death, Lothaire hath attacked us, in order to destroy us, this my brother and me.  Having never been able, as brothers and Christians, or in any just way, to obtain peace from him, we were constrained to appeal to the judgment of God.  Lothaire was beaten and retired, whither he could, with his following; for we, restrained by paternal affection and moved with compassion for Christian people, were unwilling to pursue them to extermination.  Neither then nor aforetime did we demand ought else save that each of us should be maintained in his rights.  But he, rebelling against the judgment of God, ceaseth not to attack us as enemies, this my brother and me; and he destroyeth our peoples with fire and pillage and the sword.  That is the cause which hath united us afresh; and, as we trove that ye doubt the soundness of our alliance and our fraternal union, we have resolved to bind ourselves afresh by this oath in your presence, being led thereto by no prompting of wicked covetousness, but only that we may secure our common advantage in case that, by your aid, God should cause us to obtain peace.  If, then, I violate—­which God forbid—­this oath that I am about to take to my brother, I hold you all quit of submission to me and of the faith ye have sworn to me.”

Charles repeated this speech, word for word, to his own troops, in the Romance language, in that idiom derived from a mixture of Latin and of the tongues of ancient Gaul, and spoken, thenceforth, with varieties of dialect and pronunciation, in nearly all parts of Frankish Gaul.  After this address, Louis pronounced and Charles repeated after him, each in his own tongue, the oath couched in these terms:  “For the love of God, for the Christian people, and for our common weal, from this day forth and so long as God shall grant me power and knowledge, I will defend this my brother, and will be an aid to him in everything, as one ought to defend his brother, provided that he do likewise unto me; and I will never make with Lothaire any covenant which may be, to my knowledge, to the damage of this my brother.”

When the two brothers had thus sworn, the two armies, officers and men, took, in their turn, a similar oath, going bail, in a mass, for the engagements of their kings.  Then they took up their quarters, all of them, for some time, between Worms and Mayence, and followed up their political proceeding with military fetes, precursors of the knightly tournaments of the middle ages.  “A place of meeting was fixed,” says the contemporary historian Nithard, “at a spot suitable for this kind of exercises.  Here were drawn up, on one side, a certain number of combatants, Saxons, Vasconians, Austrasians, or Britons; there were ranged, on the opposite side, an equal number of warriors, and the two divisions advanced, each against the other, as if to attack.  One of them, with their bucklers at their backs, took to flight, as if to seek, in the main body, shelter against those who were pursuing them; then suddenly,