The conscientious man, who knows to what straits even the British Museum is put, by the influx of unnecessary books, will not lightly write, still less publish, a new work. The Author of the present volume seeks an excuse in the comparative novelty of his subject, and in the ready access he has enjoyed to the sources of Frankish history, many of which have only been cleared and rendered available during the last few years by able editors and commentators in Germany.<br><br>The following pages are the result of studies, the chief object of which was to gain an insight into the age of Charlemagne. They are offered to the public in the hope that they may throw some little light on one of the darkest but not least important ages of the world, when, in the early dawn of modern history, rude hands sowed the seeds of Christian civilisation.