CHAPTER V AT MARSEILLES LANDING at Marseilles, Candidus would welcome them. The patrimony of St. Peter of which he was rector, was probably an estate in the neighbouring country, and its little house too small to entertain so large a company. But Candidus knows the city, and would easily arrange for their sojourn for a while to recover from the fatigues of their voyage, and to make their plans for the more difficult part of their journey. There were two monasteries in the city, they would be their appropriate resting-place, and both would be glad to offer hospitality to the monks of St. Andrew's, and to have the merit of assisting them in their glorious enterprise. Here, then, they would make some stay, Augustine probably visiting the neighbouring bishops to whom he had Gregory's letters of introduction, while his monks remained in their quarters. At Marseilles they would find merchants able to give them the best information about the journey which lay before them, and the prospect which awaited them at the end of it; for almost, a century before the Christian era, the agents of the commercial colony of Marseilles had visited the distant island in search of new markets, and during all the intervening time the intercourse between Britain and the Roman world which encircled the Mediterranean Sea had been carried on through the great Greek emporium. It had long been They found Gaul full of trouble. in a state of intermittent civil war. Frank territory was divided, according to the national custom, among the four grandsons of Clovis the Conqueror. Charibert held the Kingdom of Paris, Guntram of Orleans and Burgundy, Chilperic of Soissons, and Sigebert of Austrasia. These brothers were continually at war with one another. The chief interest gathers around Chilperic and Sigebert; the other two brothers played minor parts in the history; or rather, the interest centres in their queens, Fredegonda and Brunhilda, who were actuated by a deadly hate. The powerful Austrasian King was stimulated to action by Brunhilda, seeking vengeance for the wrongs of her sister, the former wife of Chilperic, who had been murdered by the agents of Fredegonda, with Chilperic's connivance-as it was believed, for the talented, versatile Chilperic was under the influence of the beautiful demon Fredegonda. Chilperic died, and was succeeded by his infant son, Chlotaire II., in whose name Fredegonda ruled over Neustria. In 593, three years before the point at which we have arrived in our history, Guntram had died, and Childebert succeeded to his dominions. In 596, Childebert died, and was succeeded by his two sons, Theodoric receiving Austrasia, and Theodebert the remainder of their father's dominions; they were both boys, and their able grandmother, Brunhilda, virtually ruled the greater part of the Frankish Empire in their names. Fredegonda died in the early part of 597 A.D., and there was peace for a few years, which might be at any moment, and soon actually was, broken by the ambitions of the rival sovereigns. It was during this pause in the chronic condition of civil war that Augustine and his party arrived. Still, since there was a cessation of hostilities, there was no immediate danger in the journey through France. But the Italians had gathered still more unpleasant information of the condition of things in the country which was to be the scene of their future work. War still raged through the middle of the island from north to south, between the fierce heathen invaders and the civilised and Christian inhabitants of the land. In Northumbria, the precise goal of their journey, there were frequent wars between the rival royal houses of the two kingdoms of Deira and Bernicia into which it was divided, like the wars between the rival brother kings of France on a smaller scale; this was complicated with a war between the Northumbrians and the native Britons, who for many years after this time kept up a stubborn resistance, and even forty years afterwards (635 A.D.), under Cadwalla, actually reconquered the whole kingdom. Northumbria, at the best, was in the cold, bleak northern part of the land, and the Angles were a fierce and barbarous people; wars and rumours of wars everywhere. When brought face to face with it, the monks must have been greatly impressed with the universal disruption and confusion. It must have strengthened in their minds the general belief that the world was coming to an end. Accustomed as they were to the quiet of the cloister of their stately house in Rome, they were greatly alarmed at the prospect before them. Bede says: "They were seized with a sudden fear, and began to think of returning home rather than proceed to a barbarous, fierce, and unbelieving nation, to whose very language they were strangers." Augustine either shared their fears or was overpowered by their remonstrances, and consented to return to Rome and entreat Gregory that they might be relieved from "so dangerous, toilsome, and uncertain a journey." They did not knowhow could they?-that out of the break-up of the old world a new and better world was rising up, and that they were to play no unimportant part in laying the foundations of the new order in one corner of that ultima thule of pagan barbarism, to lay the foundationstone of that mighty fabric of a Christian England, destined to exercise so great an influence upon the future history of the world. We may picture to ourselves, if we will, the moment when Augustine presented himself at the Palace of the Lateran; the grave, sorrowful amazement of Gregory; the head bowed with shame of Augustine, as he knelt at the feet of his abbot and bishop. We may imagine the gentle reproaches of Gregory, his unfaltering resolution, his spiritual encouragement; how he would point out that the dangers of the enterprise made it more glorious; that monks must not shrink from hardships; and that if death itself awaited them, death would be martyrdom; how he would express his grief that higher duties would not suffer him to go at once and put himself at the head of his faltering sons, and lead them in person to the holy war; and how he would gradually inspire his own lofty spirit into the heart of Augustine, and win from him the declaration to do or die. Then would follow a sober consideration of practical measures. Augustine would report what he perhaps had in his mind when he consented to return to Rome; that the south-east portion of the island was more settled and civilised; that the king had lately married a Christian princess of the Franks, who had allowed a bishop to come in her train to minister to her; and that Kent would therefore offer a more favourable opening for their work than the wild Deira to which they had been sent. Gregory was a statesman and a man of good sense, and would recognise that this providential incident promised a safe footing for his mission to the English, and favourable circumstances for the beginning of its work. He sent Augustine back, strengthening his authority over his companions by giving him the formal position of their abbot; he also gave him some new letters, one to the monks themselves, another to Stephen the Abbot, and perhaps others. This is the letter to the monks : Gregory, the Servant of the Servants of the Since it were better not to begin a good work than to think of turning back from it when begun, it behoves you, most beloved sons, to accomplish the good work which, with the help of God, you have undertaken. Let not, therefore, the toil of the journey nor the tongues of men predicting evil deter you; but with all earnestness and zeal finish what, by God's direction, you have begun, knowing that a great labour is followed by a greater glory of eternal reward. When Augustine, your prior, whom I have |