for his surrender to France of these large territories the Austrian emperor was permitted to join the French in destroying the ancient commonwealth of Venice, which with all that was oligarchical in its government had at least some show of self-ruling about it. The French and the Austrians divided the Venetian territories between them. When in 1798 Bonaparte planned his expedition to Egypt and the French needed money to finance it the Directory of France calmly proceeded to attack Switzerland, for some six centuries a republic, for no better reason than because the town of Berne was known to possess a large treasure. The French Revolution would seem then utterly to have failed in its purpose, but it was only an eclipse for a time and in spite of many vicissitudes its spirit was to work for good for more than a century later. Napoleon came to be the hammer by which a great many of the presumedly most firmly established things of the old order in Europe were smashed upon the anvil of war to be made over for the better, though the betterment was often not immediate.

The greatest woman character of the century in the best sense of the word was Maria Theresa, queen of Austria or "king," as her Magyar subjects loved to call her, and finally Austrian empress. Her father had anticipated trouble for his daughter's rule and made the treaty called the Pragmatic Sanction to secure it, but his worst portents were confirmed and Maria Theresa was scarcely seated on the throne before she became embroiled in a series of wars for the preservation and integrity of her states. Probably no woman in history has ever taken her duties as sovereign more seriously. On the other hand as the mother of 17 children she took her domestic duties quite as seriously and was a model wife and mother. Her letters to Marie Antoinette during the French troubles show her maternal solicitude at its best and her wisdom as a ruler and administrator. She treated her subjects very much as she did her family, with the most loving care and profound wisdom. She practised strict economy, encouraged manufactures and commerce, reformed the army with the idea of preventing bloodshed by being prepared for war, and organized a system of military colonies on the frontiers so as to prevent invasion and save her subjects from the worst hardships of war, that of having the enemy in their midst. Above all Maria Theresa won the love of all the different peoples who composed her multilingual kingdom. It has always been a historical mystery why the heterogeneous peoples who constitute the Austrian Empire have hung together and it has often been supposed that it was a mere question of armed force and repression. There can be no doubt, however, that there was real attachment to the house of Hapsburg and that above all Maria Theresa's long reign of nearly 50 years had much to do with creating a spirit of solidarity among these peoples. Her readiness to do for the suffering among her people was literally unbounded. It is said that once she was driving through a part of the country where famine was rife and people were starving. Passing by a mother seated at the roadside trying to nurse her child, and evidently unable to supply it with food, the empress threw a piece of

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money into her lap and told her to get something to eat, but the mother with tears in her eyes insisted that it would be too late to save her baby. The mother of 17 children might well be expected to be in a condition to supply for lack of infant food, and so the starving baby nursed at the Imperial breast and its life was saved. It is easy to understand that among peoples who had traditions of acts of this kind on the part of their empress queen, deep feelings of affection would be aroused to become a tradition in favor of the family of which she was a member.

The one thing that stains the reign of Maria Theresa is the partition of Poland. There is no doubt at all that she entered upon it with great unwillingness and felt that she was forced to take part lest there should be such a disturbance of frontiers and the balance of power in central Europe as would leave her kingdom and people open to attack under unfavorable conditions. Perhaps another fault was the association of her son Joseph II in the government. Maria Theresa was a woman of heart

and high administrative powers. Her son Joseph was an intellectual prig who was quite sure that humanity could be made better by rules and regulations and that men could be governed by sweet reasonableness and intellectual reform. His career as a ruler was an utter failure. He tried to make himself a benevolent autocrat for the benefit of his subjects and was so terribly disappointed by his failure that he died a broken-hearted man before he was 50.

Women were destined to play an extremely important rôle in 18th century history. The reign of Queen Anne is a great period in English history but unfortunately unworthy women were to be the most influential characters of the time. The most noteworthy of these whose career is typical in many ways of the lamentable political influences that were at work was Catherine II, the empress of Russia, who reigned from 1762 to 1796. She was not a native Russian, but a princess of AnhaltZerbst in upper Saxony. Her name Sophia Augusta was changed to Catherine on her admission into the Greek Church just before her marriage with Peter who had been selected to succeed his aunt, the Empress Elizabeth, on the throne of Russia. She was not the first thus to be lifted from obscurity to the high position of empress of the Russians, for her earliest predecessor in the 18th century, Catherine I, the wife of Peter the Great, who reigned for two years after his death, 1725 to 1727, was the natural daughter of a country girl in Livonia. The first Catherine, after having been the mistress of a series of Russian generals, attracted the attention of the tsar and became his mistress and subsequently his wife. She died at the early age of 40, her end being hastened by dissipation. She never learned to read or write, but she knew how to manage men. The second Catherine was quite as dissipated, and had even more administrative ability, but she had devoted herself to her own education until she came to be looked up to as one of the scholars of the time. She was a friend of Voltaire and of the Encyclopedists. She was a great believer in the new social philosophy which they preached, and maintained cor

respondence with them. Her husband frittered away his life in senseless dissipation, but while the Empress Elizabeth lived, Catherine maintained some show of respectability and acquired deep influence over her. Her mode of life, however, soon became such as to make the paternity of her children a matter of grave doubt. With the death of Elizabeth the halfimbecile Peter, her husband, soon got into serious difficulty with his people and his nobles, and Catherine through her lovers took advantage of this to secure the throne.

All during her life Catherine continued to live most licentiously. One lover succeeded another, though one favorite, Potemkin, maintained his influence over Catherine for some 15 years, supplying her with new favorites when his mistress's personal inclination for himself suffered an interval or ceased entirely. Catherine's lovers are said to have cost Russia over $100,000,000 at a time and under circumstances when money was worth at least five times as -much as it is now. In spite of this utterly depraved personal character Catherine ruled Russia for Russia's advantage though not for the benefit of her subjects. She pursued relentlessly the policy of giving Russia an egress for its commerce by sea. She succeeded in bringing Courland with its Baltic coast line into the Russian Empire, had Poniatowski, an old lover, elected to the throne of Poland, and finally brought about the infamous division of Poland

Catherine obtaining about two-thirds of the Polish territory. An insurrection of the people under Kosciusko, the Polish hero of the Ameri

can

Revolution, failed, the Russian army stormed Warsaw and the last trace of Poland as an independent country was obliterated (1794). It was the foulest deed in history. War with the Turks led to Catherine's conquest of Bessarabia and other countries down to the Caspian and came near realizing the Russian empress' dream of driving the Turks entirely from Europe and the establishment of her own empire at Constantinople. She was completely alienated from all sympathy for French ideas by the progress of the French Revolution and prohibited the publication of French works in Russia. French admirers used to call her the Semiramis of the North and her career, political and moral, amply justifies the comparison, with the moral balance in favor of the ancient ruler who anticipated Catherine by some 2,500 years. It was the presence of such rulers as herself and Louis XV during the 18th century that brought about the reaction against monarchical government which was to attract so much attention during the 19th century.

This century contains the most important chapter in the history of music. Scarlatti (1659-1725) who wrote some hundred operas, a number of oratorios and an immense amount of ecclesiastical music, introduced three novelties destined to influence music deeply. The two principal of these are the Sinfonia or Overture and the accompanied recitative. Every country in Europe took up music and made distinct contributions to it. Purcell's work in the 17th century in England had finely prepared the public mind, and Handel and Bach completed the organization of the art of music on a firm footing. It has been said that "these two great composers of the 18th century, wrote

every combination of musical notes that down to our latest times has ever been employed with good effect.".. "The more the works of these masters are studied the more are they found to foreshadow the supposed novelties in harmony, employed by subsequent artists." (MacFarren, Encyclopædia Britannica'). The period includes also the life and works of Glück who did so much to unite music and plot in opera into one harmonious whole. Piccini, Glück's rival in the famous musical war in Paris, was a much less important musician, but he had dramatic power and real musical talent. Haydn, often spoken of as the father of the symphony, contributed greatly to the development of music and some of the sons of the great Sebastian Bach have an enduring place in the history of musical art. Mozart whose untimely death at the age of 35 cut him off in the flower of his achievement is one of the greatest musicians of all time. Before the end of the century Beethoven had rounded the symphony into its modern form and left the world eternally his debtor for his marvelous command over notes. The opera comique of the French which dates from early in the 18th century, the distinction from grand opera being that there was spoken dialogue interspersed with the music, provided opportunity for the development of lighter music that was to occupy so much attention in modern times. What is noteworthy, however, in the 18th century is the depth and seriousness of interest of even the general public in music. Handel's oratorios were given to crowded houses and as Frederic Harrison has said "the ill designed churches of the period were often crowded with people who were deeply touched by the sacred music given and whose emotions were heartfelt and not at all the result of any fashionable or conventional feeling."

The literature of the 18th century, opening with 'The Rape of the Lock' and closing with Goethe's 'Faust,' must surely be considered as of significant import in the history of literature. It includes in Germany the work of Winckelmann, Lessing and Herder, as well as the youth of Schiller; in France the writings of Montesquieu, of Voltaire and the Encyclopedists, and in England such historians as Hume, Robertson and Gibbon, as well as such potent writers of English prose and verse as Addison, Steele, Samuel Johnson, young Wordsworth and Robert Burns. Frederic Harrison has suggested that it is the first age since that of Augustus which ever left inimitable pictures of its own daily home existence. The Spectator, Walpole's and Fanny Burney's letters and the novels of Richardson, Fielding and Smollett have given a picture of the times that has probably never been equalled. What is interesting above all about the literature of the 18th century is its interest in ordinary human beings. The problems of men as men were here first stated in literature and sympathy aroused for even the lowest of mortals. Gay's 'Beggars Opera, Crabbe's Tales' and Defoe's and Swift's romances are representative in this regard. Defoe and Swift wrote from so close to the heart of human nature that their best works are forever popular.

Education reached a very low ebb in the

18th century so that Cardinal Newman suggests the middle of the century as representing probably the lowest period in the history of university education, when the students at Oxford and Cambridge scarcely more than "ate their terms, that is, lived in residence to receive their degrees, while Winckelmann, wanting to teach Plato at the end of the century, had to have manuscript copies of the author because no Greek edition had been issued in Germany for over 100 years. Philosophy, however, was the subject of a good deal of attention and exploitation usually on the part of men not directly connected with the universities. It is the age of Locke, of Hume and of Bishop Berkeley in England, whose stay in America influenced Jonathan Edwards, of Voltaire and the Encyclopedists in France and of Kant in Germany. The work of these men lived to influence the 19th century. Religion was at a low ebb and it was an age of scepticism. The work of the devoted John Wesley in England, which proved the incentive for the Oxford Movement of the succeeding century, was the first index of reaction. French philosophy in its atheistic aspects was curiously enough a child of English scepticism. Voltaire and the French Encyclopedists (see ENCYCLOPEDIA) attracted attention rather by the brilliancy of their style, the keenness of their wit and their biting satire than by depth of thought. Voltaire himself pronounced the period an "age of trivialities." Rousseau suggested the abandonment of artificial culture and refinement and the going back to the primitive state of nature because it seemed hopeless to guide men by reason. Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations represented the English philosophy of independent morality applied to practical life.

The 18th is above all the century of the fundamental organization of the physical sciences in their modern form. The period crystallized the data of scientific information, till then held in solution, and gave the physical sciences the form they have maintained since. Physics, chemistry, botany, zoology, comparative anatomy, electricity and psychology as well as the elements of social science both in history and in statics took shape. Lancisi at the beginning of the century in Italy and at the end of the century Hunter and Bichat in England and France revolutionized methods and results in the sciences related to medicine. Morgagni founded pathology. Jenner's discovery of vaccination marked the dawn of a new era in therapeutics. Auenbrugger initiated clinical diagnosis, and the example of such men as Percival Pott, after whom Pott's disease (q.v.) and Pott's fracture are named, gave a new impetus to accuracy of surgical diagnosis. The Vienna School of Medicine began its work as an inheritance from some great students of Boerhaave at the beginning of the century, and such men as Cullen, Heberden, Currie, Fothergill. Huxham left an indelible impress upon medical history. Franklin, Galvani, Volta laid the foundations of the science of electricity while Priestley, Lavoisier and Scheele were doing similar work in chemistry. Laplace, La Grange and others were adding to the magnificent work that Newton had accomplished at the beginning of the 18th century, recognizing very clearly the surpassing value of their predecessor's work. La Grange declared that Newton, whose 'Prin

cipia' received its final form in this century, "was the greatest genius that ever existed." Beside him deserve to be named such men as Halley of the comet, Euler, the Bernouillis, the elder Herschel and Legendre. The century was also particularly fruitful in mathematical genius. In the biological sciences Cuvier, Buffon, Geoffroy St. Hilaire and Lamarck, most of whose work was accomplished before the century closed, did work that was destined to leave its impress deeply upon their sciences. It required much more than merely talent and application to make the first great steps in these sciences and only positive genius could have done what these men achieved.

The greatest heritage of the century to succeeding generations was what has come to be called the industrial revolution. Up to the latter half of the 18th century men had paid very little attention to mechanical inventions and their development. The people of western Europe did their farming, made their cloth and continued to do most of the domestic manufactures at least almost in the same way as the ancients had done. It has been said that "if a peasant, a smith or a weaver of the age of Cæsar Augustus had visited France or England 1800 years later he would have recognized the familiar flail, forge, distaff and hand loom of his own day." (Robinson). All this was to be changed in the course of a single generation, however. A series of machines came to replace hand labor and accomplish ever so much more in vastly shorter time than before. The essential processes remained the same, only now by the aid of machinery they were accomplished more rapidly.

In 1767 Hargreaves, an English spinner, invented what was called the spinning jenny. With this a single workman by the help of a wheel could spin 8 or 10 threads at once and thus do the work done formerly by as many spinners. In 1768 Arkwright invented a machine for rolling threads. Some 10 years later Crompton combined Hargreaves' spinning jenny and Arkwright's roller machine into what was called the spinning mule. With this as many as 200 threads could be spun at once, and when the steam engine came and power was applied a few hands could do the work of hundreds. The gradual improvement of the steam engine by James Watt, who had been called in to repair a model of a steam engine made more than half a century before by an English mechanic named Newcomen, greatly facilitated the development of industry. In 1785 a steam engine was first employed to run spinning machinery, Arkwright adopted it in 1790, and after this such engines became extremely common and the factory system replaced the old domestic system of manufacture almost completely.

This so called labor-saving machinery threw many out of employment, though it brought together a great many workmen in the employ of a new class that now developed in the population, the capitalist. John Stuart Mill about the middle of the 19th century, when he could see clearly the result of the industrial revolution, declared that all our labor-saving machinery in spite of its name had never saved mankind an hour of drudgery, but on the contrary had made it possible for a large number of workmen to work for a few and usually to

work long hours in unsanitary, ill-ventilated factories, compelling them to live in crowded slums not far from the factories because their long working day did not allow them the time to go or come farther to their work. The industrial revolution worked an immense amount of social harm, led to the employment of women and children for such long hours and under such unsuitable conditions as proved seriously detrimental to health, and it took more than a century before humanity wakened up to the necessity for regulating industry in such a way as to conserve the rights of man.

JAMES J. Walsh, Author of The Thirteenth the Greatest of Centuries.

PRINCIPAL EVENTS OF THE 18TH CENTURY. 1701. Frederick (III) Elector of Brandenburg is crowned first King of Prussia, 18 Jan.

1702. Anne, Queen of Great Britain, begins her reign. 1703. St. Petersburg is founded by Peter the Great. 1704. Battle of Blenheim.

1707. The union of Scotland with England is ratified and the first parliament of Great Britain assembles. 1708. The British defeat the French at Oudenarde.

1709. Charles XII of Sweden is defeated at Pultowa, 30 June. Battle of Malplaquet, 11 Sept.

1713. Treaty of Utrecht signed, 30 March.

1714. George I, Elector of Hanover, becomes King of Great Britain.

1715. Scotland revolts; the Stuart Pretender appears, but his supporters are defeated at Sheriffmuir.

France dies.

1717. The Turks are defeated at Belgrade.

Louis XIV of

1718. Charles XII of Sweden is killed at the siege of Frederickshall, Norway.

1720. The South Sea Scheme, 7 April-29 September, collapses. Victor Amadens, duke of Savoy, becomes King of Sardinia.

in France.

1722. Peter the Great assumes the title of Czar of Russia. 1725. Death of Peter the Great. Persecution of Protestants 1727. George II becomes King of Great Britain. 1728. Rise of Methodism in England. 1733. France and Poland at war.

1736. Kien-Lung ascends the throne of China. He receives embassies from Russia, Holland and Great Britain. 1739. Nadir, Shah of Persia, conquers the greater part of the Mogul Empire.

1740. Frederick the Great begins to reign. Maria Theresa becomes Queen of Hungary.

1743. The Allies defeat the French at Dettingen.

1744. Great Britain declares war against France, 31 March. Commodore Anson completes his voyage around the world.

1745. Battle of Fontenoy, 30 April. British forces take Cape Breton, N. S. Rebellion in Scotland. English forces defeated at Gladsmuir, 21 Sept.

1746. English forces defeated at Falkirk, 17 Jan.

Scotch forces defeated at Culloden, 16 April, and the rebellion suppressed.

1747. Defeat of the allied army at Lafeldt. British victory over the French fleet. The Prince of Orange becomes Stadtholder.

1748. Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle between Great Britain, Spain, Austria and Holland.

1752. Calendar revised in Great Britain, Sept. 3 becoming Sept. 14.

1756. Seven Years' War begins. Rupture between Great Britain and France.

1757. Damien's conspiracy against Louis XV. Prussian victory at Rosbach over French and Austrians, 5 Nov. King of Prussia becomes master of Silesia.

1759. France loses Canada in the final battle of the Heights of Abraham.

1760. George III begins his reign. 1763. Seven Years' War ends with Frederick victorious. Peace ratified at Paris between Great Britain, France and Spain.

1764. The British Parliament grants Mr. Harrison $50,000 for discovering the longitude by his chronometer. 1766. American Stamp Act repealed.

1769. Captain Cook's discoveries in the Pacific Ocean. 1772. First Partition of Poland by Russia, Prussia and Austria. Revolution in Sweden.

1773. Captain Cook's voyage to the Antarctic, reaching 71° 10' south latitute.

1774. Louis XVI of France begins his reign.

1775. The American Revolution begins, 19 April. Battle of Bunker Hill, 7 June.

1776. The American Declaration of Independence proclaimed, 4 July.

1777. The surrender of Burgoyne at Saratoga, N. Y., 7 Oct.

1778. Alliance of the French and Americans, 30 Oct. 1779. Siege of Gibraltar. Captain Cook killed at Hawaii. 1780. British naval victory over the Spaniards near Cape St. Vincent, 16 Jan. American defeat at Camden, 16 Aug. 1781. The surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown, 18 Oct. 1783. Treaty of Peace between Great Britain and the United States.

1786. Warren Hastings impeached for misrule in India. Shay's rebellion in Massachusetts.

1787-88. United States Constitution drafted at Philadelphia and ratified.

1789. The States General meets in Paris. The French Revolution begins. The King accepts the declaration of the Rights of Man. France divided into 83 departments. Washington elected President of the United States. 1790. Titles of nobility suppressed in France. 1791. Coalition between Austria and Prussia, 27 Aug. The French Constitution ratified, 3 Sept.

1792. Peace of Jassey, 9 Jan. Gustavus III of Sweden assassinated, 16 March. The September massacres in France. France declared a republic, 22 Sept.

1793. King Louis XVI beheaded, 21 Jan. Queen Marie Antoinette beheaded, 15 Oct. War declared by England against France, 1 Feb. Toulon captured by the English, 28 Aug. Reign of terror in France.

1794. Robespierre beheaded. English defeat the French fleet. Battle of Fleurus, 26 June.

1795. Holland invaded by the French. Belgium annexed to the French Republic. The remainder of Poland partitioned between Russia, Austria and Prussia. Jay's treaty between United States and Great Britain.

1796. Bonaparte's campaign in Italy.

1798. Irish Rebellion. Bonaparte's campaign in Egypt. The Battle of the Pyramids. Bonaparte made First Consul.

1799. The siege of Acre.

Death of Washington.

1800. United States capital removed from Philadelphia to of Ireland Washington. Union with Great Britain ratified by Parliament. EIGHTH CENTURY, The. The 8th century is a cardinal epoch in modern history because it witnessed the culmination of the struggle in the east and west of Europe by which it was decided that European civilization should be Christian rather than Mohammedan in character. The failure of the Saracens to capture Constantinople in the early part of the century (718) and the decisive defeat inflicted upon the Moors at Tours (732) by Charles Martel followed by Charlemagne's successful campaign (777) which pushed Moorish dominion below the Ebro in Spain definitely settled that Christianity was to have an opportunity for free development in Europe. It was the fashion a generation or two ago to suggest the possibility that civilization might have advanced more rapidly under Mohammedan dominion than actually proved to be the case under Christianity. The opinion was dictated primarily by the love of paradox though undoubtedly supported by the tendency to minimize the really great work of the Middle Ages through ignorance of their genuine achievement and to exaggerate the place of the Moors in education, literature and, especially, in science. What actually happened in the Mohammedan countries in spite of the magnificent incentive afforded them by their close touch with Greek civilization in the East is the historical demonstration that their definite repulse in the 8th century was for the benefit of humanity.

At the beginning of the 8th century the caliphs ruled from India over Persia, Arabia, Syria, Armenia, Egypt, Morocco, Spain and what is now France beyond Narbonne, as well as most of the islands of the Mediterranean and not a little of southern Italy. The backwardness in civilization of all of these regions that remained under Mohammedan rule is the answer of history to the insinuations of Gibbon and his imitators as to the benefits the Arabs might have conferred on humanity. Fortunately in the 8th century there came a division of the caliphates which greatly diminished Moham

medan power and reunion never took place. The raising of the siege of Constantinople (718) was due more to one man, Leo, known as the Isaurian, than to any other factor. Leo was the son of a shoemaker who rose by military and administrative genius to be emperor and founded a dynasty. Like self-made men at all times he was confident that he could solve all problems since he had solved so many, and his interference in Church matters separated Christianity into two parts that in spite of many well-directed attempts have not united again. Leo and his son Constantine Copronymus declared against the worship of images in religion and encouraged the so-called iconoclasts or image breakers who did so much to disturb both religion and art in the East during this century.

Defeated in their attempts on Constantinople the Mohammedans forced their way along the northern shore of Africa, crossed the Straits of Gibraltar and succeeded in conquering Spain. In 711 they won a great victory over the Visigoths which made them masters of the country, and by the end of the first quarter of the century they had overrun the peninsula and were crossing the Pyrenees to menace Gaul. The Duke of Aquitaine held them in check for a time, but they defeated him near Bordeaux in 732 and advanced toward Tours. Between Tours and Poitiers their immense host was met by Charles Martel (the Hammer) and completely defeated in one of the decisive battles of history. There are few authentic details of the battle though it would seem to have been, as far as we know, the conflict with the greatest numbers engaged ever fought between men at any time in history except in our present Great War. Charles Martel was the mayor of the palace of the western Frankish king. The Merovingians had ruled since Clovis' time, but weaklings ascended the throne and the Prime Minister, who was called the mayor of the palace, became the real ruler. Charles' son Pepin, surnamed the Short, acquired even more power than his father and finally put to the Pope the question whether the king should reign when his power was gone, received the answer that it seemed better that he who had the power in the state should be king, and so Pepin began the Carolingian dynasty. Pepin was the father of Charlemagne who was destined to consolidate France, conquered the surrounding countries, including a portion of Spain from the Moors, put down the barbarians on the north and acquired dominion over northern Italy.

Charlemagne is the heart of the 8th century. The only man in history with whose name the adjective great has become so thoroughly incorporated that most people think of it as an essential part of his name, and he thoroughly deserves that distinction. At his accession Charlemagne's kingdom was the bulwark of the Christianity of the West. At his death his empire included most of western and southern Europe. Thought of usually as a warrior his greatness is reflected much more in his successful pursuit of a far-reaching constructive policy. He put an end to the process of political disintegration which had been at work in Europe since long before the fall of the Roman Empire, and he made it possible for men to think of

progress and civilization in place of being constantly occupied with resistance to barbarian aggression which for three centuries had been their one preoccupation. It was a fitting consummation of his work that he was crowned emperor of the Romans by the Pope at Rome on Christmas Eve of the year 800. It was a striking omen of the new outlook for Europe when in the first year of the 9th century and of the Imperial reign an embassy arrived with precious Oriental presents from the great caliph of the East whose name is as well known in history and romance as Charlemagne's own — Haroun al Raschid.

Charlemagne lives in romance through his expedition into Spain, whither he went to put an end to the menace of the Moors to his kingdom by attacking them in their own stronghold. After some years of war, begun at the instance of an embassy from Spain, in the year of the mystical number 777, he succeeded in conquering all the district north of the Ebro, and established there the Spanish March, a name given to outlying districts of his domain whose rule was committed to special officials called margraves, or counts of the marches, or marks, from which our word marquis. Charlemagne's defeat of the Moors was the first step in the gradual expulsion of the Mohammedans from Spain which was not to be accomplished in its entirety for over 700 years. On the return from his victorious expedition to Spain the rear guard of Charlemagne's army was attacked and cut to pieces by the Basques in the pass of Roncesvalles, in the Pyrenees. The battle of that name, fought by Roland and his Paladins with surpassing courage to the bitter end, was celebrated in song and story for many centuries afterward. The prodigies of valor there done tinged even the tales of chivalry which were to occupy so much Spanish attention in the later Middle Ages and whose influence was felt until Cervantes laughed the romances of chivalry

away.

Charlemagne lives in history much more as a lawgiver, an organizer of the civil functions of his great empire and of education and opportunities for intellectual development than even for his success in arms. At his invitation Alçuin, called a Saxon monk by Charlemagne's earliest biographers, but claimed an Irishman (Albinus) by many writers, was invited to organize the schools all over Charlemagne's dominions. He was given the powers of Imperial Minister of Education. He well deserved Charlemagne's confidence. As Duruy says: "Alcuin was truly a scholar; he was familiar with Pythagoras; often cites Aristotle, Homer, Plato, Virgil and Pliny, and is one of the most noticeable instances of the union of those elements so difficult to harmonize, the spirit of ancient literature with the spirit of Christianity." It is interesting indeed to read of his founding in the palace of Charlemagne an academy in which the emperor and all his family and all the nobility at court were members. In this academy the emperor bore the name of David, Alcuin took the name of Flaccus, while other members took such names as Homer, Plato and Virgil. We have some 300 of his letters addressed by this modern Aristotle to the Alexander of the West.

Charlemagne's efforts for the provision of