Here, then, at Aachen, Charles built himself a lordly palace and a church, joined together by a colonnade. For both these structures he or his architect, Master Odo, borrowed the plan from Ravenna; the palace being built after the pattern of Theodoric’s palace, and the church, which was dedicated to the Virgin Mary, being a copy of that dedicated to San Vitale. Nor was the plan the only thing which was borrowed. Columns and marble tablets were brought from Rome as well as from Ravenna. The mosaics from Theodoric’s palace and the equestrian statue in gilded bronze of the great Ostrogoth--a work apparently of more artistic merit than most of the productions of the sixth century, were all carried off from the city on the Ronco[68] to adorn the Belgic palace of the new emperor. Near the palace was a wide-stretching forest surrounded with walls, full of game, resounding with the song of birds and watered by the little stream of the Worm. Of all these memorials of the great emperor probably nothing now remains but the church. The deer-park has doubtless long since disappeared: of the palace all that can be said is that the Rathhaus is built upon its site: but the _Capella in Palatio_ still stands, and is included in the much later building which is known as the Münster. It is about 100 feet high and 50 feet in diameter, surmounted by an octagonal cupola and surrounded by a sixteen-sided cloister. The resemblance to San Vitale at once strikes the visitor who is acquainted with the churches of Ravenna. It was certainly a triumphant era for the Frankish nation--still _one_, not yet fallen asunder into diverse and hostile nationalities--when the embassies of mighty kings from east and west trod the streets of the little city in Rhine-land which their ruler, sprung, not from a long line of kings but from a family of Austrasian nobles, had made the seat of his empire. Thither came swarthy Saracens from Bagdad, ambassadors from the court-- Of Haroun, for whose name by blood defiled, Genius hath wrought salvation.