Amongst the Franks, as amongst all barbaric populations, hunting was the pastime preferred when war was not being waged. The Merovingian nobles were therefore determined hunters, and it frequently happened that hunting occupied whole weeks, and took them far from their homes and families. But when the season or other circumstances prevented them from waging war against men or beasts, they only cared for feasting and gambling. To these occupations they gave themselves up, with a determination and wildness well worthy of those semi-civilised times. It was the custom for invited guests to appear armed at the feasts, which were the more frequent, inasmuch as they were necessarily accompanied with religious ceremonies. It often happened that these long repasts, followed by games of chance, were stained with blood, either in private quarrels or in a general _mêlée_. One can easily imagine the tumult which must have arisen in a numerous assembly when the hot wine and other fermented drinks, such as beer, &c., had excited every one to the highest pitch of unchecked merriment. [Illustration: Fig. 42.--Costumes of the Women of the Court from the Sixth to the Tenth Centuries, from Documents collected by H. de Vielcastel, in the great Libraries of Europe.] Some of the Merovingian kings listened to the advice of the ministers of the Catholic religion, and tried to reform these noisy excesses, and themselves abandoned the evil custom. For this purpose they received at their tables bishops, who blessed the assembly at the commencement of the meal, and were charged besides to recite chapters of holy writ, or to sing hymns out of the divine service, so as to edify and occupy the minds of the guests. Gregory of Tours bears witness to the happy influence of the presence of bishops at the tables of the Frank kings and nobles; he relates, too, that Chilpéric, who was very proud of his theological and secular knowledge, liked, when dining, to discuss, or rather to pronounce authoritatively his opinion on questions of grammar, before his companions in arms, who, for the most part, neither knew how to read nor write; he even went as far as to order three ancient Greek letters to be added to the Latin alphabet. [Illustration: Fig. 43.--Queen Frédégonde, seated on her Throne, gives orders to two young Men of Térouanne to assassinate Sigebert, King of Austrasia.--Window in the Cathedral of Tournai, Fifteenth Century.]