236 Darwinism and Other Essays. 



imperial authorities in the West. Slavonic troops 

 came to form a large and redoubtable element in 

 the eastern armies, and to the infusion of new life 

 thus received we may no doubt partly attribute 

 the prolonged maintenance of the Byzantine Em- 

 pire. It is, perhaps, not generally remembered 

 that the greatest warrior and one of the most 

 illustrious emperors of this part of the Roman 

 world were of Slavic origin. The vernacular 

 name of which Justinian is the Latin translation 

 was Upravda, or " the Upright ; " and his invin- 

 cible general Belisarius was a Dardanian Slav 

 named Beli-czar, or "the White Prince." Within 

 less than a century after this white prince had 

 driven the Goths from Italy, the able Emperor 

 Heraclius, contending on the one hand against 

 the Persians while menaced on the other by the 

 barbaric Avars, invited two Slavic tribes from 

 beyond the Danube to aid in expelling the latter 

 invaders. These tribes were the Croats and Serbs, 

 and they have remained ever since in the lands 

 which were then granted them in reward of their 

 military services. 



One reason, and perhaps the chief one, why the 

 invading Germans and Slavs so readily became 

 subjects of the Roman Empire is to be found in 

 the fact that they were settled agricultural races, 



