Christianity is now so closely connected with the idea of superiority in knowledge, wealth, and war, that many readers may be surprised to hear of its having been seriously endangered by an external enemy since its first triumph and establishment. To our ancestors, however, the unparalleled rapidity and success with which the followers of Mahomet extended their religion and their empire, was a subject of serious and just alarm. Within fifty years of the prophet’s expulsion from Mecca, Constantinople itself, the metropolis of the Christian world, was besieged by the Caliph, the successor to his temporal authority: within a hundred years the Saracenic empire extended from the confines of India to the Pyrenees. In the year 714, scarcely three years from the first invasion of Spain, Musa, the victorious lieutenant of the Caliph, prepared to pass that mountain barrier, to extinguish the kingdoms of the Franks and Lombards, and to preach the doctrines of Mahomet in the church of the Vatican. He proposed to conquer the barbarians of Germany, to follow the Danube to the Euxine Sea, to overthrow the Constantinopolitan empire, and thus unite the eastern and western dominions of the Saracens. His ambitious progress was checked and himself recalled by the jealousy of his master; but in the year 731 Abderahman resumed the bold projects of his predecessor. Gascony and Languedoc were already subject to the sovereign of Damascus, when, in 732, that enterprising soldier led a vast army to complete the subjection of France. He had already advanced unchecked to the banks of the Loire, when Charles Martel, the mayor of the palace, in name a household officer, but in authority the sovereign of France, collected his forces, and advanced to the deliverance of Europe. For six days the armies confronted each other, making trial of each other’s strength in skirmishes: on the seventh, one Saturday in the month of October, 732, the final battle, that of Tours,[14] took place which was to decide whether Europe should remain Christian, or the Cross sink under the Crescent. The light and active Saracens, whose defensive armour was merely a quilted jacket, and their weapons arrows and javelins, rushed fiercely to the attack; but they made little impression on the solid battalions of the Franks, bristling with spear–points, and protected by their close–locked shields. The latter were no match for their assailants in agility of manœuvring, but the weighty arm and steady foot made up for this deficiency. The Saracen cavalry charged up to their ranks in vain; they were compelled to rein their horses round, and when wearied and broken by their fruitless efforts, the Christians advanced and routed them with great slaughter. In the heat of the battle, Eudes, Duke of Aquitaine, led his troops round upon the enemy’s camp, overthrowing all before him, and contributed greatly to the victory by the tumult and confusion thus produced. “Then was Charles