Price.] 2QQ [January. 



In speaking of peoples having a Germanic origin, those of Eng- 

 land and Gaul are included, for these countries, before, as we know 

 after their historic ages, had no doubt received accessions, or suf- 

 fered conquests from the north of Germany, called the " womb of na- 

 tions." Tacitus conjectui'cd the Britons to have come from the neigh- 

 boring continent. "You will find," he says, "in both nations the 

 same religious rites, and the same superstition. The two languages 

 differ but little;" hesays,speaking of the Britons andtheGauls. (Life 

 of Agricola, Isi.) After the Roman armies had been withdrawn, and 

 the Picts and Scots made inroads, the Saxons, including the Ensiles, 

 who gave name to England, were called in from the north of Ger- 

 many; to whom succeeded the Danes, and afterwards the Normans, 

 all of whom sprang from the same prolific source. Normans, though 

 last from Normandy, meant Northmen ; as Germans meant r/e^-e-men, 

 or warmen ; a generic name that described, by their most striking 

 characteristic, the many peoples of Germany, who, under various 

 names, bore down upon every country of Western and Southern 

 Europe. 



The Germans had no doubt a previous Eastern origin, since phi- 

 lology and other traces indicate tiiat the stream of population had 

 flowed from Central Asia, the real source of the German nations. 

 Whatever had been their original condition, the masses moved west- 

 ward, as hunting, pastoral, and warlike nations ; conditions incom- 

 patible with the jealous seclusion of women, which has always cha- 

 racterized Southern Asia. Under the necessity of sharing the toils, 

 hardships and dangers of husbands, fathers, and sons, who passed all 

 of life in moving camps, seclusion and effeminacy were not the traits 

 either of the sons of Tuisto or Odin, or of the daughters of Freya. 

 Exposed to common dangers, and liable to be separated from hus- 

 band and children by the fate of battle, and to become the slaves of 

 the conquerors, a fate more terrible than death, their anxieties quick- 

 ened their perceptions and foresight, and they became, beyond their 

 husbands, thoughtful, astute, prophetic of the future ; became their 

 assistants in battle, the nurses of the wounded, the providers for the 

 family ; man's truest friend and counsellor. Life then was nearly 

 a constant warfare; the soil was without fixed ownership; was 

 sparsely appropriated, but while the crop of the season should mature 

 and be gathered. By the law that sprang from their profound reve- 

 rence for woman and the marriage relation, the husband was allowed 

 no second wife to share with her his affections; nor was she permitted 

 to take a second husband even after his death. Under this stern 



