Page:History of the Franks.djvu/198

1 66 HISTORY OF THE FRANKS given over to gluttony and his belly was his god. He used to say that no one was wiser than he. He wrote two books on the model of Sedulius, but their feeble little verses can't stand on their feet at all, since for lack of understanding he put short syllables for long ones and long for short. He wrote pamphlets also and hymns and masses which can in no wise be received. He hated the causes of the poor. He was always blaspheming the bishops of the Lord, and when he was in retirement he belittled and ridiculed no one more than the bishops of the churches. He called this one light- headed, that one vain, another lavish, another wanton, another conceited, another pompous. He hated nothing more than churches. For he often used to say: "Behold our treasury has remained poor, behold our wealth has gone to the churches, no one reigns if not the bishops ; our ofhce will perish and be transferred to the bishops of the cities." Going on in this way he would always break wills that were made in favor of churches and he trampled under foot the last directions of his own father, thinking that there was no one left to require the execution of his will. As to lust and wantonness nothing can be found in thought that he did not realize in deed. And he was always looking for new devices to injure the people and of late years if he found any one guilty he would order his eyes torn out. And in the directions he sent to his judges to secure his own advantages he would add this: "If any one disre- gards our orders let him be punished by having his eyes torn out." He never loved any one sincerely and was loved by no one, and therefore when he died all his people deserted him. But Mallulf bishop of Senlis, who had been sitting in his tent three days and had been unable to see him, came when he heard he was killed, and washed him and put on better garments, and spent the night singing hymns, and took him in a boat and buried him in the church of St. Vincent which is at Paris, leaving queen Fredegunda in the cathedral. Here Ends in Christ^s Name the Sixth Book of the His- tories. Thanks be to God. Amen.