Chapter XXVI: Old Rome

The scene now passes from the Imperial Palace of New Rome on the Bosphorus to the Catholic Basilica of Old Rome on the Tiber, where the greatest of the Saxon line of emperors was about to claim the inheritance of the Cæsars and to instal his house as supreme in all Italian lands. It was Christmas eve, 967, on a bright morning of winter, when snow lay on Mount Soracte and on the higher ranges of the Sabine and Alban mountains. The Flaminian way, from the city gate under the Pincian hill, for the two miles to the Milvian bridge over the Tiber, was thronged with a motley crowd of the populace of Rome, bearing visible signs of its heterogeneous origin and lawless habits, along with officials, civil and ecclesiastical, in their state robes and with emblems of office, and strong detachments of Northern soldiers, both horse and foot, whom the Roman mob regarded with terror as monsters of ferocity and force. The prefect and the senate of Rome--a strange contrast from the senators who had gone to welcome Julius and Octavius some thousand years before--were hurrying along to meet their German emperor, intermixed with the standard-bearers of the Roman militia, the long processions of priests and choristers, and the counts and barons of the Italian fiefs in military array and fantastic armor. It was a strange jumble of races, types, and various characters. The mongrel and craven descendants of African, Syrian, or Slavonian slaves jostled the degenerate heirs of the ancient patricians, and both looked on with awe and wonder at the huge, fair-haired barbarians who took their orders from no man but their mighty chief, the Saxon Otto.

At the northern end of the Milvian bridge there had been erected a rude and hasty kind of triumphal arch, decorated with the emblems and colors of the emperor-king. Near it was posted, waiting to see the imperial procession pass, a small band of spectators, whose speech and garb proclaimed them to be foreigners at Rome. One was our friend Michael, the protocolist, who, with Joannes Kyriotes, the geometer, had been despatched by the ever-watchful Chancery of Constantinople on a roving and secret commission to observe the current of Italian politics, and especially to study the real feeling of the papal court, and also of the democracy of Rome. With them was Symeon, a learned divine, who was travelling to obtain traditions and legends for his great collection of the lives of saints and martyrs. A fourth foreigner was Alexios, an artist in mosaic decoration, who had been called from Byzantium to Rome to superintend the restoration of the dilapidated mosaics in the Church of St. Cosmas and St. Damianos. They were being personally conducted by Guido, a Sicilian long settled in Bari, in the Lombard Theme, a loyal subject of the Byzantine emperor. The whole party had their own armed attendants, as well as a small body-guard from the municipal police, for the state of Rome was far too unsettled to permit of distinguished Greeks being safe in the midst of a turbulent crowd.

"Is it possible," said Michael to Joannes, "that these battered walls of old Rome can have kept at bay for a single day the mighty King of Germany?"

"Well, they helped Belisarius to beat off the Goths," said Joannes; "but then they had our soldiers under a great chief inside them."

"I dare say they may serve to baffle Goths and Germans," said Michael, "but, though I am no soldier, I can see that these obsolete and now ruinous walls never could be compared for an instant with the mighty fortifications we could show them at home on the Bosphorus."

"The walls of old Rome are poor enough," Guido now broke in, "but the castle of the Archangel, with the chapel on the top of the old Mausoleum of the Antonines, that is a pretty stronghold, I assure you."

"I admit that that is a tremendous fort," said Michael, "and the sight of its tiers of colonnades and battlements makes one understand how Theodora and Marozia, Alberic and Octavian, managed to command the city and even defy both Lombard, Tuscan, and German."

"Ah," said Guido, "you honorable and reverend sirs in New Rome cannot conceive the pandemonium that has raged in old Rome ever since I can remember and all through my father's time. One Messalina after another, the daughter, the concubine, and the mother of a pope has made her lovers or her children despots of the city, bishops, or popes, as the fancy seized her. Every other year this Roman populace, which is no good at fighting, but has a diabolical genius for riot, breaks out and overturns consul, prefect, pope, and emperor, as the German king calls himself. Thereupon down comes an army of these hairy barbarians from Lombardy, over the Apennines or the Alps, bursts into these tottering gates, crowns a new pope, instals a new count as governor, massacres, hangs, tortures, and burns every man they find in their path."

"How many popes have you seen, Master Guido?" asked Symeon.

"John X., strangled in prison. Then Leo VI. and Stephen VII., both creatures of the foul woman who killed John. Then she made her own son pope by the name of John XI. A few years after this Marozia's son, Alberic, made Leo VII. pope, and, after him, Stephen VIII. and Marinus II. and Agapetus II., in succession. Then John XII., the grandson of Marozia, was the worst of them all--denounced by a synod as guilty of murder, perjury, incest, sacrilege, and magic. When John XII. was deposed, came Leo VIII., then Benedict V., who was also deposed, and now the successor of St. Peter is our Holy Father, the venerable John XIII., whom God, in His infinite goodness, give to live the years of St. Peter."

"Why, that makes as many as twelve Holy Fathers of Rome within forty years," said Michael, with a sneer.

"Such is Rome," said Guido; "and half of them were the lovers, sons, or nephews of a bloodthirsty harlot, at whose orders they sell bishoprics, blind, mutilate, torture, and crucify their opponents and rivals."

"And they call this the universal Church Catholic, and ask ours, the earliest Church of Christ, to submit to their sacred prerogative," said Michael, bitterly.

"Ah!" sighed Symeon, "it is a fearful backsliding. But God in His mercy will bring about their repentance in His good time. We, who compile the hagiographies of saints and martyrs, cannot forget that under these Roman basilicas there rest the bones of the blessed St. Peter and St. Paul, that this city has been ruled by Gregorys and Leos, and is sanctified by the blood of so many virgins and martyrs of the faith. The Church of Christ will be restored one day, and Rome again will be the centre of Christendom in Europe."

"I will not attempt to prophesy against your reverence," said Guido; "I can only speak of what is and what has been in all living memory. This famous city is now a den of bandits, the haunt of infamous women, and a scene of bloodshed and torment. These barons live in their castles amid gangs of hired ruffians, till they ride forth to fight one another or to plunder their neighbors. I have seen these gray walls hung with the carcasses of their victims, and these streets, churches, and streams run with blood, whenever the horsemen of some pretender to the throne or of the German princes come down to sack the city or to quell an insurrection of the citizens. I have seen popes made and unmade at the order of a profligate woman or of a murderous despot. I have seen one crowned pope trample on another crowned pope, break his crozier and tear off his robes in presence of an emperor and of all his court. I have seen the prefect of Rome hung by his hair from the statue of Constantine and dragged through the streets naked on an ass. I saw twelve 'captains of the regions' hung on gallows, while other leaders were blinded, some decapitated. Some were torn from their graves and their bodies cast to the dogs. This is the modern rendering of the Pax Romana, and all is done under orders of him whom we are waiting here to see, him whom they call their 'pacific emperor, Semper Augustus,' and with the blessing of the creatures whom he pleases to nominate as the successors of St. Peter."

This conversation of the Byzantines was fortunately not understood by the bystanders, and it was now broken off by the arrival of the German emperor and his staff. Otto of Saxony, who had been emperor for six years, and had been occupied ever since with the conspiracies, intrigues, and revolutions of Italian princes, prelates, and people, was now again entering Rome in martial array. He was guarded by powerful bodies of his Northern veterans, the terrible warriors with whom he had established his rule from the Tiber to the Elbe, with whom he had triumphed over Danes, Slavonians, and Burgundians, men who had fought with him on the tremendous field of the Lech, when he saved Europe from the Hungarian flood. These gigantic horsemen proudly bore aloft the ensigns of their great chief, and thrust their way with brutal contempt among the "dregs of Romulus" in the road.

In the midst of his chivalrous body-guard rode the great Otto in full panoply, acknowledging the salutations of the people with magnificent ease, making little difference in his bearing to prelate, baron, or captain of the urban militia. By his side rode his son Otto, then fourteen, destined to lay his bones in early life in the Church of St. Peter. And then came the Empress Adelheida, whose beauty and inheritance had first called the king into Italy. The imperial cortège was surrounded by German and Italian barons, and was welcomed by Roman prelates and nobles, with banners and the chanting of hymns and the boisterous acclamations of a fickle populace, which was ever ready to cheer or to revile, as the popular fancy swayed to and fro.

"Do you see that fierce, bull-headed lord on the black charger, and as proud as a peacock?" said Guido to his friends. "That is Count Pandulph, of Capua, now Lord of Spoleto and Beneventum. He is traitor to our Basileus--nay, the head of the traitors--and seeking to win favor from the German Basileus. That gay Roman prince is Crescentius of the Marble Horse, and by his side is the Count Benedict of Palestrina and the rich and beautiful Stephania, the senatrix. Now, watch that bishop on the mule in the train of the king; notice his keen face, his subtle glances all round, his easy smiles of welcome, how he fawns on the imperial officers, what airs of importance he assumes as he waves his blessing to those who salute him and thrusts aside those who impede his path.

"That is the Right Reverend Luitprand, the famous Bishop of Cremona--Patriarch of Christendom, as he thinks himself, and Lord High Parakeimomenos of his Frankish Majesty. Note him and listen to him. He talks Greek, Latin, Frank, or Hebrew, I am told--even Arabic at a pinch. He has the Cæsar's ear. We shall hear more of him."

As the Byzantine visitors made their way back to the city, their guide from Bari was occupied in answering their questions and satisfying their curiosity. "It looks as if the whole city had been destroyed by Saracens," said Michael; "I see nothing but ruins standing amid dunghills and rubbish heaps. And those huge towers of brick, with battlements of stone, rising out of mud hovels and fetid alleys. Are those the places of the Roman princes?"

"They look to me like the dens of robbers, piled up out of marble ruins. See those Corinthian columns and those porphyry slabs, awkwardly stuck into a huge barrack of bricks. These Romans use the ancient temples of the old gods as lime-kilns, and the circus and theatres of the Cæsars as so many quarries to make some gloomy fortress," said Joannes.

"Woe, woe is Rome!" groaned Symeon; "thy glory is departed. Desolation has made in thee its home!"

"Not only is the glory of Rome departed, but art, culture, letters, and manners have gone, too," said Alexios, the artist. "They curse the Vandals, Goths, Huns, and Lombards; but these Romans to-day are just as savage themselves, even worse barbarians, for they mangle and disfigure even their own ruins. All sense of beauty and all traditions of art seem to have quitted Italy and taken refuge on the Bosphorus or the shores of the Ægean. They could not decorate the smallest chapel without our help."

Early on the morning of Christmas day the Byzantine visitors were conducted into the Vatican Basilica to witness the crowning of the young Otto with the imperial diadem, the ceremony by which the politic emperor sought to fix the empire as hereditary in his house, and instal it in effective control of the whole of Italy. They found the German troopers strongly posted within and around the Castle of the Archangel, the frowning bastile which overawed Rome, and rudely thrusting back the unprivileged mob of sight-seers. From the Ælian bridge over the Tiber they traversed the long colonnade which led to the atrium of St. Peter's, with its fountain and the tombs of popes. There they witnessed the pope, John XIII., and his cardinals receive the imperial party on the thirty-five steps of the entrance. With martial surroundings and sacerdotal pomp the mighty Otto, his wife and son, were conducted into the basilica of Constantine, which had then been the venerated temple of Rome for six centuries and a half.

The Vatican basilica of the tenth century was, of course, wholly unlike the St. Peter's we see to-day. It was quite similar to the restored church of St. Paul's _fuori la Mura_, as we now see it, but it was some twenty feet longer and a little wider, and had five naves divided off by four rows of vast monolith columns. There were ninety-six in all, of various marbles, different in style and even in size, for they had been the first hasty spoils of antique palaces and temples. The walls, above the order of columns, were decorated with mosaics, such as no Roman hand could then produce or even restore. A grand arch, such as we see at the older basilicas to-day, enriched with silver plates and adorned with mosaic, separated the nave from the chancel, below which was the tribune, an inheritance from the prætor's court of old. It now contained the high altar and the sedile of the Vicar of Christ. Before the high altar stood the Confession, the vault wherein lay the bones of St. Peter, with a screen of silver such as the Greeks called _iconostasis_, crowded with silver images of saints and virgins. And the whole was illuminated by a gigantic candelabrum holding more than a thousand lighted tapers.

The Byzantine visitors were amazed to find the cathedral of old Rome so utterly different from their own St. Sophia at home. It was nearly one hundred feet longer and not much less in width. Its mosaics, its monoliths, and its tribune resembled those of the great temple of Justinian, but its flat roof, long aisles, rude workmanship, and want of symmetry roused contempt and pity from the cultivated taste of the Greek artist. The basilica of St. Peter's was indeed but a crude adaptation of the law-courts of the Cæsars, while the Church of the Holy Wisdom was one of the most original creations in the whole record of human art.

Otto, Adelheida, and their son were conducted by a splendid procession of nobles and prelates to their appointed places at the foot of the Confession, where they prostrated themselves in worship, and then passed on to their thrones. The emperor--for in Rome, at any rate, Otto was indeed the sole "Augustus, crowned by God"--was now not only master of Rome, of Northern and Central Italy, but practically lord of the pope and sovereign in all causes civil or ecclesiastical. Otto bore himself as in very deed the sovereign lord of the holy Roman empire. He condescended to beam approval on the act of his nominee, the holy father, when the pope raised the crown of gold and placed it on the beautiful head of the imperial boy, whom he pronounced to be Imperator Augustus, by the will of God. As these sacramental words rang through the church, all hushed in profound silence, the whole congregation burst forth into acclamations of "Long life and victory!" Thrice the shout was repeated; and then the choir broke forth with their "lauds"--reiterated and monotonous chants to Christ, angels, apostles, martyrs, and virgins, to grant the new Augustus the aid of Heaven to support him against all his foes.

"An impudent travesty of the secular ceremonies at the crowning of our Basileus, I say," Michael, the diplomatist, broke out, as the great crowd followed the imperial cortège into the atrium. "They copy our very phrases and words, as if that could make a barbarian king a Roman Augustus."

"The Saxon savage seems to fancy himself another Carolus, who, indeed, was a hero and a Cæsar. He, at any rate, felt some awe of the empire, and sought to be a good friend to our Basileus and his empire," said Joannes, the geometer, who knew history as well as science.

"Nay," said Michael, "Charles once talked of marrying his eldest daughter, Erythro, to our Basileus Constantine, and Irene, the Basilissa, sent over the court eunuch, Elisha, to instruct the baby Augusta in our language, literature, and deportment."

"Did not the pretender Charles, even after his mock coronation in the Vatican, actually propose to marry the Basilissa Irene himself?" said Joannes.

"Would that they would ask for a tutor, a professor, or a silentiary, eunuch or not, to come over and teach them a little of art, letters, and courtesy," said Alexios.

"Ah!" said Symeon, "if only that blessed alliance between the Basileus of our house and a Basilissa of theirs, between a Saxon king and an imperial princess, could be brought about, what tidings of great joy would it not bring!--peace on earth and good-will among men. The revered churches of Christ would come together again as one. The Catholic and the Orthodox faith could then unite to make Christ and His Cross prevail over the Hagarene, and convert the pagans of the North and the East!"

The idea of some conciliation--at least some _modus vivendi_--between the rival claimants to the Roman empire had long floated in the mind of the politic spirits of the age, and it occupied especially the designs of that far-seeing statesman Otto himself. The coronation of his son and heir brought the problem to an acute stage. The following day the emperor held a long and secret council in the Vatican palace in which he was installed. The monarch was now in his fifty-sixth year, his powerful form giving signs of his long career of toil and of battle; his fair hair was grizzled with years, and his majestic countenance deeply furrowed with thought and care. He sat on a dais with his loved queen by his side, and the young Otto, now imperial crown-prince, between them. The lad was auburn-haired, very fair, bright, delicate, and small even for his years. He looked but a puny successor for the mighty ruler of the West.

Otto had called to his council his very politic father, the pope, and his trusty delegate, the wily Bishop of Verona. Pandulph, Count of Capua, was there, and beside him the stout old chief, Duke Burckhard of Swabia. One or two Italian counts and prelates held a lower place at the board, and among them had been admitted a young Cluniac monk whose learning, experience, and acuteness had already recommended him to the pope and to the emperor. He was Gerbert of Aurillac, who was yet but twenty-seven, but his studies in the schools of Cordova, his lofty character and profound sagacity, had made him already a man of mark. And we know that he was destined, under the name of Silvester II., to prove himself to be one of the greatest of the popes and the most politic brain in Europe.

The emperor opened the council thus: "Holy father, right reverend prelates, noble counts, we have called you to this council to make known our will and to consult you on the means of compassing it. In the thirty years since we have worn the crown of our father, King Henry, we have welded into a single realm the German and Italian lands, and in these later years we have restored the empire of our glorious predecessor, Charles, and revived the dignity of the Roman name. The holy father has now conferred the imperial title on our son, who in due time will have to maintain our office in this holy Roman empire. It is true that your Otto is King of all German lands, of Burgundy, Bohemia, Poland, Suzerain of Denmark and of Hungary. We are King of Italy, and Roman Imperator Augustus; but our rule does not extend, in fact, to the south of Italy, over Apulia and Calabria. Those fair lands and ancient cities are still held by him who claims the imperial name, who rejects our right to use it, by that sovereign of the Greeks who are schismatics from the Holy Catholic Church, who deny to our holy father the title of Vicar of Christ on earth, as they deny us the right to call ourselves the representative of God here on earth. And beyond the southern limits of Italy lies that fair and rich island of Sicily, once a bright province of the Roman empire, but now enslaved by the Saracens and Moors of Africa, who cruelly ill-use the servants of Christ. It little boots if we rule from the Baltic to the Bay of Naples, from the Rhine and the Rhone to the Danube, if South Italy be not ours, if Sicily follow the False Prophet, and if the Greek who still calls himself Roman emperor reign within two days' march of Rome. Be it by arms or be it by policy, we are bent on transmitting to our heir all Italy as his kingdom, and the acknowledged title of sole Imperator Augustus. Right reverend and most noble councillors, shall this be done by policy or by arms?"

A long silence ensued, for none knew to which course the emperor inclined, and they hesitated to thwart his purpose. Otto looked round and scanned the faces of the councillors.

"My Lord of Capua and Beneventum," he said, "you look like a man who knows his own mind, and your fiefs lie next to those of the Greek. What says the Count Pandulph?"

"My liege," blurted forth the impetuous "Iron Head," "my voice is for war--open, sudden, and to the knife. These Greeks are crafty as foxes and cowardly as sheep. Hold no parley with them. Give me the order to march and twenty thousand lances, and we will sweep them away to the Bay of Tarentum and the Strait of Messina."

"How say you, my lord bishop, you who speak their tongue and have seen so much of their capital and court?" said Otto to Luitprand.

"My liege, as a civilian and a churchman, I am disposed to prefer the ways of peace and of policy. The brave Count of Capua would prove his valor against every enemy of your Imperial Majesty; but the Lombard and the Calabrian themes of the Basileus are countries most difficult to invade or to conquer. They abound in mountains, defiles, and torrents; they are defended by strong forts securely placed on rocks or on bays of the sea; what is worse is their fever-breeding plains, which are certain death to the gallant soldiers of the North. That which is even more important is this: the Byzantine fleet dominates the sea; the immense coast line is at its mercy; they can pour in endless supplies, provisions, arms, and succor. My liege, I advise an embassy to Byzantium. Seek for your son a daughter of their ruling house, and let the dowry of the Greek princess be stipulated to be the lands they unjustly withhold from the King of Italy, the Roman emperor."

"Can you induce their Basileus to yield so much?" asked Otto, with a smile. "We fear they hold themselves to be at least our equals in place."

"The fierce Armenian soldier who has married the widow of his Basileus is proud enough, self-willed enough, and filled with the ambition of a rebel angel. But they tell me he is losing favor both with Church and with people. He is beset on the north and on the east. Nicephorus is at death grapple with the caliph in Asia; he is menaced by Bulgarians and by Russians; he has enemies and traitors in his capital and his very palace. His people long for peace. They are very rich, very politic, and careless of the honor of their name. If well plied with persuasive words, they will yield. Demand the hand of Theophano, the daughter of Romanus, with the Italian themes as her dowry. The empire will regain two noble provinces, our imperial prince will gain a lovely bride, and the grandson of your Majesties, a third Otto that is to be, will wear the crown of a sole and undivided empire, without a rival and without an enemy."

"You look gloomy, most noble duke," said the emperor, as he turned with a keen eye to Burckhard at his side. "Does this splendid prospect of our sagacious bishop not approve itself to your valor?"

"My liege," said the duke, stoutly, his huge limbs writhing with suppressed excitement, "your grace is a German king; I am a German duke. Your realm, north of the Alps, is of vast extent, and in perpetual peril of enemies, traitors, and conspiracies. Half of it has only been won or pacified by your own invincible arm and your unsleeping wisdom. Danes, Poles, Slavs, Hungarians, and Franks are not finally crushed. They may pour in again. Not while you live, my honored chief. But will this fair boy by your side wield the mighty sword of his father? Will an unborn Otto be able to control the brave, free, aspiring races of our fatherland? Will younger Ottos curb the restless mob of Rome and the craft of these Italian barons? My king, return to your German kingdom, and make that secure for your house and your people. Let not the house of Henry the Saxon be drowned in these Italian lagoons, and the blood of Saxon warriors drench the pestilential plains of Italy. They are brave as men can be, but they are not proof against the fevers and the wiles--and the harlots--of this land of sin, of poison, and of ruin."

"The holy father will not admit this apocalyptic picture of the Eternal City," said Otto, with a lofty smile; "and you forget, most noble duke, that we are the Roman emperor, crowned of God by his holiness here. We together are charged by Christ, the Son, with the care of the Church Catholic and this holy empire, of which Italy is the oldest and fairest part. What says his holiness?" the emperor asked, calmly restraining the storm rising between his Teuton and his Latin councillors.

"Our advice will be given in the private ear of your Imperial Majesty, as is most meet for the servant of the servants of Christ. But I will ask you now to listen to my young friend here, this learned brother, who has seen so much of the courts of Spain, Gaul, and Italy, whose observations may be useful to your grace."

Otto assented with a gracious smile, and the young monk Gerbert stepped forward at the summons, his keen face lighted up with genius and the play of Gallic eloquence dancing in his mobile lips.

"If I presume to speak in this august presence and in so eminent a council, it is only that I have lived in the lands of the Franks and in that of the caliph of Spain and have some knowledge of the powers that lie to the west of the empire and of this Italian kingdom. The wealth, the power, the science, and the arts possessed by the people who obey the Ommayad caliph at Cordova are incredible--not easily to be conceived by those who have not witnessed them. The so-called Fatimite caliph of Africa has power and resources equally great. It is he who holds in his grasp the rich island of Sicily. In Asia the children of the False Prophet have been gaining for generations on the people of Christ. To the north and to the east of the German realm there lie Poles, Hungarians, Russians, and Slavonians, who are hardly within the fold of the Church, who care little for our sovereign lord, the emperor, and even less for our holy father, the pope of Rome. It will be a tremendous task to make them Catholic and Romans. If all this be so, the union of all Christian princes and of all Christian churches is the one thing urgent and necessary. Let us pray for the day when all Christian rulers and all Christian men may go forth in a holy war against the unbelievers, to rescue the tomb of Christ and of His blessed Mother, of the apostles and saints, and to preserve the people of our Lord from the blasphemies of Mohammed. It will soon need all the combined strength of Christendom to protect the Church of Christ. That will be a most terrible day when Christian princes and Christian churches are in death-grip with each other. Would that our sovereign lord, the emperor, could make some alliance with those who rule in Byzantium! Oh, that old Rome could be led to stretch forth the hand of brotherly communion to new Rome! Oh, that one day all those who claim the inheritance of Constantine might do homage to an imperial descendant of our lord the emperor."

"May I speak, since this matter of state seems to touch so closely myself?" said the imperial youth, with his sweet smile and bright look to his father. "I long for such a bride as the bishop describes the princess--lovely, graceful, brilliant, with all the charm of that polished court and all the genius of old Greece. Her mother came, they say, from Lacedæmon, and drew her race from the hero kings of Sparta, of whom I have read with my tutor in old Plutarch."

"His imperial highness speaks the truth with his usual discernment," fawned the courtly bishop; "they who have not seen Byzantium cannot imagine its splendor and the majesty of its state. An alliance with the daughter of Romanus, the Basileus, granddaughter of the eighth Constantine Born-in-the-Purple, as they boast so often, would give fresh glory even to the son of Otto, to the grandson of Henry. The empire of the mighty Charles has been sundered for a hundred years. If it were merged by marriage in the race of Constantine, it would shine forth again like the sun risen after a gloomy night."

"What says our empress?" asked Otto. "For this touches her deeply, too, and must move a mother's heart."

"My lord," said Adelheida, still beautiful, thoughtful, and loving, devoted to the hero of her young dreams, "a Greek princess, graceful, accomplished, and intelligent, would add fresh lustre and culture even to your throne, mighty as it is."

"But will our advances be well received by him who occupies the golden palace of Justinian?" said Otto.

"Nicephorus Phocas," said the bishop, positively, "is between the devil and the deep sea, as our Lombard proverb runs; he has no choice. He will grasp your offer. He has restless Bulgarians on his northern border and fierce Saracens on his eastern frontier. Byzantine churchmen and officials now in Rome here tell me that the people and the Church are weary of him. The army has a new favorite. The widow whom he married cares for him no more. Nicephorus will yield, if he be pressed by an envoy of superior culture, who knows how to handle an uncouth soldier."

"We will consider of this embassy and project of alliance," said Otto as he broke up the council. "Mother and son, churchmen and civilians, are for peace, love, and friendship. My lord of the Iron Head and of the Iron Hand, with his gallant men-at-arms, is all for war. It may not be impossible to try them both, and see which of the two our friend the Basileus prefers. My lords and reverend sirs, we thank you."