"On returning from Rome to Austrasia, Charlemagne sent Louis at once to take possession of his kingdom.

From the banks of the Meuse to Orleans the little prince was carried in his cradle; but once on the Loire, this manner of travelling beseemed him no longer; his conductors would that his entry into his dominions should have a manly and warrior-like appearance; they clad him in arms proportioned to his height and age; they put him and held him on horseback; and it was in such guise that he entered Aquitaine.

He came thither accompanied by the officers who were to form his council of guardians, men chosen by Charlemagne, with care, amongst the Frankish 'leudes,' distinguished not only for bravery and firmness, but also for adroitness, and such as they should be to be neither deceived nor seared by the cunning, fickle, and turbulent populations with whom they would have to deal." From this period to the death of Charlemagne, and by his sovereign influence, though all the while under his son's name, the government of Aquitaine was a series of continued efforts to hurl back the Arabs of Spain beyond the Ebro, to extend to that river the dominion of the Franks, to divert to that end the forces as well as the feelings of the populations of Southern Gaul, and thus to pursue, in the South as in the North, against the Arabs as well as against the Saxons and Huns, the grand design of Charlemagne, which was the repression of foreign invasions and the triumph of Christian France over Asiatic Paganism and Islamism.
Although continually obliged to watch, and often still to fight, Charlemagne might well believe that he had nearly gained his end.

He had everywhere greatly extended the frontiers of the Frankish dominions and subjugated the populations comprised in his conquests.

He had proved that his new frontiers would be vigorously defended against new invasions or dangerous neighbors.