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Table of Contents

ATTALUS ARRIVES AT METZ.—BARBAROUS MANNERS OF THE FRANKS.—PERSECUTION OF ATTALUS.—OPPRESSION OF THEODORIC, AND CONSPIRACY AT AUVERGNE.—CRUEL CONDUCT OF THE KING.—ATTALUS SOLD FOR A SLAVE.—CONVEYED TO THE CASTLE OF DAGOBERT.—HIS PERSECUTIONS AND SUFFERINGS THERE.—HIS CONDUCT UNDER AFFLICTION.

Attalus found things very different at Metz from what he had been accustomed to in the Christian province of Auvergne. The houses, indeed, abounded with silver and gold, and splendid furniture, the spoils of other nations, which had been torn from their lawful owners, by the robber Franks; but there was but little to promote the comforts and conveniences of life, of which this barbarous people had no idea. Neither learning nor the arts had any place among them: all they thought of was eating, drinking, riot, and excess of every kind. Their manners were rude and uncourteous; scarcely one of their feasts passed off without quarrels, at which swords were drawn and blood shed, even in the king's presence; and, in a word, the Austrasian Franks were heathens in principle and in practice.

The young hostages were at first lodged in the palace of the king, and shared with the sons of the Frankish nobles the honour of waiting upon him at his meals. They also carried his weapons when he went abroad, and attended him at church, where the conduct of Theodoric gave Attalus frequent opportunities of remembering the observations of his grandfather, the Bishop of Langres. The service was hastily hurried over, without due regard to Christian order or Christian holiness; and the Frankish chiefs conversed irreverently, or played with their weapons and the ornaments of their dress, instead of joining in the devotions of such of the congregation as appeared to consider themselves in the temple of God.

Before the concluding benediction was well ended, both king and people hastened from the cathedral, and consumed the rest of the Sabbath in barbaric dances and ribald sports. There was, indeed, but little difference, as the Bishop of Langres had said, except in name between the baptized sovereign and his Pagan subjects.

Many attempts were made by the young Franks to render the Christian hostages of Auvergne as wicked and as regardless of the displeasure of God as they themselves were. In some instances their mockeries and seductions prevailed; but on Attalus temptations, ridicule, and threats, were alike tried in vain, both by the heathen youth of the court of Metz, and the weak-minded among his own countrymen, who, having yielded to evil counsel and evil inclinations, wished to make him a companion in their guilt.

It was not by his own strength that Attalus was enabled to stand, when several who were his elders, and apparently of a sterner disposition than himself, fell. It was through the grace of God, to whose protection he commended himself daily, that he was supported through every trial, and manfully resisted the snares with which he was beset in the infidel city of Metz.

Meantime, the tyrannical dominion of the Franks, and the enormous taxes which they exacted, became unbearable to the people of Auvergne. They began to feel, that even the loss of their twelve youthful hostages would be a less misfortune to the country than the state of misery to which they were reduced by the foreign tyrant, who had treated them with the arrogance of a conqueror, instead of the paternal kindness of a sovereign. In spite, therefore, of the entreaties of those whose sons had been given up as pledges of their fealty to the King of the Franks, some of the chief men entered into a conspiracy to free their country from the yoke of the oppressor.

When Theodoric heard this, he not only took active measures for defeating their project, but immediately sold all the young hostages as slaves to his ferocious nobles. It was the hard lot of Attalus to fall into the hands of an old heathen chief named Dagobert, who stripped the noble youth of the rich ornaments and costly robes which he had heretofore been accustomed to wear, and having arrayed him in the coarsest garments, put an iron collar about his neck, on which was engraved, "Attalus, of Autun, the slave of Dagobert, the lord of Gurm." He then carried him away into the wild desolate country of Treves, where his hideous old castle was situated, in the midst of a chain of barren hills; a situation where the air was cold enough to chill the very marrow in people's bones, and nothing would grow except a little stunted prickly underwood.

When Attalus, who was fastened by a leathern thong to his master's stirrup, to prevent his making his escape, first beheld this dismal place, his heart seemed to die within him. How different was the scene from the prospect of his own fair land of Auvergne! There the bright sparkling Aube flowed through plains of emerald verdure, and the inexhaustible fertility of the rich arable soil supplied perpetual harvests; there the southern hills were wreathed with clustering vines, and clothed with flowers and lovely foliage; and there the undulating landscape was studded with marble villas, built after the Roman order of architecture.

With the thoughts of his country, too, came tender remembrances of his beloved parent, his venerable grandsire, and all the sweet and pleasant ties of kindred, of friends, and of home. The feelings of the tender-hearted boy were at length overcome by the weight of his afflictions, and the heart-sick exile paused and wept.

"Slave, wherefore dost thou tarry?" growled the harsh voice of Dagobert.

"I am no slave, but a free-born Christian, the heir of the noble Count of Autun!" said Attalus; "I have never before been treated like a dog; and I will go no further."

"Thou wilt not?" replied Dagobert; "then must I teach thee that thou art my slave, and that thy duty is obedience!" He accompanied these words with severe blows, and poor Attalus being chained to his stirrup, was compelled to proceed, though his shoes were worn, and his feet, lacerated by the rocky paths he had traversed, bled at every step.

When they came to the castle-gate, a number of wretched slaves and half-naked servants came out to receive their lord, together with a company of men-at-arms, with large battle-axes stuck in their girdles. Their long braided locks of hair dangled over their ears, and they looked like a gang of ferocious robbers.

They welcomed Dagobert with savage cries of pleasure; for, now he had returned, they would be able to go forth, as usual, to commit all sorts of depredations on helpless travellers, to ravage the neighbouring country, and to pillage the flocks and herds of the peaceful inhabitants. It was thus that the warlike followers of the Frank chiefs got their living by spoil and violence, even in times of peace; and their lord's castle was a strong-hold of wickedness, murder, and oppression.

Attalus shuddered when he entered the gloomy walls of Gurm, wherein he was condemned to become a hewer of wood and a drawer of water, among the servants and slaves of his barbarian master. He found neither kindness nor compassion from any one, but was treated with unfeeling derision. The whiteness of his hands, and the delicacy of his skin, which the Franks considered as proofs of effeminacy, were fruitful subjects of their rude mirth.

Dagobert had only one daughter, who was married to a barbarian chief named Clodobert. This Clodobert was not a whit more amiable than the old heathen, his father-in-law; but having no inclination for fighting, he always staid at home, to take care of the castle, to till the barren lands of Gurm, and to fatten and sell the cattle, which his father-in-law and his rapacious followers carried off from the pastoral valleys in the neighbourhood, that were not protected by paying tribute to the Austrasian monarch.

Clodobert carried on a great trade in horses, for the mutual profit of his lordly father-in-law and himself. When, therefore, he found that the new slave, Attalus, was gentle and kind in his treatment of animals, never teasing or playing tricks with them, like the other slaves and domestics of Dagobert, he took him into his favour, removed him from his servile occupation in the castle-yard, and employed him as the keeper of the horses in the barren pastures, at the foot of the mountainous eminence on which the castle of Gurm was situated.

Attalus infinitely preferred this service, where his duties were regularly and distinctly pointed out to him, to his first situation of drudge-general to every one who chose to call upon him, and impose some difficult, and perhaps impossible task. It had not unfrequently happened, that while he was doing one thing, other persons of the ill-ordered household reviled or beat him for not having done something else. Then there were half-a-dozen children of Clodobert and his heathen spouse—young barbarians, who combined the mischievous folly and restless vivacity of childhood with the cunning and wickedness of riper years, and ran wild about the castle, tormenting every one they came near. The mild and graceful captive of Auvergne was an especial object of their malignant sport; they pinched, bit, and scratched him, without remorse, pulled his long, dark ringlets, and followed him wherever he went, hanging on his garments, and calling him by insulting epithets of contempt.

It required all the firmness and Christian-like forbearance of Attalus, to restrain him from repelling with violence those malign imps. They only laughed at his remonstrances, and threatened him with their mother's vengeance, if he endeavoured to prevent them from committing the most dangerous acts of mischief, such as running about with lighted firebrands, setting on the ferocious wolf-dogs to attack him, or piercing his flesh with their newly-shod arrows.

So intolerable did poor Attalus find these young barbarians, that the cheerless solitudes of the bleak plains, and the company of the horses, were to him a most blessed change. But his delicate frame was nipped by the cold east winds, and he suffered greatly from his exposure to the torrents of rain that frequently descended from the mountains, and a thousand other hardships, to which he, who was born the heir of greatness, and had been tenderly nurtured by fond parents, had never been accustomed.

Sadly did the forlorn captive miss the affectionate intercourse of friends and kindred; but above all did he lament the loss of Christian instruction, and the opportunity of joining in public worship. His private devotions were, at this time, his only solace. The desolate slave, though despised by men, could still hold communion with his God, and though his weary body was denied the privilege of Sabbath-rest, his spirit found refreshment in heavenward meditations, which taught him to submit, with patient meekness, to the hardships of his bitter bondage.