children, his power shall revert to the elder brother. And if he shall happen to have children from concubines, we exhort the elder brother to act mercifully towards them.
16. But if at our death either of them shall happen not yet to be of lawful age according to Ripuarian law, we will that, until he arrive at the established term of years, just as now by us, so by his elder brother, both himself and his kingdom shall be cared for and governed. And when he shall come to be of lawful age, he shall in all things possess his power according to the manner laid down.
17. But to our son, if God will that he be our successor, the kingdom of Italy shall in the aforesaid manner be sub- ject in all things, just as it was subject to our father, and remains subject in the present time to us, bv the will of God.
18. We exhort also the devotion of our whole people, and that firmness of a most sincere faith, the fame of which has spread among almost all nations, that if our son, who by the divine will shall succeed to us, shall depart from this life without legitimate heirs, they shall, for the sake of the salvation of all, and the tranquillity of the church and the unity of the empire, follow the conditions that we have made in the matter of his election, and elect one of our sons, if they shall survive their brother; so that in choos- ing him they shall seek to fulfil, not a human will, but the will of God.
IV.
TREATY AT AIX BETWEEN LOUIS II. AND CHARLES THE BALD CONCERNING THE DIVISION OF THE KINGDOM OF LOTHAR II. A.D. 870.
(Altmann u. Bernheim, "Ausgewiihlte Urkunden," p. 16. Berlin, 1891.)
In the year of the Incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ 870, on the day before the Nones of March, in the 32nd year of the most glorious king Charles, in the palace at
