292 GERMANY. 



navio-ation for several months. Much has been done to render the Elbe navigable 

 throughout the year, but a uniform depth of 33 inches, which a commission hxed 

 upon in 1870 as being absolutely necessary, has not yet been secured, and in 

 the summer the depth at some places is hardly 28 inches. 



Inhabitants. 



Formerly the whole of Saxony was inhabited by Slavs. The names of towns, 

 villages, and rivers prove this, for though Leipzig, Plauen, and Bautzen have a 

 German ring about them, a reference to ancient documents shows that they are 

 virtually Slav, their meaning being " lime wood," " flooded meadow," and " group 

 of cabins." INIany villages, such as Gorlitz, Oelsnitz, and Blasewitz, still retain 

 their original Slav names. 



The upper basin of the Spree, in Saxony as well as in Prussia, is still occupied 

 by Wends who speak Slav. They are the remnant of a Slav nation which for- 

 merly extended as far as the Elbe, but is now decreasing almost daily. About the 

 middle of the sixteenth century the country of the Wends extended eastward to 

 the Oder. Its gradual reduction since then is shown on the accompanying map, 

 and it must be observed that even within the limits there assigned to the Wends 

 German exclusively is spoken in the towns, and all, a few old people excepted, 

 speak that language as well as Slav. Many persons have translated their family 

 names into German, and in course of time they will no doubt claim a pure 

 Teutonic descent. All those causes which lead to the extinction of an ancient 

 language are at work in the country of the Wends. Government ignores their 

 existence, the schools are German, and so are the employers of labour. The 

 number of persons still speaking the ancient language is estimated at 136,000, 

 viz. 86,000 in Prussia, and 50,000 in Saxony ; but probably not many thousands 

 will remain at the end of the present century. 



The cold plateau of the Erzgebirge appears to have been avoided by the old 

 Slav inhabitants of the country, for the geographical nomenclature- there is 

 German, and many of the names were evidently given by colonists. Huntsmen 

 first penetrated these forbidding regions, and they were followed by agriculturists, 

 who later on crossed the mountains into Bohemia. It is well known how these 

 German colonists, by dint of hard labour, have forced the reluctant land to yi^ld 

 harvests, and called into life new branches of industry. Still the poverty of these 

 mountaineers is great, and it is only by the strictest economy and sobriety they 

 are enabled to live. As compared with the Saxons of the plain, they are small, 

 feeble, and ill conditioned. The manufacture of toys is carried on there almost as 

 extensively as in Thuringia, and the workmen earn even less. 



The Saxons of the kingdom of Saxony are not as pure a race as their kinsmen 

 to the north-west. For ages the name of Saxon was almost looked upon as 

 being synonymous with German, and the German colonists in Transylvania are 

 known as Saxons to the present day. But though the political domain of the 

 Saxons has been much curtailed, their influence upon German life has always 



