356 Comparative Physical Geography. 



herself their anger, suffers the penalty of her rashness. About 

 390 B.C. the city was burnt, and the future mistress of the world 

 wellnigh perished in her cradle, by the strong hand of the very men 

 of the North whom she was destined afterwards to subject to her laws. 

 A century later, these same Gauls, who find Rome victorious and 

 Italy shut against them, rush upon enervated Greece, give her up 

 to pillage, and, profaning the sacred temple at Delphi, announce the 

 fall of Greece, and the last days of her glory and her liberty. An- 

 other troop of these bold adventurers cut their way into Asia Minor ; 

 they maintain themselves there, objects of terror in the land which 

 bears their name, to the very moment when the power of Rome 

 forced all the nations to bow beneath her iron yoke. 



A century before the birth of our Saviour, the men of the north 

 are again in motion. The Cimbri and the Teutons appear at the 

 gates of Italy, and spread terror even to Rome herself. Forty years 

 have scarce rolled away when Rome, in her turn, assails the 

 Northern world. Csesar marches to conquer the Gauls, formerly so 

 terrible, and in the course of ages they are won to civilization. Thus, 

 by the third gate which opens the wall of separation, the Southern 

 woi'ld penetrates into that of the North. 



But a still more earnest struggle then commences. The Germans 

 have preserved their native energy, and are still free. Rome is de- 

 clining, and, little by little, the sources of life in that immense body 

 are drying up. The weaker it grows, the more the men of the 

 North press upon the mighty colossus, whose head is still of iron, 

 though its feet are of clay. It lalls for its own happiness and that 

 of humanity ; for a new sap — the fresh vitality of the Northmen — 

 is to circulate through it, and soon shall it be born again, full of 

 strength and life. 



You see, from the beginning to the end of history, the contrast 

 of these two natures exercises its mighty influence. The struggle 

 between the people of the two worlds is constant. In Asia it may 

 be again renewed, for nature there is unconquerable, and the con- 

 trast still exists. In Europe, the coarse struggle of brute strength 

 of the early days has ended, since, culture having passed into the 

 North, conquerors and conquered, civilized men and barbarians, have 

 melted down into one and the same people, to r-ise to a civilization 

 far superior to the pi'eceding. But we behold it reappear, less ma- 

 terial but not less evident, between the free and intelligent thinker, 

 the Protestant of the North, and the artistic, impassioned, supersti- 

 tious Catholic man of the South. 



Let us now pass to a second feature of the structure of the con- 

 tinent Asia-Europe, which has almost as much weight as that we 

 have just discussed. 



Long chains, extending from the North to the South, in the direc- 

 tion of the meridians, the Bolor and Mount Soliman, cut at right 

 angles the great east-west axis. The Bolor forms the western mar- 



