Aye, slavery thus rendered the rich Gaul, who was ever accustomed to comforts, the brother in misery and sorrow of the poor Gaul who previously knew what arduous work was. Aye, the woman of white hands and delicate complexion was thrown together with the woman whose hands toil had roughened and whose complexion the sun had tanned--both were rendered by slavery sisters in dishonor and shame, and were cast weeping, or, if they resisted, bleeding into the bed of the Frankish seigneur, whom, on the Sunday following a Gallic priest would regularly give remission for his sins!
Oh, our fathers! Oh, our mothers! By all the sorrows that you underwent! Oh, our brothers and our sisters, by all the sorrows that you now undergo! Oh, our sons! Oh, our daughters! By the dregs of the cup of humiliation and disgrace that you are made to drain! Oh, you all, by the tears that drop from your eyes, by the laceration of your bodies--you will be avenged! You will be avenged upon these abhorred Franks!
But let us step into the burg of the seigneur. By the faith of a Vagre! By the sweat and the blood of our fathers that have moistened and crimsoned every beam, every stone of this structure--it is a comfortable, spacious and handsome building, this burg of the seigneur count! Twelve well rounded oaken beams support the portico; it leads directly into the _mahl_, as these barbarous chiefs style the tribunal where they dispense their seigniorial justice--a vast, spacious hall, in the rear of which, and raised on a platform, is the seat of the count, and the benches of the leudes who assist him in the ceremony. There he holds his _mahl_ and judges the crimes committed on his domains. In a corner of the room a stove, a rack and pincers are seen--no justice without torture and execution. In yonder opposite corner and even with the floor is a wide tank full of water and deep enough for a man to drown in. Near the tank lie nine plow-shares. These are all instruments for _judicial trials_; they are prescribed by the _Salic Law_, the law of the Franks, to which Gaul is now subject, seeing the land is in the power of Frankish conquerors.
And yonder door, made of solid oak, thick as a hand's palm, and covered with sheets of iron and enormous nails--that door is the door of the chamber in which the treasures of the noble seigneur are kept. Only he keeps the key. In that apartment are the large boxes, likewise ribbed with iron, where he locks up his gold and silver sous, his precious stones, his costly vases, both sacred and profane, his necklaces, his bracelets, his gold-hilted parade sword, his handsome bridle with its silver bit and his elaborately silver-ornamented saddle with stirrups of the same metal--all stolen from this noble land of Gaul.