"August Prince," answered the clerk, his head swimming at the thought of such unheard-of good fortune, and dropping on his knees: "It rests with God and your will to decide my fate." "Arise. I appoint you Bishop of Limburg. But follow me. It will be well for you to learn, from personal observation, the greed with which bishoprics are striven for. The riches that they entail may be judged from the ardor with which their possession is pursued. And yet, once won, the cupidity of the incumbents, so far from being assuaged, seems whetted. Do you remember, Eginhard, that insolent Bishop of Mannheim? When, at the time of one of my campaigns against the Huns, I left him near my wife Hildegarde, did not the worthy feel so inflated with the friendship that my wife showed him, that he carried his audacity to the point of demanding from her as a gift the gold wand that I use as a symbol of my authority, for the purpose, as that impudent bishop declared, of using it for a cane? By the King of the Heavens! The sceptre of Charles, of the Emperor, is not so readily to be converted into a walking stick for the bishops of his empire!" "You are in error, Charles," put in Amael. "Sooner or later, the bishops will use your sceptre for a baton by means of which to drive peoples and kings as may suit themselves." "By the hammer of my grandfather! I will break the bishops' mitres on their own heads if ever they dare to usurp my power!" "No; you will do no such thing, and for the simple reason that you stand in fear of them. As a proof, behold the vast estates and the flatteries that you shower upon them." "I, fear the bishops!" cried the Emperor; and turning to Eginhard: "Is that matter of the rat settled with the Jew?" "Yes, seigneur," answered Eginhard, smiling. "The bishop closed the bargain yesterday." "That happens in time to prove to you that I am not afraid of the bishops, seigneur Breton--I, flatter them? When, on the contrary, I miss no opportunity to give them severe or gentle lessons wherever they deserve reproof. As to the worthy ones, I enrich them; and even then I look twice before bestowing upon them lands and abbeys belonging to the imperial domains. And the reason is plain. With this or that abbey or farm I am certain of securing to myself some soldier vassal greatly more faithful than many a count or bishop." Thus pleasantly chatting, the Emperor regained his palace, and in the company of Vortigern, Amael, Eginhard and the freshly appointed Bishop of Limburg, re-ascended the steep spiral staircase that led to his private apartment. Hardly had Charles entered his observatory when one of his chamberlains announced to him: "August Emperor, several of the leading officers in the palace have solicited the honor of being admitted to your presence in order to lay a pressing request before you--the noble lady, Mathalgarde (she was one of the numerous concubines of Charles) also called twice on the same errand. She awaits your orders."