greatness of mind, however, was such, that he was not troubled by a burden of this kind; indeed even great inconveniences he regarded as compensated by the praise won by liberality and by the reward of good report.” This is the story. The presbyter Aigulf[49], an Anglo-Saxon[50] himself too, came to Tours to visit the father. When he was standing at the door of Alcuin’s dwelling, there happened to be four of the brethren of Tours talking together. When they saw him, they said one to another, not imagining that he knew anything of their language, “Here’s a Briton, or a Scot[51], come to see that other Briton inside. O God, deliver this monastery from these Britons! Like bees coming back to the mother-bee, these all come to this man of ours!” What would we not give to have this in the words in which they spoke it, instead of in the author’s Latin. The presbyter went into Alcuin’s dwelling, and, after other matters, told him what he had heard. “Do you know which they are?” Alcuin asked. “Indeed I do not. I could not for shame look at them when they said that.” Alcuin said, “I am sure I know who they are.” He called in some of the brethren by name, and said, “These are they.” Greatly grieved by their folly, Alcuin yet spared them, saying, “May Christ, the Son of God, spare them.” Then he gave them each a cup of wine to drink, and without severity sent them away. Aigulf afterwards made diligent inquiry, and found that they were the right men. We of to-day may remark that Alcuin evidently knew the characters of his pupils; but his ideas of discipline differed from ours. We should not have let them know that we had heard personal remarks of that kind; and we should not have given them glasses of wine. We may remember the words of Archbishop Temple to Bishop Creighton, when the Bishop had received the late Mr. John Kensit for an interview at Fulham, and had given him tea. “It was all right to receive the man; but you shouldn’t ha’ given him tea.”