Excerpt from The Abbatial Crosier: Or Bonaik and Septimine, a Tale of a Medieval Abbess The turbulent epoch that rocked the cradle of the Carlo vingian dynasty, the dynasty from which issued the colossal historic figure of Charlemagne, is the epoch of this touching story - the eighth of the series of Eugene Sue's historic novels known collectively under the title The Mysteries of the People; or, History of a Proletarian Family Across the A yes. From the seething caldron of the valleys of the west ern Rhine, inundated by the Arabs from the south, the Frisians from the north, the Saxons from the west, and in which the chants of Moslems, of Christians and of barbarians mixed into the one common cry of desolating war, the feudal social system, previously introduced by Clovis, and now threatened to be engulfed, emerged from the chaos as a social institution. Many a characteristic of feudalism would be missed if this, a crucial period of its existence, is not prop erly apprehended. As in all the others of this series of Eu gene Sue's stories, the information is imparted without the reader's knowledge. What may be termed the plot seizes and keeps the interest from start to finish, steadily enriching the mind with knowledge historically inestimable, besides connecting with the era described in the previous story The Branding Needle; or, The Monastery of Charolles - and preparing the ground for the thrilling events that are the subject of the succeeding narrative -the Carlovingian Coins; or, The Daughters of Charlemagne. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.