arlemagne had its walls completely razed
to the ground, "in order that," as he said, "that city might not be able
to revolt." The troops entered those same passes of Roncesvalles which
they had traversed without obstacle a few weeks before; and the
advance-guard and the main body of the army were already clear of them.
The account of what happened shall be given in the words of Eginhard,
the only contemporary historian whose account, free from all
exaggeration, can be considered authentic. "The king," he says,
"brought back his army without experiencing any loss, save that at the
summit of the Pyrenees he suffered somewhat from the perfidy of the
Vascons (Basques). Whilst the army of the Franks, embarrassed in a
narrow defile, was forced by the nature of the ground to advance in one
long, close line, the Basques, who were in ambush on the crest of the
mountain (for the thickness of the forest with which these parts are
covered is favorable to ambuscade), descend and fall suddenly on the
baggage-train and on the troops of the rear-guard, whose duty it was to
cover all in their front, and precipitate them to the bottom of the
valley. There took place a fight in which the Franks were killed to a
man. The Basques, after having plundered the baggage-train, profited by
the night, which had come on, to disperse rapidly. They owed all their
success in this engagement to the lightness of their equipment and to
the nature of the spot where the action took place; the Franks, on the
contrary, being heavily armed and in an unfavorable position, struggled
against too many disadvantages. Eginhard, master of the household of the
king; Anselm, count of the palace; and Roland, prefect of the marches of
Brittany, fell in this engagement. There were no means, at the time, of
taking revenge for this cheek; for after their sudden attack, the enemy
dispersed to such good purpose that there was no gaining any trace of
the direction in which they should be sought for."

[Illustration: Death of Roland at Roncesvalles----227]

History says no more; but in the poetry of the people there is a longer
and a more faithful memory than in the court of kings. The disaster of
Roncesvalles and the heroism of the warriors who perished there became,
in France, the object of popular sympathy and the favorite topic for the
exercise of the popular fancy. The _Song of Roland,_ a real Homeric poem
in its great beauty, and yet rude and simple as became it