nobles were almost entirely Frank. There was an understanding that the
king could only act by their consent, and must be chosen by them; but
matters went more by old custom and the right of the strongest than by
any law. A Salic law, so called from the place whence the Franks had
come, was supposed to exist; but this had never been used by their
subjects, whose law remained that of the old Roman Empire. Both of these
systems of law, however, fell into disuse, and were replaced by rude
bodies of "customs," which gradually grew up. The habits of the time
were exceedingly rude and ferocious. The Franks had been the fiercest
and most untamable of all the Teutonic nations, and only submitted
themselves to the influence of Christianity and civilization from the
respect which the Roman Empire inspired. Charles the Great had tried to
bring in Roman cultivation, but we find him reproaching the young Franks
in his schools with letting themselves be surpassed by the Gauls, whom
they despised; and in the disorders that followed his death, barbarism
increased again. The convents alone kept up any remnants of culture; but
as the fury of the Northmen was chiefly directed to them, numbers had
been destroyed, and there was more ignorance and wretchedness than at
any other time. In the duchy of Aquitaine, much more of the old Roman
civilization survived, both among the cities and the nobility; and the
Normans, newly settled in the north, had brought with them the vigour of
their race. They had taken up such dead or dying culture as they found
in France, and were carrying it further, so as in some degree to awaken
their neighbours. Kings and their great vassals could generally read and
write, and understand the Latin in which all records were made, but few
except the clergy studied at all. There were schools in convents, and
already at Paris a university was growing up for the study of theology,
grammar, law, philosophy, and music, the sciences which were held to
form a course of education. The doctors of these sciences lectured; the
scholars of low degree lived, begged, and struggled as best they could;