106 Checks to Population among the ancient Bk. i. 



the two facts were necessarily connected. For 

 a careful distinction should always be made, be- 

 tween a redundant population and a population 

 actually great. The Highlands of Scotland are 

 probably more redundant in population than any 

 other part of Great Britian ; and though it would 

 be admitting a palpable absurdity to allow that 

 the north of Europe, covered in early ages with 

 immense forests, and inhabited by a race of peo- 

 ple who supported themselves principally by 

 their herds and flocks,* was more populous in 

 those times than in its present state ; yet the 

 facts detailed in the Decline and Fall of the Ro- 

 man Empire, or even the very slight sketch of 

 them that I have given, cannot rationally be ac- 

 counted for, without the supposition of a most 

 powerful tendency in these people to increase, 

 and to repair their repeated losses by the prolific 

 power of nature. 



From the first irruption of the Cimbri, to the 

 final extinction of the western empire, the efforts 

 of the German nations to colonize or plunder 

 were unceasing.f The numbers that were cut 

 off during this period by war and famine were 

 almost incalculable, and such as could not possibly 

 have been supported with undiminished vigour 

 by a country thinly peopled, unless the stream 



* Tacitus de Moribus German, sect. v. ; Caesar de Bell. Gall. 

 vi. 22. 



f Caesar found in Gaul a most formidable colony under Ario- 

 vistus, and a general dread prevailing that in a few years all the 

 Germans would pass the Rhine. De Bell. Gall. i. 31. 



