Germany. This name was given by the Romans to a country inhabited by various tribes of different names, but nearly alike in manners, customs, language, and religion. But they comprehended under it not only the country now called Germany, but also Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Livonia, and Prussia. The modern inhabitants call themselves Deutsch, and their country Deutschland; but, as to the origin, meaning, and primary application of both names (German and Deutsch), German antiquaries are far from being agreed, though most of them seem to be of opinion that German is a genuine Deutsch word, compounded of ger, or gerre, a spear, and man, and consequently meaning spearman, or warrior. Deutsch seems to have been known to the Carolingians, and it first occurs in a document of the year 813; but it is only since the time of the emperor Otto I. (A.D. 936-73) that it has been in use as the general name of the German nation.

The Rhine on the west, and the Vistula on the east, seem to have been generally considered as the boundaries of Germany; whilst on the north it extended along the ocean and the Baltic Sea, and on the south was terminated by the river Danube. But such boundaries were by no means definite; for many German tribes inhabited the southern banks of the Rhine as far as the Scheldt. Between the Rhine and the Moselle were the Ubii; and higher up, but beyond the latter river, were the Treviri, and then the Triboeci, the Neemetes, and the Vangiones. The Mediomatrici were planted along the Moselle, near the site of the present city of Metz; and above them, on the Rhine, in the present Swiss canton of Basel, were the Raunici or Rauraci. The ancient nations of Vindelicia were settled between the sources of the Rhine and of the Danube. Noricum was inhabited by several tribes between the rivers Drave and Danube, and comprehended the provinces now known by the names of Austria, Styria, Carinthia, Tyrol, and Bavaria. Beyond the Danube, to the westward of the Marcomanni, the country was occupied by the Hermunduri, and extended to the north along the Hercynian Mountains to the river Sala. A nation beyond the Hercynian Mountains, known then as the Boiohemum, and in modern times as Bohemia, were in contact with the Quadi, whose territory, now called Moravia, touched, on its southern part, the Danube. These two tribes, with the Marcomanni, and some smaller clans, were comprehended under the general name of Suevi, a people who at a subsequent period forced their way into Spain, and established themselves in that peninsula as a warlike and independent nation. The Suevi were a powerful nation, who extended themselves along the Hercynian Forest, through which they penetrated, and occupied a tract of land extending from the Vistula to the Elbe. Among their possessions were the divisions which subsequently obtained the names of Saxony, Brandenburg, Lusatia, and Silesia. One subdivision of them, called the Semnones, grew sufficiently powerful to seize some of the richest provinces of Gaul; whilst another, the Estii, possessed the borders of the Baltic Sea, whence they drew much amber, of which they made use in traffic with the surrounding tribes. These last, according to Tacitus, were worshippers of the mother of the gods, and relied on her for protection. They are said to have been more industrious than the rest of the Germans in the cultivation of their lands, and at a very early period produced corn. Their amber was reported to have been obtained by diving in the rivers and the sea. This substance was then highly estimated; and at a subsequent period, in the reign of Nero, a Roman knight is stated to have purchased for that emperor, of the Estii, at one time thirteen thousand pounds weight, amongst which was a single piece weighing thirteen pounds. At a still later period, a letter is found in Cassiodorus, in which Theodoric, king of the Goths, gives thanks to the Estii for a present of amber, and in return assures them of his friendship and protection.

In the interior of Germany, the Cimbri and the Saxons were possessed of the country north of the Elbe; whilst on the south side of that stream the Chauci were the masters of the district through which the Weser flows, and were in contact with the two smaller tribes of the Cheruscii and Chamavi. The Frisi were distinguished as the Upper and the Lower, and were separated from the Chauci by the river Ems, and from each other by a branch of the Rhine; whilst beyond the Yssel were some migratory tribes, the Bruckteri and the Marsi. The Uspetes were established on the river Lupia, now the Lippe; and beyond that stream were the Uspetes, who were celebrated for changing their residence, and were thence to be found in other districts. The Teucri were settled on the Rhine, in the country of the Menopii; and next to them the Jubones, near the modern Juliers. The Catti or Cotti inhabited parts of Hesse and Thuringia, extending from the Hartz Mountains to the Rhine and the Weser. Their southern neighbours were the Sedusi, bordering on Swabia, where they came in contact with the Marcomanni, who have been already mentioned.

Such are the best accounts which can be collected from Caesar, Tacitus, and Ptolemy, respecting the localities of the various tribes who inhabited Germany before the period of the intercourse between them and the Romans. It has been justly remarked, that whilst modern nations are fixed and permanent societies, connected amongst themselves by laws and government, and bound to their native soil by arts and agriculture, the German tribes were only voluntary and fluctuating associations of soldiers, almost of savages; and the same territory often changed its inhabitants in the course of conquest or of emigration. A victorious state often communicated its own name to a vanquished people. Sometimes crowds of volunteers flocked from all parts to the standard of a victorious leader; his camp became their country, and some event soon gave a new but general name to the mixed community. Thus the distinctions of ferocious invaders were perpetually varied by themselves, and naturally confounded the astonished subjects of the Roman empire.

It is probable that the accounts of the numbers of the German people, as transmitted by early writers, are grossly exaggerated. In great and civilized states, millions of subjects pursue their peaceful avocations in silence and obscurity; but in a state of rude republicanism, or of civil commotions, almost every member of the community is called into active exertion; and thus, with their irregular divisions, their restless motions, their profusion of kings and warriors, and numerous contests, they present to our minds an appearance of numbers very far beyond the reality, which is still further strengthened by the most splendid appellations being frequently and repeatedly applied to inconsiderable objects. When the Romans first became acquainted with Germany, about the year 640 from the building of their capital, or more than 100 years before the commencement of the Christian era, the natives had advanced but a few steps from the savage state. Even in the subsequent age, as Tacitus affirms, they were so ignorant of the use of letters as to be unable to transmit from one generation to another any annals of their country, or any knowledge of the agreeable or useful arts of life. In an extent very far Germany surpassing modern Germany, Ptolemy speaks of ninety towns or cities; whilst Tacitus asserts, as a well-known fact, that in his time they had no cities, and that they affected to despise the buildings constructed by Roman industry, as places of confinement rather than of security. Their dwellings were not even contiguous, nor formed into villages, but each of these barbarians fixed his independent dwelling on any spot which a plain, a wood, or a stream of good water, invited him to settle on; and in constructing his hut, neither stone, brick, nor tiles were employed. Built of timber, they were very low, and covered with straw, having a hole to allow of the emission of the smoke.

The clothing was of the simplest kind, notwithstanding the inclemency of the climate in a territory covered with woods, and not ameliorated by cultivation. In the more northern parts scanty garments of furs were used; and in the south some coarse linen, spun and woven by the females. Their food consisted chiefly of wild animals, or of the flesh of their large herds of cows and of horses, which were nearly in the state of their original wildness. A small quantity of corn was the only produce of the soil; the use of gardens, orchards, and artificial meadows, was unknown; nor could any great improvement in agriculture have existed, where a new division of the land took place annually, and a great part lay waste and without any tillage. The Germans seem to have learned the process of brewing or of distillation, as they made intoxicating liquors from wheat and barley, in the use or abuse of which they indulged to the greatest excess in social meetings and public assemblies. Drinking and gambling were their highest gratifications. They gloried in passing whole days and nights at the table; and the blood of guests, often of friends and relations, stained their drunken assemblies. The desperate gambler often staked his person and his liberty on the cast of a dice, and then patiently submitted to the decision, and was sold into slavery by his more fortunate competitor.

Notwithstanding the grossness of manners amongst the German tribes, the females were held in high estimation; and whilst the men were brave, the women were chaste. Polygamy was not in use excepting amongst the princes; and amongst them only for the sake of multiplying their alliances. Divorces were prohibited by manners rather than by laws. Adulteries were punished as rare and inexpiable crimes; nor was seduction justified by example and fashion. The unpolished wives of the Germans partook of few of those gratifications which tend to inflame the passions, and their fidelity was in some measure secured by the exposure to which they were subject in the open huts, and by poverty, solitude, and the painful cares of domestic occupation. Besides these restraints, the Germans treated their women with esteem and confidence, consulted them on every occasion of importance, and fondly believed that in their breasts resided a sanctity and wisdom more than human. Some of these interpreters of fate, such as Velleda in the Batavian war, governed, in the name of the deity, the fiercest nations of Germany. The rest of the sex were respected as the free and equal companions of soldiers, associated even by the ceremony of marriage to a life of toil, of danger, and of glory. In their great invasions, the camp of the barbarians was filled with a multitude of women, who remained firm and undaunted amidst the sound of arms, the various forms of destruction, and the honourable wounds of their sons and husbands. Fainting armies of Germans have more than once been driven back upon the enemy by the generous despair of the women, who dreaded death much less than servitude. If the day was irrecoverably lost, they well knew how to deliver themselves and their children, with their own hands, from an insulting victor. Heroines of such a description may claim admiration, but they can scarcely inspire the passion of love. They who attempt to imitate the sterner virtues of man must lose the attractive softness of their own sex, which is their principal charm. Conscious pride taught the German matrons to suppress every tender emotion which stood in competition with honour; and the first honour of the sex has ever been that of chastity.

The Germans were a warlike people, notwithstanding which their government was a species of democracy, although a few of the tribes on the shores of the Baltic acknowledged the authority of kings; but such kings owed their power as frequently to their valour or their eloquence as to their descent; and with all of them the power was tempered by the prevalence of popular assemblies. The assembly of the warriors of the tribe was convened at stated seasons, or on sudden emergencies. When a youth had attained the age of manhood, he was introduced into the general council of his countrymen, solemnly invested with a shield and a spear, and adopted as an equal and worthy member of the commonwealth. In such assemblies, the trial of public offences, the election of magistrates, and the great affairs of peace or war, were determined by independent votes. Sometimes these important questions were previously considered and prepared in a committee or select council of the principal chieftains. The magistrates might deliberate and persuade, but the people only could resolve and execute; and hence the resolutions were for the most part hasty and violent. They too often turned away with indignant contempt from the remonstrances of justice and policy, and signified by a hollow murmur their dislike of such timid councils. But when a popular orator proposed to vindicate the meanest citizen from either foreign or domestic injury, or called upon his countrymen to follow some enterprise of danger and of glory, the applause of the assembly was displayed by a loud clashing of shields and spears; for the Germans always assembled in arms, and it was to be dreaded lest an irregular multitude, inflamed by faction and strong liquors, should use their arms to enforce as well as to declare their furious resolutions.

A general of the tribe was elected on occasions of danger; and if the danger was pressing and extensive, several tribes concurred in the choice of the same general. The bravest warrior was named to lead his countrymen into the field by his example rather than by his commands; but this power, however limited, was still invidious. It expired with the war, and in time of peace the German tribes acknowledged not any supreme chief. Princes were, however, appointed in the general assembly, to administer justice, or rather to compose differences, in their respective districts. In the choice of these magistrates, as much regard was shown to birth as to merit. To each was assigned by the public a guard and a council of a hundred persons; and the first of the princes appears to have enjoyed a pre-eminence of rank and honour which sometimes tempted the Romans to compliment them with the regal title.

The comparative view of the powers of the magistrates, in two remarkable instances, is alone sufficient to represent the whole system of German manners. The disposal of the landed property within their district was absolutely vested in their hands, and they distributed it every year according to a new division. At the same time they were not authorized to punish with death, to imprison, or even to strike, a private citizen.

The Germans respected only those duties which they imposed on themselves. The most obscure soldier resisted with disdain the authority of the magistrates. "The noblest youths," says Tacitus, "blushed not to be numbered amongst the faithful companions of some renowned chief, to whom they devoted their arms and service. A noble emulation prevailed among the companions to obtain the first place in the esteem of their chief, among the chiefs to acquire the greatest number of valiant companions. The glory of such heroes diffused itself beyond the narrow li..." mits of their own tribe. Presents and embassies solicited their friendship, and the fame of their arms often ensured victory to the party they espoused. In the hour of danger it was shameful for the chief to be surpassed in valor by his companions, and shameful for the companions not to equal the valor of their chief. To survive his fall in battle was indelible infamy. The chief combated for victory; the companions for the chief. The noblest warriors, whenever their native country was sunk in the laziness of peace, maintained their numerous bands in some distant scene of action, to exercise their restless spirit, and to acquire renown by voluntary dangers. Gifts worthy of soldiers, the warlike steed, the bloody and ever-victorious lance, were the rewards which the companions claimed from the liberality of their chief. The rude plenty of his hospitable board was the only pay which he could bestow, or they would accept. War, rapine, and the freewill offerings of his friends, supplied the materials of this munificence." This institution, however it might accidentally weaken the several republics, invigorated the general character of the Germans, and even ripened amongst them all the virtues of which barbarians are susceptible; the faith, valor, and hospitality so conspicuous long afterwards in the ages of chivalry.

The religion of the Germans was as gross as that of other nations in the same low stage of civilization. They adored the sun and the moon, the fire and the earth, together with those imaginary deities who were supposed to preside over the most important occupations of human life. They were persuaded that, by some ridiculous arts of divination, they could discover the will of the superior beings, and that human sacrifices were the most precious and acceptable offering to their altars. They seem to have adopted no images as visible objects of worship, nor to have constructed any edifices for the celebration of religious rites. Their only temples were dark and ancient groves, consecrated by the reverence of successive generations. Their secret gloom, the imagined residence of an invisible power, by presenting no distinct object of fear or worship, impressed the mind with a still deeper sense of religious horror; and the priests, rude and illiterate as they were, had been taught by experience the use of every artifice which could preserve and fortify impressions so well suited to promote their own interest.

The German priests had assumed a jurisdiction even in temporal concerns which the magistrate could not venture to exercise; and the haughty warrior submitted to the lash of correction, when it was inflicted, not by any human power, but by the immediate order of the god of war. Thus the defects of civil policy were sometimes supplied by the interposition of ecclesiastical authority. The latter was constantly exerted to maintain silence and decency in the popular assemblies, and was sometimes extended to a more enlarged concern for the national welfare. A solemn procession was occasionally celebrated in what are now the countries of Mecklenburg and Pomerania. The unknown symbol of the earth, covered with a thick veil, was placed on a carriage drawn by cows; and in this manner the goddess, whose common residence was in the island of Rugen, visited several adjacent tribes of her worshippers. During her progress the sound of war was hushed, quarrels were suspended, arms laid aside, and the restless Germans had an opportunity of tasting the blessings of peace and of harmony. The truce of God, so often and so ineffectually proclaimed by the clergy of the eleventh century, was an obvious imitation or continuation of this ancient custom.

But the influence of religion was far more powerful to inflame than to moderate the fierce passions of the Germans. The consecrated standards, long preserved in the groves of superstition, were placed in the front of the battle; and the hostile army was devoted with dire execrations to the gods of war and of thunder. With the Germans cowardice was the most unpardonable of sins. A brave man was the worthy favourite of the martial deities. He who had lost his shield was banished alike from the civil and the religious assemblies of his countrymen. Some of the northern tribes seem to have embraced the doctrine of transmigration; others imagined a gross paradise of immortal drunkenness. All agreed that a life spent in arms, and a glorious death in battle, were the best preparations for a happy futurity, either in this or another world.

That singular order of men, the bards, have attracted to them the attention of all who have attempted to investigate the antiquities of the Celts, the Scandinavians, and the Germans. It is not easy, however, to calculate the enthusiasm of arms and glory which they kindled in the breasts of their audience. It was in the hour of battle, or in the feast of victory, that the bards celebrated the glory of the heroes of ancient days, the ancestors of those warlike chieftains who listened with transport to their artless but animated strains. The view of arms and of danger heightened the effect of the military song; and the passions which it tended to excite, the desire of fame, and the contempt of death, were the habitual sentiments of a German mind.

Such is the description of the manners, characters, and propensities of the ancient Germans, as delineated by Tacitus, and by which, in spite of their climate, their want of learning and the arts, and the absence of fixed laws, they were formed into a people of military heroes, and enabled to carry on formidable hostilities, during more than two centuries, with the mighty power of the Romans.

The early history of the Germans, like that of all nations who had no written records, is involved in much obscurity. The first knowledge of their transactions was that of the invasion of the country by the Gauls, commanded by Segovesus, king of the Celtæ; whilst his brother Bellovesus marched with another army into Italy; both of which divisions are said to have been directed by the flight of birds. Segovesus crossed the Rhine, and gained a settlement near the Hercynian Forest. The Germans, however, soon acted on the offensive, and expelled the Gauls, and, by the assistance of the Belge, one of their most warlike tribes, gained possession of some territory to the west of the Rhine, where they were enabled to fix and maintain themselves so firmly as never to be driven out, and whence they extended themselves to the sea-coasts of Britain, and even drove its inhabitants into the interior. The Germans and the Gauls, thus brought into contact with each other, continued to hold vacillating intercourse, sometimes at war, at other times in alliance in opposition to the power of the conquering and disciplined Romans. The Germans, under the name of Cimbri, then invaded the territory of Rome, and spread such terror, that Marius, by a deviation from the law, was appointed consul to command an army against them. After various marches during some years, in 102 before Christ, Marius, with an army of 55,000 men, attacked the barbarians on the banks of the Rhone, and, though they are said to have mustered 300,000 foot and 15,000 horse, completely defeated them, with a loss of 150,000 killed and 60,000 prisoners. Many, preferring death to slavery, underwent military execution; and a few were scattered over Gaul, or crossed the Danube, and so escaped to their own country.

After Julius Caesar had completed the subjugation of Gaul, and extended his conquest to the Rhine, he first became acquainted with the German name. Ariovistus, the leader of a tribe that dwelt to the south of the Danube, attempted to fix his establishment in Gaul, but was Germany, defeated by Caesar, and, with the loss of 80,000 men, was driven across the Rhine, though two tribes of his followers remained on the west side of that river; and the fugitives who returned augmented the numbers of the German tribe of the Marcomanni. Caesar built a bridge over the Rhine, and twice passed that river at the head of his army, not with the view of permanent conquest, but to secure his province of Gaul against the attacks of the barbarians; and he also took many of the Germans into his pay, first in the war with the Gauls, and afterwards in the civil contest with Pompey. The civil wars, which occupied first Cæsar and Pompey, and afterwards Mark Antony and Brutus and Cassius, left the Germans opportunities to attempt incursions. The confederation of the Segambri passed the Rhine, and having repelled the attack of Agrippa, settled themselves on the western side of that river; but a few years afterwards they were defeated by Lollius the legate of Augustus, when, 14 years before Christ, Drusus, the son-in-law of the emperor, constructed several fortresses along that river, to prevent the incursions of the Germans. He proceeded with success, and penetrated as far as the Elbe. He died in the year 8 before Christ, and was succeeded by Tiberius, who during his command not only sustained the power which Drusus had acquired, but extended it towards the north; and, by intrigues among the natives, as much as by his force, induced many of the tribes to solicit peace, and excited others to enter into the military service of Rome.

The body-guard of Augustus was composed of German volunteers, amongst whom was the distinguished noble whose name has descended to posterity, being sometimes called Hermanus, and at others Arminius, who received the privileges of a Roman citizen and the dignity of a Roman knight. He was the son of Sigmer, a prince of the Cherusci, and had been educated in Rome, and early appointed an officer in the army of Augustus, but is said never to have lost the relish for the customs of his ancestors, nor his zeal for the independence of his country; and during the course of his instruction in arts and in arms he warmly cherished the hope of adapting these instructions to the purpose of freeing his country from the Roman yoke. He felt a confidence that all the discipline of the Roman armies would be unable in a fair field to resist the raw bravery of his unpolished countrymen.

The best legions of Rome were intrusted to the command of Quintilius Varus, with the superintendence of the territories on the right bank of the Rhine, which had been added by Drusus to the Roman dominion. He was confident in the power of his military superiority, and thought, in addition to that, to secure obedience by changing the customs and principles of the Germans, and thus converting them into useful subjects. For this purpose he took with him a great number of civil officers, lawyers, and men of letters, to introduce the new order of things. These measures roused the jealousy of a people enamoured of their freedom, and disseminated the seeds of insurrection amongst all the tribes situated between the Rhine and the Elbe. Arminius availed himself of this spirit to form alliances in opposition to Varus, amongst all the military leaders of the districts. It happened most opportunely for the purpose of Arminius, that, in the year 9 A.D., a general revolt broke out on the Roman frontiers of Dalmatia and Pannonia. It is doubtful if this was connected with the plans of Arminius, but it helped to strengthen the confederacy which had been entered into by those tribes which were in possession of the country bounded by the Rhine, the Saale, and the Elbe. This confederacy was not broken up by the treason of one of the chiefs, Segestes, the leader of the Catti, who communicated to the Roman commander the plan and the detail of the intended insurrection, which was received by Varus with the contempt which reliance upon the numbers and discipline of his troops had inspired. Arminius redoubled his assiduities to remove suspicion, if any existed, of his fidelity to the Roman cause, and succeeded, by pointing the attention of Varus to some irruptions which, at the instigation of the confederacy, had broken out on the banks of the Weser. These small but concerted disturbances were intended to inveigle the Roman commander to advance into the interior of the country; and the leaders of the German troops in the pay of Rome, who were involved in the confederacy with Arminius, by the display of unbounded zeal and obedience, agreed in urging the Roman commander not to wait for further displays of resistance, but to advance with his three legions and the auxiliaries, and to extinguish the rebellion in its focal point. In vain did Segestes repeat his warnings. Nothing could shake the confidence of Varus in Arminius, and the confederates and the Romans plunged deeper and deeper into the heart of the country, where the snares had been laid for their destruction. Near the sources of the river Lippe, in the country of the Bructeri, after a long and wearisome march through woods and marshes, the Romans saw themselves enclosed on every side in a hollow surrounded by hills whose summits were all occupied by the natives. At this moment intelligence arrived that Arminius with the rear division, consisting of stipendiaries, which he commanded, had declared against the Romans, and had been the moving spring of the whole operations. Varus saw clearly destruction before him; for though discipline and courage might prolong the contest, it could inspire no hopes of a successful issue.

Three days of suffering and ineffectual hostilities compelled the Romans to submit. Varus chose death rather than disgrace. Three Roman eagles were taken; and a limit was thus set to the advances of the Romans towards the north, which they were never afterwards enabled to pass. The Germans disgraced their victory by useless cruelties. Some of the men of letters and artists who were taken had their hands cut off, and others were blinded. The site of this memorable event cannot be clearly ascertained by any records, but it is generally placed by the antiquarians of Germany near the sources of the rivers Lippe and Ems, not far from where now stands the small city of Detmold. The event occurred in the ninth year of our era.

When Arminius had thus restored the ancient freedom to his country, he destroyed the fortresses which the Romans had constructed on the Rhine, the Elbe, and the Weser, and exerted himself to rouse the military spirit of the Germans, and taught them to rely on that spirit rather than on the strongest fortifications. A civil war soon broke out amongst the natives themselves, and the party opposed to Arminius was headed by Segestes. That prince applied to the Romans for assistance, and was aided by their general Germanicus, when he was surrounded by the troops of Arminius. His deliverance was effected with but little loss on either side; but the wife of Arminius was taken prisoner by Segestes, and on being carried before the Roman general, maintained a spirit and dignity which is highly applauded by Tacitus. The treachery of Segestes animated the exertions of Arminius, and he was offered assistance by his uncle Inguomar, a leader of a tribe, and celebrated as a warrior. Arminius attempted also to gain to his party his brother Flavius, who like himself had been educated in Italy, but who resolutely maintained his fidelity to the Roman power. Arminius desired a meeting with Flavius, and they saw and conversed with each other across the river Weser. The expostulations and the inducements of Arminius were ineffectual; the brothers became exasperated against each other, and would have proceeded to feats of arms if they had not Germany, been separated by the stream, and at length been borne away from the scene by their respective partisans.

Germanicus the Roman commander once more attacked the army of Arminius, and gained a splendid but useless victory on the plain of Idistavius, on the banks of the Weser; but having excited the suspicious jealousy of the Emperor Tiberius, the necessary succours were withheld, and Arminius was soon enabled again to make head against the Romans, and caused them to suspend their attempts on the freedom of Germany. This temporary tranquillity, however, gave rise to an intestine war.

Marobodus, a leader of the Marcomanni, but who had been educated in the court of Augustus, was enabled by his address and his power to unite many tribes of the Suevi in a confederacy with his own nation, which collectively assumed the name of the Marcomanni. At the head of this powerful league he attacked and conquered the nation of the Boii, seated in the south of Bohemia and a part of Franconia, and founded a formidable state, which extended over the Hermundurins, the Quadi, the Longobards, and the Semnones, and could bring into the field 70,000 warriors. Augustus had given orders to Tiberius to suppress with twelve legions the power of Marobodus, but a general insurrection of the Dalmatian tribes compelled him to conclude a peace which secured to him no benefit. The subsequent disasters of the Romans in Western Germany suspended all attacks on the Marcomanni, who continued to excite insurrections in the south of Germany.

Two great powers were thus formed, the Marcomanni and the Cheruscii, the one under Marobodus and the other under Arminius. Between these, dissensions speedily arose. On one side the Longobards and the Semnones, wearied by the oppressions of Marobodus, deserted his party and united with the Cheruscii; and on the other side Inguiomer, the uncle of Arminius, from jealousy of his nephew, was induced to pass from his party to that of the Marcomanni. After a war between these two confederations, which was carried on with all that systematic regularity which the two commanders had learned in the Roman legions, the Cheruscii remained conquerors. Tiberius, instead of giving that aid to Marobodus which he eagerly asked, left him exposed during two years to the attacks of Catualda the Goth, who compelled him to abandon his territory and seek refuge amongst the Romans; and Catualda was soon exposed to the same fate by the hostilities of the Hermundurins, who had obtained the lead among the confederates which were headed by Arminius.

The death of Arminius occurred in the year 21 A.D., at the age of thirty-seven years, during the twelve last of which he had gloriously and happily conducted the affairs of his country with the applause of his followers, to whom, after his death, he continued an object of the highest veneration. He was indeed suspected of designs to introduce royalty and to assume the kingly dignity, but it is now impossible to confirm or refute the charge which has been brought against his memory.

After the death of their leader, the Cheruscii, owing to internal disputes, gradually lost the rank they had held, and at length allowed the Romans to nominate a king of their country, who assumed the name of Italicus, and was the last branch of the family of Arminius. Under him they quarrelled with their allies the Longobards, and soon sunk down into an insignificant tribe, inhabiting the district to the south of the Hartz Mountains. About the same time, in the west of Germany, the Catti raised themselves to a state of some consideration, and, whilst the Romans were occupied in suppressing an insurrection of the Frisi, seized the fortresses constructed on the Rhine. They were assailed by Galba, and induced to cede the territory included between the Lahn, the Maine, and the Rhine, to the Romans, who parcelled it out among the most meritorious of their warriors. In the year 58 the Catti and the Hermunduri contended for the salt springs on the river Saale in Franconia. The numerous followers of Marobodus and of Catualda had established themselves about the same time on the Danube, between the rivers Gran and Morava, and there, under Vannius, whom they had received as a king from the Romans, founded a new kingdom, which was soon felt to be oppressive to the people. Although Vannius had found allies in the Sarmatian Jaziges, yet he could not resist the confederacy formed against him by the Hermunduri, Lygerii, and the Western Quadi, but fled from his kingdom and took refuge with the Romans, when he was succeeded by his nephew Sido, who had performed some important services for the Emperor Vespasian. In the west the Batavians, by an obstinate struggle, shook the Roman power, which was only retained by extraordinary exertions. About this period began the war which finally terminated in the downfall of Rome. The Suevi were attacked by the Lygerii, and applied for aid to Domitian, who sent them a hundred horse soldiers, the smallness of which number was deemed an affront, and induced them to form a confederacy with the Jaziges, which threatened Dacia and Pannonia. Domitian was defeated, but Trajan proved more successful; but afterwards war broke out more fiercely under Antoninus Philosophus. The barbarians disquieted the empire on two sides without cessation. On one side small but numerous hordes of the Goths arrived in Dacia to establish themselves by force of arms; but these were removed by having a still better country pointed out to them in a southern direction. But the more terrific hostilities were those carried on by the Marcomanni, who had combined with the Hermunduri and the Quadi. Marcus Aurelius contended with them during his whole life; and Commodus purchased a peace with them in 180 A.D. At the same time the Catti laid waste Rhaetia and Gaul, and the Cheruscii drove the Longobards back on the Elbe, and advanced themselves under the name of Franks. About the year 220 A.D. new tribes of Germans assailed the falling empire. The Visigoths, the Gepides, and Herulians, attacked the Romans in Dacia; whilst at the same time a new race called the Alamanni, a mixed tribe, of Sclavonic origin, made their appearance in Southern Germany, in opposition to whom was constructed the celebrated Vallum Romanorum, the traces of which are still visible from Jaxthausen to Ohringen. The power of Rome gradually sank, partly from the constant and increasing hostilities of the Germans and other barbarous tribes, and partly from internal dissensions. As that empire was weakened, the Franks advanced to Spain, and under Probus conquered also the Batavian peninsula. Thus the Franks and Alemanni remained the most powerful of the German nation. The former of these lost the Batavian territory to the Saxons, and the latter were humbled before the Romans in the last victory obtained by that mighty people. At the beginning of the fifth century the barbarians assailed the empire on every side. The Vandals, Suevi, and Alani became masters of Gaul and Spain. They were followed by the successful Burgundians and the Western Goths; to the Burgundians succeeded the Franks, to the Western Goths succeeded the Eastern Goths, and to them the Lombards. Then began that stream of emigration which poured from the north to the south, and, as a conquering power, became the founders of the subsequent European kingdoms. A new change was given to the face of Europe by those vast emigrations of people, mostly Germans, though some came from countries farther eastward than Germany, which gradually spread and subdued the west, introduced new forms of society, and framed languages, which, with but little variation, have continued till the present time. The new states, Germany, formed out of what had previously been portions of the Roman empire, though often at war with each other, and differing in smaller matters, chiefly arising from difference of soil and climate, were united in one similar system of policy and domestic government, and had those common habits strengthened by the providential introduction of the Christian religion, to which, though varying in some points of faith, they all in process of time professed adherence. We have here space only for a slight sketch of the history of those emigrations the beneficial effects of which we now enjoy, and to which, during a period of more than a thousand years, Europe has been indebted for the great advancement in the arts and the policy of civilization which has raised it above the other portions of the habitable globe.

These emigrations, which thus revolutionized Europe, began from the Frozen Ocean, extended themselves to the Atlantic Sea, and stretched over a portion of Northern Africa. They continued from the year 375, when the Huns first broke into Europe, till 568, when the Lombards had completed their conquest of the Roman empire. The causes of these excursions of whole tribes were various, arising in some cases from excessive population, in others from the pressure of more remote tribes, and in all from the charms of the beautiful and well-cultivated provinces which the Romans had gradually added to their dominions. At a more early period single tribes in small parties had changed their domicils, and thereby prepared the way for the greater emigrations. The constant conquests of the too extended empire began in the middle of the third century to make it totter under its own weight. Some powerful emperors, indeed, especially Constantine and Theodosius, suspended its fall; but others, under the pressure of circumstances, and from short-sighted policy, had taken parties of the barbarians into their pay, and, as a reward for their military services, had granted them lands to establish themselves on, on the frontiers of the empire. In this way settlements were granted to the Franks in Belgic Gaul, and to the Alani, the Vandals, and the Goths, in Dacia, Pannonia, and Thrace.

Many individuals of skill and courage were appointed to offices of high power and trust, and two of them, Rufin and Stilicho, to the command of armies. The consequence of this was, that as they improved in education, they became fully acquainted with the weakness of the Roman government, and accustomed themselves to consider it as a prey, on which in due time they might seize.

The first movement towards the emigrations was given from the farthest part of Northern Asia, where a wild and warlike tribe, probably of Mongul or Kalmuck origin, were settled on the confines of China. These, expelled from their own settlements about the end of the first century, extended themselves towards the west, and drove the Alani, a tribe from Caucasus, out of Asiatic Sarmatia, and also dislodged the Western Goths, who were settled in ancient Dacia, and in the district between the Dniester, the Danube, and the Vistula. A portion of the Alani, after long wanderings, arrived on the Danube in what is now Hungary; connected themselves there with the Vandals, an original north German colony, who had been planted there about one hundred years, and, together, pressed forward into Germany, where they further strengthened themselves by a union with the Suevi, another German tribe which had been settled on the Upper Danube. These three populations, thus united, pressed forward to the Rhine, passed that river into Gaul, captured Mayence, Strasburg, and other flourishing cities, and devastated the whole country.

After these united people had in a few years spread desolation over a great part of Gaul, they pressed on towards the Pyrenees, and entered Spain. They subdued nearly the whole of that country about the year 411, divided it by lot amongst themselves, and left a very small portion of it only in the possession of the Roman garrisons. They however retained their former discipline and courage, and formed an alliance with some of the Western Goths who had penetrated into Spain, and attacked the conquerors. The Alani, who had founded a kingdom in Lusitania, now Portugal, were completely overcome in 418; and the remnant of them, after their defeat, received protection from the Vandals; and hence from that time their name is no more to be found. They carried on the war with the Romans, and thereby gained the ascendency over them, when, in 427, they formed the resolution to pass over into Africa. The kingdom founded there by Genseric, after maintaining itself a hundred and five years, was at last subdued by Belisarius, the general of the Greek emperor Justinian. The Suevi, who after the departure of the Vandals remained in Spain, extended and maintained their power till they were defeated and scattered by the Western Goths in 584. The Huns, with whom these movements had originated, established themselves in 377 in Pannonia, whence, conducted by their king Attila, they made a wasting campaign in Gaul; but that leader having met with a signal defeat in 451, turned towards Italy, and could scarcely be induced to spare Rome itself and to quit Italy. After his death in 453 the kingdom of the Huns disappeared, its inhabitants having been scattered and lost among the tribes of the Goths and Gepides.

The most dangerous enemies of the Romans were the Goths, to whom reference has before been made. They were a tribe of Germans originally established in East Prussia, on the shores of the Baltic, but had extended themselves through Poland, to the Black Sea, and had spread themselves over the Roman provinces on the Danube. In the third century, Rome found it necessary, or at least convenient, to allow of their establishment in Dacia. This powerful nation, the first amongst the Germans who embraced the Christian religion, was divided into two branches. The Eastern Goths were established on the river Don and the Black Sea, and the Western Goths between the Dniester, the Danube, and the Vistula. As they were assailed by the advancing Huns, and compelled to abandon their settlements about the year 375, the Romans conceded to them other settlements in the interior of their empire. The Western Goths, under their king Alaric, attacked the Romans in Italy in 403, several times assailed Rome itself, and conquered and plundered it in 410. His successor Ataulf led his followers into Gaul in 411, and from thence into Spain, where was erected the largest Gothic kingdom, which from 624 comprehended the whole of the Peninsula, with a part of France and some portions of Africa, and was only terminated in 711, by the victory of the invading Moors at the battle of Xeres.

The Eastern Goths had been settled by the Romans in the country of Moesia, now known by the names of Bulgaria and of Servia. Odoacer, the chief of two German tribes, the Heruli and the Rugieri, who had served under the Roman standards, became the master of Rome and of all Italy. But he was subdued by Theodoric king of the Western Goths, who thus succeeded to supreme power in Italy in the year 493.

Though Theodoric was one of the greatest characters of his age, the kingdom he founded proved but of short duration. The Emperor Justinian, after his successes in Africa, attacked the power of the Goths, and by his generals, first Belisarius and afterwards Narses, once more, in 554, restored Italy to the dominion of the Greek empire. The Gothic sovereigns then disappeared, and in a few years no trace of them remained except their name, which has been applied to a peculiar style of architecture. A few years after the fall of the Gothic kingdom, the greater part of Italy fell under the power of the Longobards or Lombards. According to some accounts, they were a tribe from Scandinavia, but according to others, a branch of the great German family of the Suevi, who in earlier times had inhabited these parts on the Elbe which are now known as Luneburg, and who had, after various excursions, been settled in Pannonia about 527. They advanced from thence, in 568, towards Italy, and under their king Alboin made a conquest of nearly the whole peninsula; a feat which was easily effected, owing to its desolate and depopulated condition. The chief opposition they encountered was from the city of Pavia, which, after a siege of three years, was captured in 572, and made the capital of the kingdom. Lombardy flourished during two centuries, till it fell under the power of the Emperor Charlemagne in the year 774.

The history of Germany between the years 560 and 670 is wholly destitute of the materials necessary to frame a consecutive narrative. The only writer of the period was Gregory bishop of Tours, and his attention was wholly engrossed by the events of the Frank kingdom which had sprung up in Gaul, and had begun to decline, the manners, laws, and customs of which he has faithfully represented. The only part of his voluminous work which relates to Germany, is an account of an alliance formed between the Bavarians and Longobards, which offended the Franks, and proved the cause of hostile movements, which, however, were speedily and pacifically terminated in 589. From the death of Dagobert in 632, the dominions of the Frankish kings of the Merovingian race were gradually diminished. One portion after another fell into the hands of great lay or ecclesiastical feudatories; but these circumstances seem to have had little effect on the German tribes. They scarcely interfered in the Frankish contests; and though not without internal controversies and contentions, these were of local and temporary importance only, and seldom produced extensive or calamitous convulsions. Preparations for defence against the Franks were carried on; some fortresses were constructed, and military discipline was maintained. But the most distinguished feature of the century, was the spread of the Christian faith. A saint from Ireland, with his assistants, laboured amongst the German tribes with great diligence and success. The cross of Christ had been planted among them, and publicly acknowledged as their standard; but the remains of heathenism, with its superstitions, were cherished by the great mass of the rude people, and the sacred rites of the Druids were performed in their hallowed groves.

Columban indeed found almost everywhere Christian priests, but their knowledge was slight, many of their ceremonies were idolatrous, their faith was wavering, and, what to the Irish saint was most annoying, their dependence on the see of Rome slightly if at all acknowledged.

The success of the Irish missionaries is much lauded by the monkish writers of the ages that followed their exertions; and whatever effect they may have produced upon the manners and morals of the Germans, it must be acknowledged that they were successful in bringing that people into that close connection with the great head of the Christian church, which became, in a succession of centuries, under the guidance of Providence, one of the means of their advancement in civilization.

During the same period was laid the foundation of those small sovereign states which successively grew up in Germany under ecclesiastical and lay chiefs, who bore the titles of archbishops, bishops, abbots, princes, dukes, counts, margraves, landgraves, and barons. These, in Germany, process of time, had the indirect choice of the emperor, who assumed the title of Chief of the Holy Roman Empire, and was elected to that dignity by princes called electors, who were independent, though nominally the household officers of the reigning emperor. The emperor Charlemagne was the real founder of the holy Roman empire, although that name was not given to it until a later period. He was of the race of the Frankish kings, the son of Pepin and the grandson of Charles Martel, and, jointly with his brother Carloman, ascended the throne of Gaul in 768. He was one of those extraordinary characters calculated to change the face of the civilized world. The history of his actions, during a long and glorious reign of forty-seven years, would relate his transactions in France, Spain, Italy, and Germany, but must here be restricted to those which relate to the last of those countries. (See article France.) The death of Carloman in 771 gave him the sole command of France, and his authority extended over Italy and a portion of Germany. He wished to obtain more power in that direction, and resolved to attack the Saxons, and make religion one of the pretexts for his attempt. The Saxons were a pagan people settled in Holstein and Westphalia, between the Weser and the Elbe, and, like all people in a barbarous state, thought themselves warranted by this independence in making incursions on their neighbours. They were frequently defeated, and made treaties of peace, which they soon broke, and thus continued until they were completely subdued in 803, when Charlemagne settled some of them in Flanders, and others in Switzerland, whilst the country was occupied by a Vandal tribe from Mecklenburg.

This long resistance of so weak a power was owing to the enlistments of the troops of Charlemagne being but for one year, and to the other wars in which he was engaged with the Lombards, the Danes, and the Saracens, as well as with some of the feudatories in his patrimonial dominions. He had long nourished the desire to become emperor of the West, and had negotiated a treaty of marriage with Irene, empress of Constantinople, which would have led to a general union of all Christendom under one head, but which was frustrated by the death of that princess. He was, however, in the year 800, crowned in Rome, by Pope Leo III. and acknowledged as emperor of the West in all the extensive dominions he had obtained. He reigned as emperor fourteen years, and died in 814, at Aachen or Aix-la-Chapelle in Germany, which had been early selected as his favourite residence.

The German empire may be dated from the treaty of Verdun in 843, by which the Frankish kingdom was divided. Lorraine was added to it in 924. Otto the Great brought the kingdom of Italy in 961, and the imperial dominions in that country in 962, into close connection with the empire of Germany, which then for the first time received the appellation of the Holy Roman Empire. But the Italian states were rather feudatories than subjects of that empire, and this slight bond was in a few years dissolved. Bohemia was a part of the empire under Otto, and continued to be so considered until a later period. For a short time the kings of Denmark owned allegiance on account of Jutland, and the king of Poland on account of Silesia, a state of things which continued till 1555. Hungary was also a part of the empire from 1045 till the reign of Henry IV. Prussia likewise, the possession of the Teutonic order, stood in the same relation to the empire from 1230 to 1525, and Livonia from 1205 to 1556.

---

1 See Laden's Geschichte des Deutschen Volkes, 2 und 3 Theil; also Sartorius De occupatione et divisione agrorum Romanorum per barbaros Germanicorum stirpis, &c. 1812. The Emperor Conrad II., in 1033, united a part of the kingdom of Lower Burgundy with the empire, which thus comprehended Franche-Comté, Dauphiné, the Lorraine, West Switzerland, Provence, and Savoy. These portions were, however, one after another separated from it; and in 1648, when Switzerland and the United Netherlands were declared independent, none of them remained to the empire but Savoy, Mompelgard, and the bishopric of Basel. The principles which regulated the intercourse of the emperor with the several princes, and of those princes with each other, were grounded, not, as in other states, on charters granted by the chief, but on resolutions adopted at various times amongst the several states in general assemblies. The most memorable of these resolutions were, 1st, that of internal peace in 1495; 2ndly, the Golden Bull, so called from having a seal of gold appended to it. This was agreed to under the Emperor Charles IV. in 1355, and confirmed at two subsequent diets or assemblies, which were held at Nuremberg and Metz. The chief object of it was to secure to the several states the right of independent voting in the election of an emperor. 3rdly, The treaty of Passau in 1552, or rather that concluded in consequence of it at Augsburg in 1555. This treaty established religious peace, and conferred on the several sovereigns who had embraced the Lutheran religion the free exercise of it in their dominions; and to the subjects the right to change their religion, and to leave the dominions without permission from the princes. 4thly, The treaty of Westphalia, concluded in 1648, which extended freedom of religion to those who had embraced the reformed or Calvinistic religion, as well as to the Lutherans.

Germany was divided, in 1500, under the Emperor Maximilian I. into six circles, viz. Franconia, Bavaria, Swabia, Upper Rhine, Westphalia, and Saxony. These were increased in 1512 to ten, by adding to them the circles of Austria and Burgundy, and forming two circles out of that of Saxony, and two out of that of the Rhine. But Lusatia, Silesia, Bohemia, Moravia, and other countries, though encompassed by the empire, were nevertheless not included in it. Each of these circles had at its head an ecclesiastical and a lay prince, who assembled the states of the circle, communicated between the emperor and them, and called their attention to the civil or military affairs of the body. Besides these, each circle had a military chief, generally denominated the field-marshal, who commanded the forces, and had the care of providing subsistence, arms, and other stores. In the assembly of the states a majority decided every question; but the decision required to be conformable to the general laws of the empire.

After the reformation of religion at the treaty of Westphalia, the circles were divided into Catholic, Protestant, and mixed. The circles of Austria, Bavaria, and Burgundy belonged to the first; to the second appertained Saxony; and to the third the remainder.

The imperial dignity was retained by the family of Charlemagne till the year 888. After that time it was elective, although for a long period there was a general adherence to the family which had been once chosen. At the commencement, the emperor was elected by the whole of the princes, whether lay or ecclesiastical; but during an interregnum, which lasted from 1197 to 1272, the highest or arch-princes, called karfursten, assumed the exclusive right of electing, and by a subsequent union amongst themselves, at the election of Charles IV. in 1356, secured the power they claimed. Frankfort was the place of election to which the Archbishop of Mentz summoned the princes or their ambassadors who were allowed to vote; but none of them was to be attended by more than two hundred followers, of whom only fifty were permitted to be armed. All strangers, even sovereigns, and the ambassadors of foreign potentates, were commanded to leave the city on the day of election. After the choice had been concluded, the person chosen, or his representative for him, was required to take the prescribed oaths to maintain the golden bull and the several capitulations. He was then led into St Bartholomew's Church, and declared emperor. The early emperors were crowned by the pope or his delegates, and several of them made toilsome marches to Rome, chiefly for that purpose. Till they received that coronation they were only styled kings; and the popes carried their arrogance so far as to claim the right, not merely of confirming and crowning, but even of electing and deposing the emperors. In 1338, however, the electors asserted their right to elect the emperor independently of the pope, and this became a law of the empire.

It became usual, during the lifetime of an emperor, to choose a successor to the imperial dignity; and the person so chosen was designated king of the Romans. This institution first arose in 1220, when Henry VII., a son of the Emperor Frederick II., was elected. He was bound to take oaths similar to those enjoined upon the emperor; but during his lifetime he was forbidden to mingle in the public business of the empire. In case of the death, of the minority, or of a protracted absence of the emperor, the golden bull had provided that the Prince of Saxony should exercise vicariate power in Saxony and Westphalia, and the Prince of Alsace similar power in Franconia, Swabia, and the Rhenish circles. They could call assemblies, collect and control the finances, and administer justice; but they had no power to grant imperial dignities or feudal estates. In neither of the circles of Austria or Bavaria was any provision made for the exercise of this vicariate power.

The states of the empire, or general assembly, consisted of the clergy and laity, who held their property direct from the empire. The first comprehended the archbishops, bishops, prelates, abbots, abbesses, and the masters of the Teutonic and St John's orders; the second included arch-princes, dukes-princes, landgraves, margraves, burggraves, grafs or counts, and the free imperial cities. After the peace of Westphalia, the states were divided into the Catholic and the Protestant portions, who on many subjects deliberated and resolved separately. Whilst the inferior princes exercised the executive and legal authority within their own states, those greater affairs which related to the empire in general, and to the respective connection of one sovereignty with another, were brought under the notice of the general assembly, in which the emperor presided either personally or by his commissary, who was always a prince of the empire, and who was attended by an assessor. The assembly was divided into three benches or colleges, in which every thing was decided by a majority of voices; but at a subsequent sitting they were united, and then the majority of the three benches determined the final resolution. Many subjects were intrusted to the examination of imperial deputations or committees. The power of making war or concluding peace belonged to the assembly, but was sometimes intrusted solely to the emperor, though only in pressing emergencies. The emperor had originally the power of nominating to the ecclesiastical dignities; but the popes gradually so intruded their authority, as to reduce the monarch's power to almost a shadow. After the peace of Westphalia, the empire was divided between the three religions. In the Catholic states, the pope and the bishops had usurped the judicial power, and administered it according to the canon law. In the Protestant parts, all the juridical power of the church was abolished, and the affairs of religion were left to the management of consistories chosen from among the subjects, in most cases on the nomination of the princes.

The power of coining money appertained originally to Germany, the emperor, but was gradually obtained by several of the chiefs of the respective states; but the fineness and the weight of the coin were directed by the authority of the emperor and the general assembly. The tolls on certain rivers and roads, the regulation of the great fairs of Frankfort, Brunswick, and Leipsic, and the conveyance of letters by post, as well as providing post-horses, were the regalia of the emperor; and the latter were granted hereditarily to the Prince of Taxis, whose successors, even to the present day, have some power and some profit connected with them. The degrees in the universities were conferred in the name of the emperor; and, through a prince named by him, called the Pfalzgrave, the doctors, licentiates, advocates, solicitors, notaries, and other legal officers, were admitted to practise their professions in the courts of law.

The finances of Germany, viewed as one empire, were under the direction of the general assembly. The contributions were called Roman months, each of which amounted to a force of 20,000 infantry and 4000 cavalry; and the number of these months which were granted to the emperor was adapted to the occasion that required them. These were divided among the several states, and called their contingents. They were, however, in process of time, frequently converted into payments in money, at stipulated rates. In later times each Roman month was estimated at 128,000 florins, or about L12,000 sterling. This tax was paid either at Augsburg, Frankfort, Nuremberg, or at Leipsic, and the collectors of it were called Pfenning-meister.

Many of the individual princes were under greater or less restraint in the exercise of power, from the rights of their state assemblies; and when there was a collision between them, an appeal was made to the imperial tribunals. To those courts the princes were answerable for the debts they incurred, and by them their dominions were on some occasions put in a state of sequestration; but in other of the principalities there were no assemblies of the states, and consequently less limitation of powers, though in them the sovereign could be brought under the authority of the imperial chamber, and obliged to fulfil his engagements.

This sketch of the ancient constitution of the German empire is interesting, from the length of time which it lasted, and from having, during ten centuries, with all its complexity and impediments, preserved, among the many independent states of which it was composed, a feeling of nationality, which is still cherished by all who are descended from the rude and ancient tribes of German origin. This constitution gave to Germany but little other unity, and less power, and rendered the greatest of the European kingdoms the weakest of them all. It kept them, however, from suffering the misery of a conquered and an oppressed people, and has led them to a degree of intellectual culture, in which they have been equalled by few, and exceeded by no other nation. Perhaps the distribution of the territory in such small sovereignties was one of the most effectual means of advancing and securing that reformation of religion, which all Protestants regard as one of the greatest blessings to the whole human race.

The history of Germany in modern times is so much connected with that of the rest of Europe, especially during the wars of the last and the present centuries, that a narration of it would only be a repetition of what is to be found in this work under the heads of Europe, France, and especially Britain; and to them the reader is referred.

The peace of Presburg in December 1805 first gave occasion for the dissolution of the ancient constitution of Germany. By that treaty the Dukes of Bavaria and Wurtemberg were raised to the rank of kings, and the Prince of Baden to that of an independent sovereign. Soon afterwards (28th May 1806) the arch-chancellor of the empire declared to the assembled diet, that, though contrary to law, he had nominated Cardinal Fesch, the uncle of Bonaparte, as his coadjutor and successor; and on the 12th of July the new kings of Bavaria and Wurtemberg, and sixteen other princes, formally announced to the Emperor Francis II. their separation from the empire, and invited the other princes to join them in a new alliance. The Emperor Francis on the 6th of August issued a declaration of his withdrawing from the head of the empire, abandoning the title of Emperor of Germany, and assuming that of Emperor of Austria.

In the room of this dissolved constitution, of nearly a thousand years' continuance, the several states which had been accomplices in its destruction, with some others added to them, formed what was called the Confederation of the Rhine, which, by February 1808, had received the adhesion of most of the princes, and placed Bonaparte at its head, under the title of protector. Two years afterwards, the protector, by his sole decree, united the rivers Scheldt, Meuse, Rhine, Ems, Weser, and the mouths of the Elbe, to France, and robbed of their dominions several of the smaller princes, whom he had contracted to defend. With these augmentations he continued his aggressions till the dispersion of his army in Russia.

As the events which produced the deliverance of Germany from the yoke of France belong to the history of that country as much as to this, our notices of it here must be brief. After the destruction of that vast army which penetrated into Russia, almost all the states of the north of Germany, with Prussia at their head, declared war against France. An army was quickly collected from the French conscription, and, with a wonderful celerity, Bonaparte, at its head, was enabled to penetrate into Saxony, to threaten Prussia, and exhibit a force which he supposed would overawe Austria. The battles of Lutzen and Dresden, in 1813, produced an armistice, during the continuance of which negotiations for peace between Russia and Prussia on one side, and France on the other, were carried on under the mediation of the Emperor of Austria. But as peace could not be concluded, Austria was induced to join the allies against France. During these periods a spirit had risen in Germany which animated all classes of its inhabitants, so that those powers which still clung to the interests of France could place no reliance on the support of their subjects. Bonaparte, overpowered by numbers, with an army of raw troops from his own dominions, and with troops of doubtful fidelity from the dominions of his allies, was surrounded, and, after being compelled to retreat from Dresden, fought the important battle of Leipsic against the armies of Russia, Austria, Prussia, and Sweden. The issue of that battle was not considered as doubtful even from its commencement; but, during the contest, the Saxon division of the army marched from their station in the French line, and took up their position with the Prussians. The result of the battle was a hurried retreat from Leipsic to the frontier of France, which was then the river Rhine. On the retreat to the Rhine, the shattered remains of the French army were intercepted by the forces of Bavaria. A battle was fought at Hanau, about twelve miles from Frankfort, which, though gained by the French, tended only to hasten their flight, and led to the loss of much that remained of their stores, arms, and ammunition.

By the end of the year 1813, the French were totally expelled from every part of Germany, and the occupation of Paris by the allies, early in 1814, led to general tranquillity. The Congress of Vienna soon afterwards met, and never was a body of plenipotentiaries plunged into such a labyrinth of difficulties. The great extent of country which had been delivered, and was without any government; the number of claims urged either from previous possession, or from active service in effecting the deliver- were such as to perplex with difficulties which appeared to be nearly insuperable, and, in whatever way they were terminated, must necessarily have left great dissatisfaction. They were, however, so settled as to leave Germany in the state described in the preceding pages; and whether they could have been adjusted with more regard to the principles of equity is not for us to decide.

The return of Bonaparte from Elba produced most gigantic efforts upon the part of all those smaller sovereigns who had been reinstated in their dominions by his downfall. The number of troops actually mustered and prepared to march when the battle of Waterloo took place and suspended them, amounted to more than 1,200,000 men. They were not indeed all armed, but many more men could have been raised if arms for them could have been procured. These efforts, added to the costly exertions made in the war of the deliverance, have encumbered with debts almost every state, as is noticed in the detailed account of them. These debts, however, have not been solely created by the events in question. The ephemeral kingdom of Westphalia, formed for Jerome Bonaparte, extended over Hanover, Brunswick, and Cassel, as well as the circle from which it was denominated. During his government, all the different portions of his kingdom had incurred vast debts in executing his projects. These debts were owing to individuals or corporate bodies within the dominions attached by the congress to their new sovereigns; and the princes, for the sake of the people, were compelled to assume the debts, and provide means for their liquidation, and the payment in the mean time of the interest. Thus the ungrateful task of providing for the expenditure attending the subjection of their states, as well as for their liberation, became one of the first duties on their resumption of power. This odious consequence of former circumstances has been industriously improved by the enemies of tranquillity, and has created considerable discontent.

These feelings of discontent were chiefly confined to writers in periodical papers of the smaller kind, and to associations amongst the young men in those universities in which the discipline was the most relaxed. The demonstrations of this dissatisfied state of the public mind were few, and scarcely noticed except in narrow circles. The murder of Kotzebue by Sandt, and a similar attempt on the life of Ibell, the minister of Nassau, were tokens of great excitement amongst a few fanatics; but the judicial inquiries which followed these transactions seemed to the governments to prove that the mischievous views of insurrection or assassination were confined to a very narrow circle. There was no interruption to the full exercise of the powers of the law, nor any necessity for increasing the military establishments. The Revolution in Paris in 1830 produced, however, considerable excitement in several parts of Germany, particularly in Hanover and in Saxony, and also in Brunswick, though in the latter country it was more owing to the personal character and conduct of the sovereign, which led to his deposition and to the investing of the power in the hands of his brother. In Hanover, the suspension of the university of Göttingen, and the mild but firm measures of the government, soon led to tranquillity; and in Saxony, though some mischief was effected, it was but of short duration, and the kingdom soon returned to that tranquil state which was habitual to the greater part of its inhabitants.

So matters continued till 1848, when the spirit of the French Revolution of that year soon spread over Germany, and awakened the slumbering consciousness of the German people. The effects were seen in various political agitations and commotions, and in the important concessions made by the terrified princes to the demands of their subjects. On the 2d of March the subject of a general representation of Germany, the states of Germany, was discussed in the assembly of the states of Baden, and on the 5th of that month, fifty-one German notables met at Heidelberg, passed various resolutions, appointed a committee of seven to prepare the plan of a new German parliament, and called a preliminary meeting, or Vor-parlament, to meet at Frankfort on the 30th. This vor-parliament met accordingly, and determined the mode of election for the great national assembly, which was appointed to meet at Frankfort on the 18th of May. When the assembly met, they received a message from the federal diet, expressing the desire of the latter to act in friendly unison and cooperation with the representatives of the nation. The assembly's chief occupation for several weeks was to determine the nature and limits of the authority that it was deemed necessary to lodge in some sort of central executive government, and the result of their deliberations was the appointment of the archduke John of Austria to the provisional office of regent, vicar, or administrator (Reichsverweser) to administer the central government till the election of an emperor; and, so completely were the princes humbled, that this appointment was immediately confirmed by the diet, as so instructed by their respective governments. The archduke accepted of the office of vicar, and was formally installed at Frankfort 12th July. At the end of June the committee to whom had been intrusted the task of preparing the draft of a constitution for United Germany, presented their report to the assembly, and the following were its principal provisions. Germany was to form an empire, comprising not only all the states of the confederation, but also the extra-federal provinces of Schleswig, Posen, East and West Prussia, and Austria; and the existing sovereignties were to be limited and subordinated down to the point at which their action might be found compatible with the perfection of imperial unity. The head of the empire was to be a kaiser or emperor, whose office was to be hereditary and his person inviolable, but whose powers were to be controlled by a diet of two chambers. The upper chamber of the diet was to be constituted by the reigning subject sovereigns or their deputies, and a deputy from each of the four free cities, with a complement of as many imperial councillors, with certain qualifications, as should raise the number of the members to 200. The latter were to be appointed by the sovereigns or diets from the citizens of any German state, to serve for twelve years, one-third going out every four years by rotation. The lower chamber was to consist of representatives elected by the people in fixed proportions according to population, but by methods to be determined by the governments of the respective states. The members were to be elected for six years, but one-third was to retire every two years. The diet was to hold its sittings, and the emperor to reside, at Frankfort. The emperor's dignity was to be maintained by a civil list voted by the diet. He was to exercise the executive power in all the business of the empire; to nominate and appoint the officers of the state, of the army and navy, and of the staff of the national guard. He was to have a voice in proposing measures to the diet, and the right of affirming their acts. His ministers were to be responsible, and no edict was to have legal force without the signature of one of them. In the emperor and parliament together was to be vested the national representation of Germany with respect to foreign states, the disposal of the army, the right of conducting negotiations and concluding treaties, making peace or declaring war. Provision was also made for the establishment of an imperial court of justice, to have the cognisance of all disputes between the citizens of different states; between the German states and princes; and between princes and their diets; and of all imperial fiscal matters. Free municipal institutions were to be guaranteed; a national guard was to be instituted; there was to be unrestricted freedom of public meetings; and absolute freedom of religion, science, and the press.

Such were the outlines of this memorable constitution. The members of the assembly, however, being men better acquainted with theoretical speculation than with practical business, wasted their time in idle discussions, and the only one of their acts worth further notice was their offering the imperial crown to the king of Prussia, which his majesty felt himself constrained to decline. In May 1849 the assembly split into two parties, one of which transferred its sittings to Gotha, and the other to Stuttgart, and so the bubble burst. The vicar resigned his office in December; the princes have recovered their sovereignties, and the bond has been renewed.

Germany may be considered in two points of view, either politically, as the country included within the limits of the Germanic confederation; or ethnologically, as the country inhabited by the people who speak the various branches and dialects of the Deutsch or German language. In the latter respect, the Deutsch or German nations are found to extend in a compact mass along the shores of the German Ocean and the Baltic or East Sea, from a point between Calais and Gravelines, near the Straits of Dover to the Gulf of Riga, and from that long line of boundary southwards, with dimensions continually narrowing to the Alps and the Adriatic Sea. Politically considered, Germany is situate between 45. and 54.50. N. Lat. and 5. 43. and 20. 50. E. Long., bounded N. by the German Ocean, Denmark, and the Baltic Sea; E. by West Prussia, Posen, Poland, Galicia, Hungary, and Croatia; S. by the Gulf of Venice, Italy, and Switzerland; W. by France, Belgium, and Holland. Its whole extent, including rivers and lakes, is about 246,770 square English miles, which is about the 16th part of Europe, the 215th part of the whole dry land, and the 800th part of the whole surface of the globe.

The southern and the central parts of Germany are occupied by numerous ranges of hills and mountains, sometimes separated only by narrow valleys, and elsewhere forming large elevated plains or table-lands, while the northern portion of the country sinks into a wide sandy moorish plain, but little raised above the level of the sea. The Tyrol and the south-eastern provinces of Austria are occupied by branches of the Alps, which present long narrow valleys, dismal precipices, cataracts, and glaciers; and the northern border of this alpine region may be defined by the towns of Bregenz, Southofen, Fuessen, Traunstein, Salzburg, Gmunden, Steier, St Polten, and Baden. Immediately to the northward lies the valley of the Danube, which stretches almost across the breadth of Germany, declining from an elevation of about 2200 feet, near the source of the river, to about 350 on the borders of Hungary. In passing through Bavaria the valley expands into a plain of considerable extent, which, at Ratishon on its eastern border, has an elevation of about 1000 feet, and gradually rises as it approaches the mountains that surround it. Further north the middle region of Germany is occupied by various ranges of hills, terminating northwards in a line drawn through the towns of Aachen, Duren, Krefeld, Dortmund, Soest, Paderborn, Bielefeld, Tecklenburg, Bentheim, Fursteneau, Rehburg, Hanover, Braunschweig, Magdeburg, Dessau, Halle, Weissenfels, Wurzen, Meissen, Bautzen, Goerlitz, Liegnitz, Breslau, Ramsau, and Rosenberg. These hills form a series of elevated valleys and table lands, the most remarkable of which is the valley of Bohemia, which has all the appearance of having been a lake before it was drained by the bursting of its mountain barriers. This region is much diversified by picturesque scenery, and abounds in verdant and well-wooded valleys, watered by clear streams. The banks of the Meyn, the Fulda, and the Moselle, are remarkable for their varied scenery, and the valley of the Rhine unites the grandeur of a fine landscape with the appearance of a highly fertile country. To the northward again of the hilly region, the country sinks into plains, which fall very gradually from an elevation of about 300 feet at the foot of the hills to the level of the sea. These plains extend through Lower Silesia, Lusatia, Brandenburg, Pomerania, Mecklenburg, Holstein, Hanover, and the lower part of Westphalia. To the west of the Elbe the flat country is almost entirely destitute of trees, and presents only a succession of level tracts, covered with heath and juniper, and of moors consisting chiefly of deep beds of turf intersected by rivers which flow in depressions from 100 to 200 feet below the general level of the plains. To the east of the Elbe the country is more sandy, but the sandy tracts are covered with pines, and interspersed with fertile spaces of sometimes considerable extent. The beds of the rivers also are generally wider and less deep than in the western part of the plain. Through the northern part of this plain a higher tract may be traced from west to east, from Oldeslo in Holstein to Schwedt on the Oder, about 70 miles from the sea. Eastward of the Oder it continues for some distance due east, then gradually approaches the sea, terminating on the banks of the Niemen near Grodno. It seems to have formed at one time the shore of the sea, and it is on its northern sides that are found those numerous erratic blocks or boulders that have attracted so much of the attention of geologists. Though it does not rise into hills, it forms the watershed between a number of small streams that run direct to the Baltic, and others that run southward to the Elbe, the Oder, and the Vistula. To the alpine region belong the territories of Liechtenstein, Tyrol, Southern Bavaria, Styria, Salzburg, Carinthia, and Illyria; to the middle region, Baden, Wurtemberg, Hohenzollern, the greater part of Bavaria, the northern portions of Austria, including Bohemia and Moravia, Hessen, Nassau, Luxembourg, Schwartzburg, Reuss, Saxony, and Anhalt; to the low country, Hanover, Oldenburg, Braunschweig, Lippe, Holstein, Mecklenburg, and nearly the whole of Prussia.

The Rhaetian Alps extending eastward from Switzerland, occupy the provinces of Vorarlberg and Tyrol, where they and hills, are divided into two branches by the valley of the Inn the northern branch being called the Algauer Alps, the southern the Tyrolese Alps, through which lies the Brenner Pass, with a summit elevation of 4700 Paris feet above the level of the sea. In the same chain is the highest mountain of Germany, the Orteler-spitz, the elevation of which is estimated by various authorities at between 11,800 and 14,004 Paris feet. Further east, the Noric and Carnic Alps, with their various branches, occupy the greater part of the Austrian territory south of the Danube.

Westward of the Rhine the Vosges mountains extend into the lower palatinate of Bavaria, under the names of the Wasgau mountains and the Hardtwald, the highest of which, the Donnersberg (Fr. Mont Tonnerre), rises to 2223 feet. The Hochwald and the Hundsruck (dog's back) fill up the rest of the country between the Rhine and the Moselle. To the north of the latter river the country is occupied by the Eifel mountains and branches of the Ardennes, whose range eastward is cut through by the valley of the Rhine. In the N.E. angle formed by the Rhine, in its course from the Lake of Constance to Mentz, and to the N.W. of the Upper Danube, the country is traversed by the various diverging ranges of the Schwarzwald or Black Forest, in Swabia, the Raube Alp, the Odenwald, and the Steigerwald, which are terminated northwards by the valley of the Meyn. North of that river, between the Rhine, the Saale, and the Elbe, are the Taunus, the Westerwald, the Ohrenberg in Nassau, Hesse, and Rhenish Prussia; the Rodhaar and Eggegebirge, in Westphalia and Waldeck; the Osning or Teutoburgerwald, in Lippe, Westphalia, and Hanover; the Hohe Rhön and the Spessart, in Bavaria and Electoral Hesse; the Vogelgebirge in Upper Hesse; the Franken- Germany. wald, Thuringerwald, and the Hartz, in Bavaria, the Saxon duchies, and Hanover. East of the Meyn and the Saale on the Fichtelgebirge, in the upper palatinate of Bavaria; the Bohemianwald on the south-west, the Erzgebirge on the north-west, the Riesengebirge or Sudetic Mountains, and the Geisenkergebirge, on the east and north-east, and the Zdarsky-Hory, on the south-east of Bohemia. The Erzgebirge are connected with the Fichtelgebirge by the Egergebirge, whose highest points rise only to 2881 and 2355 feet.

None of these mountains attain an elevation comparable to that of the Alps; and the central knot, the Fichtelgebirge, which send their rivers to the German Ocean, and the Baltic and Black Seas, are less a connected range of mountains than an elevated plateau, with a mean elevation of little more than 2000 feet. Their highest point, the Schneeberg, is estimated by different authors between 2599 and 3305 feet.

The principal points of elevation in or among the other ranges are these:

| Range | Elevation (ft) | |------------------------------|---------------| | Hoehnacht, in the Eifel range | 2349 | | Ernstberg, in the Schnefeld or Schnee-eifel | 7407 | | Lancher-see | 748 | | Feldberg, in the Schwartzwald | 4656 | | Belchen | 4552 | | Harzsteinhorn | 4552 | | Kastel | 4165 | | Kesselberg | 3417 | | Sackopf | 3204 | | Kniebis | 2967 | | Belchen Pass | 2831 | | Killen Pass | 2821 | | Kniebis Pass | 2734 | | Kinzigthal Pass | 2670 | | Feldsee and other lakes, in the S. Wald | 1532 to 3632 | | Katzenbeckel, in the Odenwald | 2328 | | Sieglitzberg, in the Frankenwald | 2458 | | Hohs-kulm | 2424 | | Beerberg, in the Thuringerwald | 2372 | | Schneekopf | 2357 | | Inselsberg | 2044 | | Gieckelhahn | 2819 | | Blissberg | 2849 | | Eissenberg | 2888 | | Finsterberg | 2897 | | Wurzelberg | 2550 | | Harz plateau, general elevation | 1922 | | Brocken or Blocksberg, in the Hartz | 3746 | | Heinrichshohe | 3375 | | Village of Hohnges | 2051 | | Klausenthal | 1869 | | Goleraberg, in the Spessart | 2029 | | Great Feldberg, in the Taunus | 2892 | | Little Feldberg | 2563 | | Hunau, in the Westerwald | 2745 | | Siebengebirge (Lowenberg), in the Westerwald | 1602 | | Crest of the Erzgebirge, nowhere below | 2136 | | Plateau of Gottsgrube, the most elevated town in Germany, in the Erzgebirge | 3578 |

The nucleus of the Alps consists of granite. Along the southern slopes of the Rhine Alps, and in the valley of the Adige (Etsch), the peaks are composed of primary rocks, and rugged masses of dolomite or magnesian limestone look at a distance like buildings in ruins. This formation overlies porphyries, which seem to have undergone, through the action of great heat, a modification that appears even in limestone, having changed its primitive compact into a granulated texture, and destroyed the organized bodies that it contained. At the base of the Styrian Alps, freestone, clay, and shell-marl, accompanied with large deposits of fossil vegetation, are found in the valley of the Muhl. These mountains contain no thermal water, but a great number of chalybeate springs. The Alps of Salzburg are composed of granite and other primitive rocks, and their summits are lost in the clouds, though their elevation appears less than that of the limestone mountains below them, an optical illusion occasioned by the abrupt slopes of the latter. To the west of the lower part of the Enns there are fine marbles and rock salt; to the east, mines of lead, silver, iron, and coal. To the north of the Danube, in the valley of the river March, the low plains are covered with alluvium and detrital matter. On the adjoining slopes of the Gesenke, Karpathian, and Sudetic mountains, there are isolated basins of the coal formation, composed of freestone, schistose clay, clay-ironstone, porphyries, metalliferous limestone, containing lead, iron, and zinc, rocks composed of ancient shells, clay, gypsum, and beds of rock salt. The adjoining summits consist of granite; but schistose and micaceous rocks appear in the lower parts. In Silesia, the alluvial plains abound with bluish clay.

The constitution of the Bohemian mountains is essentially different in several respects. The Bocherneralw consists of small-grained granite, micaceous rocks, slate-schist, and syenite. These rocks present very rugged tops, with pyramidal and needle-shaped peaks, separated by deep ravines. Forests occupy their upper parts, while their bases are covered with pools and marshes. The summits and rounded flanks of the Riesengebirge indicate the former presence of volcanic fires; they contain freestone and basalt, surrounded with limestone full of fossil shells. The southern slopes of the Erzgebirge show also many traces of volcanic agency. Their porphyries have undergone some violent upheavings; the celebrated mineral waters of Carlsbad and Toplitz spring from among them, and the ferruginous waters of Bochin and Eger, and several others less celebrated, rise from ground that bears the marks of igneous origin. Near Eger is the Rammerberg, a conical hill covered with lava and scoriae. The substructure of the Erzgebirge is granitic, and its mineral wealth, particularly on the Saxon side, is of such importance as to have given the chain the name it bears, which means metalliferous mountains. The eastern part, however, of the Erzgebirge, towards the Elbe, becomes a sandstone range, which bears the name of the Saxon Switzerland, and is much celebrated for its grotesque rocks, romantic valleys, and sublime and picturesque views. Towards the centre of Bohemia, near the banks of the Moldau, the primitive micaceous rocks are covered with alluvium, in which are found fossil wood and iron ore. "In the country round Prague there is a most complete and symmetrical exposure of the whole silurian system, whether as respects the clear order of the strata, or the vast abundance of organic remains." In the mountains of Moravia, particularly towards the north, the freestone is so easily decomposed as to exhibit everywhere at a distance the forms of extensive ruins.

The course of the Danube divides Bavaria into two great geological districts. On the south, from the Lake of Constance to the mouth of the Inn, extend vast tracts of the same epoch as the formations of the Paris basin, reposing upon the older rocks that underlie the granite of the Alps. To the north of the river there is a large development of oolitic rocks, chiefly of the later, middle, and newer periods, amongst which are the remarkable and valuable lithographic limestones of Solnhofen, rich in fossils of various kinds. The alluvial and transported soil of this region contains the bones of extinct species of animals. In the valley of the Regen are found the bones of tapirs and rhinoceroses; in the valley of the Meyn the bones of gigantic elephants; and the caverns of the limestone rocks of the Steigerwald contain immense masses of the bones of lions, hyenas, and

---

1. "Wunderliches Deutschland." Leipzig, 1852. Germany, various ruminant animals scattered in the alluvial clay. Deposits of the same kind abound in the valley of the Neckar. The calcareous schists of the valley of the Altmühl contain the remains of crocodiles. The banks of the Regnitz and the Meyn consist of primitive limestone and other quartz deposits. The nucleus of the Schwartwald seems to consist of granite, but in some places the granitic rocks support secondary limestone. The spaces which extend northward are composed of old sandstone. The slopes that overlook the Rhine are formed of soil posterior to the chalk.

To the north of the Meyn the hills are composed of primitive limestone, flanked with sandstone. To the east and west they contain volcanic deposits, which form on the one side the chains of the Vogelsberg and the Westerwald, and on the other, to the west of the Rhine, the basaltic group of the Eifel. Among these oceanic and volcanic products granitic summits and table lands occasionally appear; but to the north of the Thuringerwald granite becomes less and less frequent, till there is no further trace of it. At the mouth of the Aller the old limestone terminates; and to the north and the west all the plains that fall to the North Sea, as far east as the Elbe, are covered with immense beds of sedimentary deposits, or with beds of sand lying upon chalk, limestone, sandstone, and gypsum, which mix at last along the shores of the Baltic, with the sandy and marshy soil of Pomerania. This great plain has every appearance of having been, at no very distant epoch, covered by the sea; in many places its surface still consists of bare sand, but in the Isle of Rugen, and several places in Pomerania, Hanover, Luneburg, and Holstein, there are to be found isolated masses of rock belonging to the chalk or muschelkalk formations.

In the S.W. and N.W. of Germany the new red sandstone formation has been more fully developed than in England or France. It has been called by German writers Trias, or the triple-group, because it is separable into three distinct formations called the Keuper, the Muschelkalk, and the Bunter-sandstein. This last consists, as the name implies, of various coloured sandstones, dolomites, and red clays, with some lias, especially in the Hartz, and of calcareous pisolite, or roestone, the whole sometimes attaining a thickness of more than a thousand feet. In Wurtemberg, the keuper, and in Baden, the muschelkalk, attain the same thickness.

According to Sir R. I. Murchison, rocks which have been, or may be classified as silurian, devonian, carboniferous, and permian, occupy detached districts in the S.E. of Prussia, Saxony, and the smaller states westward, and spread over large tracts in the northern territories of Austria, particularly in Bohemia and Moravia. Palaeozoic rocks abound in Thuringia, Franconia, Saxony, and the adjacent principalities, the older sedimentary formations occupying a considerable region on the north-western flank of that devious chain of granitic gneissose, and other crystalline rocks that, ranging from N.E. to S.W., divides Saxony from Austria, and trends into the Fichtelgebirge of Bavaria. From that chain these deposits descend into, and spread over, a broad and comparatively low undulating tract, which, in its central part, is cut transversely by the river Saal, as it flows from Hof on the S.E. to Saalfeld on the N.W. On their N.W. boundaries these rocks rise again into the lofty eminences of the Thuringerwald, the whole succession having a dominant strike from the S.W. to N.E. In this way the newer strata may be said to occupy a broad trough ranging lengthwise from Reineburg and Gera on the N.E., by Schleiz, Plauen, and Hof, to Upper Franconia on the S.W., whilst the older rocks of the series, rising up on both sides, are often found in a highly metamorphic state, but chiefly on the S.E. flank of the depression. The lower silurian rocks of the Thuringerwald and of the Saalfeld tract, are penetrated at intervals by porphyries and greenstones, and irregularly overlapped towards the S.E. flanks by masses of Devonian age.

In advancing westward from central Germany to the Hartz and Rhenish Prussia, nearly all traces of the silurian rocks are lost, whilst devonian and carboniferous deposits become vastly more expanded. The grauwacke of the Hartz is now ascertained to be no older than the devonian era. The Brocken itself is composed of a comparatively modern granite, which has become decomposed into chaotic piles called Felsen-meer.

The convoluted and broken rocks that present such an antique slaty aspect, and, crowned with castles, form the chief features of the gorges of the Rhine and the Moselle, and all the territory on the right bank of the Rhine, from the Taunus, S.E., to the coal-fields east of Dusseldorf on the N.W., including the duchy of Nassau, and having its northern frontier in Westphalia, bounded on the E. by the secondary rocks of Hesse, which range southwards by Marburg and Giesen to Frankfort, formerly considered to be a tract of undivided grauwacke, is now found to consist of the devonian and lower carboniferous systems. On the left bank of the Rhine the same succession occurs between the lower devonian rocks of the Hundsruck on the S.E. to the coal-tracts of Aachen and Belgium on the N.W. It is only by deflecting westward into the mountainous region of the Ardennes that the slaty rocks, rising from beneath all the other deposits, are met with. The upward succession, from the devonian to the carboniferous, is clear on both banks of the Rhine.—(Murchison's Siluria.)

The coal measures are widely distributed in many parts of Germany, as Bohemia, Saxony, Silesia, Rhenish Bavaria, and Rhenish Prussia, from the last of which Holland is supplied with coals.

No part of Europe yields a greater variety or abundance of mineral productions, and in no part of the world are the mines worked with so much skill or so much economy. Precious stones are discovered in many parts; rock-crystal, amethysts, topazes, are found in Bavaria; calcedony, agate, petchblende, and porcelain-jasper, in Bohemia; barytes in many parts; marbles, gypsum, and alabaster, in Bohemia; alum, near Töplitz; rock-salt and Glauber salts in various parts; and abundance of the earths calculated for making earthenware, from the coarsest description to the finest porcelain. Fossil coal is found in many districts, and much of it is consumed; but the cheapness of wood, and the prejudices of the people against the use of it in their houses, have operated to prevent the mines from being completely explored or worked to anything approaching the extent of which they are capable. Gold is procured, though in very small quantities, by washing, in Salzburg, in Bohemia, in the Rammelsberg, and in Silesia. Silver and cinnabar are raised from the mines of the Erzgebirge in Saxony. Iron, copper, tin, lead, calamine, bismuth, cobalt, nickel, titanium, arsenic, and almost every other mineral, is more or less raised from the mines. The abundance of mineral substances everywhere scattered, and which it would be difficult to enumerate, has promoted the study of mineralogy, and given birth to the school of Freyburg, whence the pupils of Werner carried the science to every part of the world.

The great abundance of mineral springs, hot, cold, bitter, mineral acid, salt, is a peculiar characteristic of Germany. The warm waters of Aix-la-Chapelle, Pyrmont, Carlsbad, Töplitz, Baden-Baden, Bruckensau, Kissingen, and Wiesbaden, attract every year crowds of visitors. Those of Ischel, Baden near Vienna, and many more, though less resorted to, are nowise inferior. The acidulated springs of Selters, Driburg, and Rohitschs, the bitter waters of Seidschutz, Seidlitz, and other places, and the long series of salt springs that follow the base of the northern Alps, are sufficient proofs that Germany abounds with mineral veins or deposits of the most various kinds. The country is, moreover, gene- Germany, rally well supplied with good and wholesome water for the ordinary purposes of life. The only exceptions consist of some marshy tracts in Westphalia, and of some of the colder valleys of Salzburg.

The soil is generally productive. The plains in the north have indeed much arid sandy land; but nature has provided some rich and fruitful soils along the borders of the rivers, where the most abundant harvests are gathered. The south has also on its mountains much barren or slightly productive land; but the beautiful valleys and plains among the hills rival in fertility the best alluvial lands on the banks of the northern rivers. In general the soil in the north is heavy, and in the south light; the former most adapted for corn, and the latter for vines. The best soil is in the middle, between the mountains and the sandy plains. In Bohemia, Silesia, Franconia, Saxony, and on the Rhine, the proportion of good soil is much greater than in the north or the south.

Germany has seven large rivers which pass through it to the sea, and in their course receive about 500 smaller streams, about sixty of which are navigable, either naturally or by means of artificial improvement. These are the Danube, Rhine, Weser, Elbe, Oder, Etsch or Adige, and Ems, which will be found described under their own names.

The chief of the German lakes is the Boden See, or Lake of Constance, on the borders of Switzerland. (See Constance.) To the eastward, among the valleys of the Alps, are several lakes of considerable dimensions, as the Walchen, Kochel, Ammer, Wurm or Starenberger, Tegern, Schleier, Chiem, Gruneld, Hallstaedter, Traun or Gmunden See, Mond, and Kammer or Alter, lakes.

Along the southern shores of the Baltic or East Sea there is a number of lakes, which form the western portion of an innumerable series, extending through Prussia into Russia and Finland, and occupying comparatively higher ground than the adjoining plains and river channels. Some of these are of considerable extent, as the lake of Schwentin in Mecklenburg and the Spirding See in East Prussia, the latter, however, beyond the political limits of Germany. At the eastern base of the Hartz are the salt and the sweet lakes (Salzige and Sisse Seen), and to the north of Minden, to the east of the Weser, is a considerable sheet of water called the Steinhuder Meer; and to the west of the Weser is a smaller lake called the Dummer See.

The climate of Germany is very uniform in respect of the degrees of cold or heat experienced in its different regions; for though there is a difference of 9° of latitude between its southern and northern borders, that difference is compensated by the different elevations of the country, the northern part being lowland on the sea, while the midland and southern regions rise to a considerable elevation. This is indicated by the following table of places from north to south:

| Places | Latitude | Elevation above the sea in feet | Mean temperature of the Climate | |--------------|----------|---------------------------------|--------------------------------| | Stralsund | 54°19' | 51 | 47° 30° 63° | | Berlin | 52°30' | 140 | 48° 31° 64° | | Gotha | 50°57' | 1010 | 46° 29° 60° | | Baireuth | 49°37' | 1119 | 46° 29° 61° | | Ratibon | 49° 1' | 1290 | 48° 31° 64° | | Munich | 48°10' | 1733 | 48° 34° 65° | | Innsbruck | 47°16' | 1905 | 50° 29° 64° |

The mean temperature of the coldest month varies from 29° at Munich to 26° at Stralsund; and of the warmest month, from 67° at Innsbruck to 62° at Gotha.

The climate, however, of some parts of Germany is milder than the table would indicate; for a great part of the north-western provinces is open to the influence of the sea, and experiences the benefits of the same western breezes that soften the climates of Britain and Norway. The valley of the Rhine, likewise, being deeply sunk between ranges of mountains, enjoys the finest climate, having the highest annual temperature, a mild winter, and not too hot a summer. A similar climate is enjoyed in the south-eastern part of Germany, the lowlands of Austria, where the mean temperature of the year is 51° at Vienna; of the winter, 33°; of the summer, 69°; of the coldest month, 30°; and of the warmest month, 71°.

In Germany the prevalent winds are westerly, or a little to the south of west. Blowing from warmer climates and from the sea, they carry much vapour with them, which, coming in contact with the cold air of the Alps, produces a great deal of rain, particularly in the basin of the Danube. The number of rainy days in each year is about 150, but the greater number of them happens in summer, and the smaller in autumn. From the coast of the North Sea to the plain of Bavaria, the number of foggy days is about 40; but at the foot of the Alps the number increases to 133 or 135. Storms of thunder and of hail are not frequent; they happen oftener in Lower Silesia, and least frequently in Lower Austria. The quantity of rain that falls yearly on the plains is, in the basin of the Rhine, 25 inches (Paris); of the Weser, 25; of the Elbe and the Oder, 22; and of the Danube, 30.

Except the Alps, none of the German mountains rise to the snow-line. In the southern Tyrol that line is found at an elevation of 8760 feet; in the Alps of Salzburg and Styria, at 8005.

From what has been said respecting the face of the country, and its diversities of elevation, it will readily be understood that no general accounts of the climate will be properly or strictly applicable to every particular region. The whole country may be divided into three zones. The first of these comprehends the northern plains, the climate of which is not cold, but humid and variable. They are exposed to every wind, and to the fogs and storms of two seas. The north-western plains are subject to frequent rains and devastating hurricanes from the North Sea; but the influence of the Baltic on the north-eastern plains is much less, and their climate though colder is less moist and less variable. The second zone comprehends the middle portion of Germany, including Moravia, Bohemia, Saxony, Franconia, Swabia, Hesse, and the country on the Rhine. The mountains of this region form in some degree a barrier against the direct effects of the maritime climate of the lowland. The sky is not so obscured by mists, and the regularity of the seasons is not so much disturbed by winds and storms; but the general elevation of this country renders the climate colder than it is in other countries in the same latitude but nearer the level of the sea. This region is, however, the most agreeable in Germany, and may be divided into three parts: the first comprising Hesse and Saxony, where the grape yields only an acid and imperfect wine, but the peach and the apricot flourish. In the second, comprising Bohemia, Moravia, and part of Franconia, from the height of the mountains the winter's snow is of longer continuance, but the effect of the summer's heat is more sudden and powerful, so that early and abundant harvests depend in a great measure on favourable exposures. In the third, which comprises the countries on the Meyn, the Neckar, and the Rhine, the grape is of better quality, woods of chestnut and almond trees grow, and the summers are warmer and less variable than in the northern provinces of France. The climate, indeed, of these countries is finer than any other in Germany, and is the most salubrious and most agreeable of any in Europe. The third general zone is that of the Alps, whose elevated heights and rapid declivities connect very different climates. Thus the culture of the vine ceases in Bavaria and Upper Germany. Austria, but is resumed with fresh vigour in the neighbourhood of Vienna. In the valleys of Styria and Carniola fields of maize or vineyards are in close contiguity to the glaciers and perennial snows of the Tyrol and Salzburg. In general, the climate of Germany is very healthy. In the south, however, under the influence of the Alps, the air is raw and cold, whilst in the plains and open valleys a climate equal to that of the finest parts of Italy is enjoyed. The northern provinces are colder, damper, and more ungenial, and, near the stagnant lakes that abound in the Baltic provinces, unwholesome. The weather besides undergoes extreme variations, and frost is frequently felt at a late period of the year. It is also often very severe through the winter, and even the great rivers Rhine and Danube are frequently frozen over from November to March.

Germany is suitable for the cultivation of all the kinds of useful plants that belong to the temperate zones; and, owing to the equality of the climate, they are spread over all the country. The highlands of the middle region as well as the northern lowlands grow the different species of cereals; and in the eastern part of the latter region there are tracts of land which will bear comparison with those that are called the granary of Europe. Wheat, rye, barley, and oats are the cereals most generally cultivated; but in some districts these are added spelt, buckwheat, millet, emmer (Triticum dicoccum), einkorn (Triticum monococcum), and maize. The potato is largely cultivated, not merely for food, but for the purpose of distillation into brandy. Beans, peas, vetches, and lentils are also produced abundantly. The common beet (Beta vulgaris) is largely cultivated in some districts for the production of sugar. Flax and hemp are cultivated, though not to so great an extent as formerly, for manufacturing into linen and canvas, and the expression of oil. In many districts tobacco is the most productive and most profitable object of culture. To these are to be added rapeseed and poppies, and above all cabbages, of which the Germans make a favourite mess called Sauer-kraut.

The fruits of temperate climates are largely produced; apples, pears, cherries, and plums are everywhere common. The more delicate fruits, as apricots and peaches, only grow in the warmer districts on the Rhine and the Danube, where likewise are to be found the true chestnut, the common almond, and the fig-tree growing in the open air. The olive-tree is only to be found on the Italian side of the Alps. Vines are grown to a large extent in the west and south, particularly along the Middle Rhine and the Lower Danube. On the Upper Danube, as far down as Austria, no vines thrive; and though vines are grown in the valley of the Saale, on the Weser, and in Silesia, they are in small quantity, and of inferior quality. On the contrary, the lower slopes of the hills along the Rhine from Basel to Coblentz, in Baden, the Palatinate, and Hesse, and above all in Nassau, are literally covered with vines. There are produced the celebrated Andesheimer, Hochheimer, and Johannisberger. The wines of the lower Meyn, particularly those of Würzburg, are of the best kinds; those of the upper Meyn and the valley of the Neckar are rather inferior. The Moselle wines are lighter and more acid than those of the Rhine.

The forests, as well in the plains as in the mountains, produce an abundance of juicy berries of the most various kinds, including strawberries, bilberries, raspberries, and cranberries. The heaths of the north-western plains afford abundant food for bees, which produce large quantities of honey and wax.

The woods are extensive, especially among the hills, where the finest forest-trees of the temperate zone grow to perfection; and on this account it is that so many of the mountain-ranges have the word Wald attached to their names, as the Schwartzwald, the Böhmerwald, the Thuringwald, &c. The elevated plateaux are less wooded than the hills; but the eastern region of the northern lowlands abounds with extensive woods. A narrow strip along the shores of the Baltic is covered with oaks and beeches; further inland coniferous trees are the most prevalent, particularly the Scotch fir (Kiefer). Birches are also widespread. Woods on the mountains consist chiefly of firs, pines, and larches, but contain also silver-leaved firs, beeches, and oaks. Chestnuts appear on the terraces of the Rhine valley, and in Swabia and Franconia. Quite woodless is the whole north-west of Germany, where the people find compensation for the want of wood in their boundless fields of turf or peat.

Wild animals of numerous kinds abound all over Germany, to the great injury of agriculture; among these may be mentioned particularly the roe, stag, hare, and boar. The fallow deer and the wild rabbit are more rare. Of other wild animals, the Alps produce wolves, bears, and lynxes. The wolves are likewise a scourge of the Scheifergebirge, on the west of the Lower Rhine, to which they find their way from the French territory. The chamois and marmot are numerous in the Alps; the wild goat, or ibex, is seldom met with. Foxes, martens, weasels, badgers, and otters abound everywhere; the hamster particularly at the foot of the Hartz.

Of domesticated animals, horses, oxen, sheep, and swine are the principal objects of attention in Germany. They are bred everywhere, as well in the plateaux as in the lowlands, but more successfully in the latter. The coastlands of the North and the East seas are celebrated for the excellence of their cattle. Saxony, Silesia, Bohemia, and Moravia feed the finest sheep; Westphalia and the districts bordering on the lowlands furnish excellent swine. The ass is found in the hill-countries only, and the mule among the Alps. The hilly regions are also favourable for the breeding of goats. The finest breed of German horses is to be found in Mecklenburg and north Hanover; mixed indeed, it is admitted, with English blood, but not improved. The pure Mecklenburg horse is particularly excellent, the Holstein horse is larger and heavier, and often purchased for the Mecklenburger, but is not so enduring. The Hessian horse is large and strong, of little beauty, but spirited, and a good worker. Horses are mostly brought from Westphalia, Friesland, and north Holland. Various other breeds might be named; but, generally speaking, those of North Germany are better than those of the south.

The feathered tribes are everywhere abundant in the fields, woods, and marshes. Partridges, snipes, thrushes, quails, wild geese, bustards, grouse, blackcocks, woodcocks, wild ducks, widgeons, and teal abound everywhere. The Leipzig larks are known all over Germany; thrushes, sparrows, bullfinches, and serinfinches are plentiful, the last especially in the Hartzwald. Bohemia is celebrated for its pheasants, bustards, and mountain-cocks. Geese and ducks are found mostly in the flat districts, where the great abundance of standing water affords ample scope for their increase. The lammergeier and the golden eagle are found only, with the chamois, among the highest Alps. Tame geese are bred in large flocks, particularly in Pomerania. The length of time during which the migratory birds remain in Germany differs considerably with the different species. The stork remains about 170 days; the house-swallow 160; the snowgoose 260; and the snipe 220. In Northern Germany these birds arrive from twenty to thirty days later than in the south.

The waters of Germany abound with fish; but the genera and species are few. Carp and the salmon tribes are the most abundant; after them rank the pike, the eel, the shad, the loach, the perch, the lamprey, and many others.

Besides frogs, Germany has few varieties of amphibia. Of serpents there are only two kinds, but both poisonous. In Southern Germany the edible frog (Rana esculenta) Germany, and the *Helix pomatia* are used as food. The most remarkable animal of Germany is the olm (*Proteus anguinus*), which is found in the lake of Zirnitz, the cave of Adelsberg, and the lake of Sittich.

The rearing of bees is chiefly attended to in the heaths of Hanover, where they abound. The cultivation of the silkworm has been attempted, but has either entirely failed, or had at best very indifferent success; the black mulberry, which grows in Germany, being less suited to them than the white. Of late an attempt has been made to extend the cultivation of silkworms in Lusatia and the Mark of Brandenburg, but it seems not yet to have become an object of general attention.

Germany is inhabited by people of two distinct families, Deutsch and Slavs. The former are the more numerous, and exclusively occupy the northern, western, and southern provinces; the latter prevail in the east, where, besides forming the bulk of the population of Bohemia and Moravia, they have likewise colonized in the alpine valleys of Styria and Tillyria, on the northern slope of the plateau of Upper Silesia, on the plateau of Lusatia, and on the coasts of Pomerania. In the latter province they are called Kassubes; in Lusatia, Wends; in Bohemia, Czechs; in Moravia, Slovaks, Hannaks, Chrowats, &c. The Slavic population bears the proportion to the Deutsch of about 2 to 13. But, besides these principal stocks, there are also groups of people of other families,—Italians, in the valleys on the south side of the crest of the Alps, in the Tyrol, Friuli, and Istria; French, in a small district of the Lower Rhine, to the west of that river, and in several parts of the northern lowlands, in small colonies, where, however, they have acquired the German manners and customs, language, and way of thinking. Greeks and Armenians are to be found in the Austrian provinces; Jews are scattered over all Germany, and gypsies wander about as nomades or vagabonds. The total number of all races was estimated, in 1854, at 43,286,116, being an increase of only 13,121,716 since 1816, or less than 1 per cent. per annum. The increase, however, in North Germany has been in a ratio double of that of the south, which seems to have nearly reached the maximum of its capabilities of supporting population, and it is from that region principally that during this period several millions of people have emigrated to America and elsewhere abroad.

The Roman writers described the Germans as large and powerful men, with blue eyes and yellow hair. These characteristics are still preserved among the people of the highlands of Middle Germany and the adjoining borders of the northern lowlands. In general the Northern Germans are taller and more slender than those of the south; and, instead of the yellow hair and blue or light gray eyes of the former, the latter have dark gray or brown eyes and brown hair. The inhabitants of the Alps, even the women, are distinguished for their large bones and great bodily strength. In the flat land the forms are not so angular as in the south; but the northerns are not on that account inferior in bodily strength.

The German is earnest, quiet, and somewhat listless; he is considered, however, industrious and persevering in everything he undertakes, honest and frank in expression, simple in his manners. "To be always true and honest" is his motto, and his courage is equal to any emergency. Gifted with a deeply penetrating spirit of observation, and naturally inventive, the exact sciences have been always his favourite object of study, while at the same time he has not neglected the fine arts. The Germans have been the authors of many useful inventions, among which, those of gunpowder and printing have been attended with the most important results.

The German loves his country, but for a long time it has been more the love of home than true patriotism that has been most obvious in the character of the German people. The splitting of Germany into so many states, and the difference of interests thence necessarily arising, increased by difference of political and commercial institutions, have essentially contributed to lessen their general patriotism, though in the minds of many enthusiasts, notwithstanding the failure of the great experiment of 1848, the union of the whole German race into one great nation is contemplated as not only desirable, but as even still within the limits of probability.

The German and the Slavonic languages are of course languages, the prevalent ones; but in southern Tyrol and the Adriatic coast-land Italian is spoken, and in the small district round Malmédy in the Lower Rhine French is most general.

The German language is divided into two great branches, the High (Hoch) Deutsch and the Low (Platt) Deutsch; the former being the language of books and the educated classes, while the latter is spoken by the lower classes. The Low Deutsch is divided into many dialects, which, according to the situations of the places where they are spoken, may be called Upper Dutch and Lower Dutch (*ober-deutsche* und *nieder-deutsche*). The ober-deutsche dialects are spoken in the alpine and middle highland regions of Germany by a greater number of people than the nieder-deutsche. Among these dialects may be noticed the following:

The *Alemannic*, the language of the German Swiss, which has spread itself within the political limits of Germany, into the north-western region of the Alps, the Black Forest, and the valley of the Rhine, as far down as Baden-Baden. Rough guttural tones are its characteristics.

The *Swabian* dialect prevails between the Black Forest and the Lech, and from the Alps to Kocher, consequently in the greater part of the kingdom of Württemburg and as far as Augsburg. Its characteristics are nasal sounds, and a peculiar but pleasing ringing soft sing-song utterance.

The *Bavarian* dialect, which is broader and more nasal than the Swabian, and slurs over a great many sounds, is spoken in the plateau of Bavaria, and the adjoining region of the Alps, as far as Austria and Carinthia.

The *Frankish* dialects are very manifold. In place of the broad and strong tones of the Bavarian and Swabian, they have more flexibility and sharpness. They are distinguished into East Frankish and West Frankish; the former prevailing in Bohemia, the Voigtländ, and the western portion of the Erzgebirge; the latter in Hesse, as far as the Taunus, and across the Rhine, in this middle part of its course. Both are subdivided into a variety of minor dialects.

The *Upper Saxon* dialect which forms the transition from the ober- to the nieder-deutsch, is spoken in Thuringia, the whole of Saxony (except the Upper Erzgebirge), Lusatia, and Silesia, with differences of tone and expression in the different districts.

The *Nieder-Deutsch* dialects are spoken by the people of the whole of the northern plains, from the hill country to the sea, and from the eastern borders of Germany to the western. They are the proper *platt-deutsche*, in contradistinction to the *ober-deutsche*, out of which the *hoch-deutsche*, or written language, has been framed. Two principal dialects may be distinguished in this nieder-deutsche, viz., the *Lower Saxon* and the *Westphalian*, the latter of which approaches, in some of its branches, to the hardness of the ober-deutsche, while the former exhibits great softness, flexibility, and euphony, but at the same time a want of power. The Lower Saxon branch extends from the east side of the Weser eastward throughout the plain of Germany, and is divided into the Holstein, Hamburg, Mecklenburg, Pomeranian, Brandenburg-Markish, and Luneburg varieties, the last of which is spoken through Brunswick and Hanover east of the Weser. The Westphalian branch prevails from the Weser westward to the Rhine, not only in the plains but also in the adjacent hill country. Its varie- ties are the Munster, the Osnaburg, and the Sauerland dialects. The Flemish and Dutch dialects are spoken in a small corner of Germany, where the Rhine passes into its delta.

The mixture of Westfrankish, Westphalian, and Dutch has produced a particular dialect called the Lower Rhenish, which is spoken on the Lower Rhine, particularly to the west of the river.

The Frisian language, which differs considerably from the Deutsch dialects, is spoken on the shores of the North Sea, between the Ems and the Elbe, not however always in its original purity, but much intermixed with the Westphalian and Lower Saxon dialects, which are its immediate neighbours.

The Germans have spread themselves and their language in numerous colonies beyond the proper bounds of their fatherland, not only in Europe but also in America. Since the twelfth century they have occupied the shores of the Baltic provinces of both Prussia and Russia, imposing their language as well as manners and customs upon those regions. Numerous German colonies are also to be found on the banks of the Volga, the shores of the Black Sea, and beyond the Caucasus. German miners inhabit the Urals; and it was Germans that in the tenth century carried the first elements of civilization to the Magyars, by settling in Transylvania, where their descendants still form an industrious community. Germans have crossed the Atlantic in swarms; there are said to be now upwards of five millions of them settled in the United States, and emigration is still continuing on a large scale.

Of the Slavonic languages, the Polish is spoken in Upper Silesia, and the Czech in Bohemia and Moravia, in various dialects. The dialect spoken in Prague and its vicinity is the finest and purest, and has now become the language of writing and books. Other dialects of the Slavic tongues are spoken in Carniola, Carinthia, and Styria, and the eastern regions of the alpine valleys, and in Lusatia.

Noble, burgher, and peasant are the three ranks or classes that form the population of Germany. The nobility are divided into the higher and the lower; the burghers, according to their occupations, into many branches; the peasantry into still more, which, in the several states and their constituent parts, exhibit many differences, arising from the political and civil arrangements of the particular districts.

The German civil law, in its present state, secures to every German the privilege of changing his residence from one German state to another, of becoming its subject, and even of entering into its civil or military service, unless his obligation to the military service of his native state stands in the way. He has likewise the privilege of acquiring and possessing landed property beyond the limits of the state where he lives, without being subjected to more burdens and taxes on that account. He is also free of any transit dues on his property passing into another state, unless there be particular treaties on this subject between the one state and the other.

To the high nobility belong all those princely and groß-lich (of the rank of count or earl) families, which, before the establishment of the existing political constitution, were immediate feudatories or princes of the empire, in the enjoyment of territorial possessions, of which they were sovereigns. The heads of these families form now the first rank in the state to which they belong; and they and their families are the most privileged class, particularly in respect of taxation. In respect of their persons, families, and possessions, they still retain most of the old rights and privileges attached to their estates not inconsistent with the sovereign power and the higher rights of the state governments. Among these may be mentioned the unlimited right of living in any German state, or in any foreign state at peace with

Germany; of making obligatory engagements respecting Germany, their estates and family relations, freedom from military service, the exercise of civil and criminal jurisdiction on their estates in the first instance, and, when their territory is large, in the second instance also, jurisdiction in the forests, and in matters of local police, and connected with the churches and schools and other institutions, but always according to law. Many of the same sort of privileges were also allowed to the other nobles of the empire, who are not of this first and most highly privileged class. But of the more invidious of these privileges, especially that of exemption from military service and taxation, the old nobles, as they are called, were deprived in 1848.

Christianity was introduced into Germany in the seventh century, and Mentz became the ecclesiastical metropolis of the empire. The Reformation, in the sixteenth century, divided the Germans into three denominations, the Catholic, the Lutheran, and the Reformed; but in recent times the two latter are scarcely to be discriminated, and in most of the states they have become united under the name of the Evangelical Church. The difference of religions, however, occasions no difference in the enjoyment of civil and political rights. The Catholics are the most numerous in the south of Germany, the Protestants in the north. They stand to each other in the proportion of about 22 Catholics to 15 Protestants. In south-eastern Germany there are a few thousand members of the Greek Church; and scattered over all the country about 300,000 Jews. The spiritual affairs of the Roman Catholic Church are administered by nine archbishops and their thirty-one suffragan bishops, namely:

Archbishoprics. Bishoprics. Vienna .............. St Poelten, Graetz, Gurk, Leoben. Salzburg ............. Linz, Brixen, Trent. Görz .................. Laibach, St Andree-lavant, Gradiska, Trieste, Citta-nova. Prague ............... Leitmeritz, Budweis, König-gratz. Olmutz .............. Brunn, Breslau. Freising ............. Passau, Augsburg, Regensburg. Bamberg ............. Eichstätt, Würzburg, Speier. Freiburg ............. Mentz, Fulda, Rotenberg, Limburg. Cologne ............. Troves, Münster, Paderborn, Hildesheim.

The archbishops and bishops are the representatives of the pope in all spiritual affairs and matters of conscience; but they are not allowed to publish any papal bull without the express permission of the state governments. Occasional outbreaks, however, still serve to show that the spirit of the long-during contest between church and state is only slumbering, and not extinct; and the supremacy and other inadmissible claims of the church are still asserted with as much zeal, if not with the same success, as in the middle ages. Mentz and Treves, formerly the sees of archbishops who were prince-electors of the empire, have been degraded into suffragan bishoprics.

The Evangelical Church acknowledges the headship of the state, and submits to the rule of the spiritual officers and boards appointed by government. These consist of a minister of church affairs, consistories, and of general superintendents, who, in the Prussian states, generally bear the title of bishops. There is a bishop of the Greek Church in Trieste; and the spiritual concerns of the Jews are superintended by land-rabbis.

In the intelligent practice of agriculture some of the Industry. Germans are not behind the most advanced of the other countries of Europe. Mecklenburg, in particular, and Holstein are distinguished for their excellent husbandry; and in Hanover, Brunswick, Bohemia, Saxony, and some parts of Prussia and Austria, it is scarcely inferior. Generally speaking, agriculture is the principal occupation of the Germans, particularly in Bavaria, Württemberg, Baden, Hesse, Nassau, Hanover, Brunswick, Oldenburg, Prussia, Anhalt, Holstein, and Mecklenburg; while in the Saxon Germany, duchies, Schwartzburg, and Reuss, some districts of Prussia, Bohemia, and the kingdom of Saxony, manufactures employ at least an equal, and in some cases even a greater, number of the people. The greatest contrast in respect of agriculture is to be seen in Mecklenburg and Württemberg. In the former farming is conducted on a large scale; in the latter, as well as in other provinces, the land is divided into small parcels, cultivated by small proprietors or tenants, who follow ancestral usages, and are unprovided with means to make any improvements, by draining or otherwise. In the former the Schlagewirthschaft prevails, according to which one immense field is covered with wheat, while another is covered with oats, a third with clover, a fourth is being ploughed and harrowed, and a fifth is feeding herds of cattle, the common size of farms being so much as 500,000 square rute, or almost 2000 acres; in the latter, everything is grown cheek by jowl, in small patches, more like gardening than farming, the usual size of Württemberg farms being only from 5 to 20 square rute, or from \( \frac{1}{4} \) th to \( \frac{1}{3} \) th of an acre.

There are three systems of husbandry at present practised in Germany. In the first, called the three-field husbandry, while one field is sown with winter corn, and another with summer corn, a third lies fallow; but sometimes, instead of a fallow the third field is sown with green crops, peas, potatoes, &c. In the second system, called the four-field husbandry, the principle is that the same field shall not be occupied two years together with corn, without at least one fallow intervening; as, for example, one year, rye; second, clover; third, oats or barley; fourth, potatoes; fifth, again winter corn. This is also called the rotation system (Fruchtwechselwirtschaft). The third system, called the Schlag or Koppelwirtschaft, practised in Holstein and Mecklenburg, divides a farm into a number of large parcels of equal size (stucke, koppeln, or schliege), which, after several years' continuous bearing of grain or other produce, are allowed for several years more (3 to 7) to lie fallow, or in grass for summer pasture. For these two countries this system is found very suitable, for the population is there comparatively thin.

In the different provinces of Germany different kinds of corn obtain the preference and are most cultivated, as in the following list, where the different articles follow each other in the order in which they are named.

Bavaria.—Rye, oats, barley, spelt, wheat. Württemberg and Baden.—Spelt, oats, barley, rye, wheat, maize. Hesse.—Rye, barley, oats, wheat, spelt, maize. Mecklenburg.—Wheat, barley, rye, oats. Brunswick.—Barley, rye, wheat, oats.

In Germany generally, and in Mecklenburg in particular, the production of corn is greater than the consumption. Assuming the productiveness of the kingdom of Saxony as a standard, Germany could maintain about 54,000,000 of inhabitants, or 12,000,000 more than at present. The cultivation of the potato is now largely extended, particularly in Prussia. In the north-east of Germany buckwheat is also cultivated; but the cultivation of oil plants, peas, beans, turnips, and other roots, flax, hemp, and hops, is not large enough to dispense with the importation of these articles. About three-fourths of the Germans are employed in agriculture; and many parts of the country are crowded with small proprietors or tenants, who necessarily live in a state lower than that of hired labourers. Of the great bulk of the people the food is of the poorest kind—rye-bread or potatoes; and it is chiefly owing to this general misery that Germany can export corn in most years. In bad seasons the distress is sometimes dreadful; the agricultural population having no means of procuring foreign supplies,—nothing to give in exchange for bread.

Naturally, in accordance with climate and other physical circumstances, the production of wine and fruits (Obst-und Weinbau) is greater in the south and west than in the north and east. The districts on the Rhine, the Lower Maine, and the Neckar are the best; but, even in the south of Germany, there are districts, as in Old Bavaria, between the Inn and the Lech, that are less productive of fruit than even Mecklenburg and Brandenburg. In both quantity and quality, however, the south excels the north, where the best kinds of fruit only ripen with difficulty. The principal places for the production of wine have been already noticed. The quantity is estimated at about 3,000,000 of emers, worth about 18,000,000 of thalers = about L3,000,000 sterling yearly.

The cultivation of forest trees is now more scientifically practised in Germany than in any other country, and the care of the government is now directed to the restoration of the forests, which, till recently, were completely neglected and left exposed to every kind of destructive agency. In all the states likewise, institutions for the promotion of agriculture, in all its branches, have been or are being formed.

The relative proportions of ground occupied in agricultural and other natural productions in the different states is shown in the following table.

| State | Agriculture | Wine | Gar. | Meadows | Pastures | Wood and Forests | Waste | |-----------|-------------|------|------|---------|----------|------------------|-------| | Austria | 340 | 12 | 17 | 51 | 260 | 155 | | Prussia | 430 | 9 | 10 | 65 | 110 | 240 | | Bavaria | 430 | 12 | 14 | 56 | 360 | 70 | | Württemberg | 330 | 12 | 30 | 69 | 320 | 80 | | Baden | 330 | 16 | 26 | 97 | 320 | 117 | | Hesse | 500 | 12 | 02 | 110 | 12 | 336 | | Mecklenburg | 750 | ... | 02 | 90 | 28 | 80 | | Brunswick | 350 | ... | 20 | 69 | 30 | 20 | | Nassau | 300 | 20 | 14 | 90 | 50 | 26 | | Saxony | | 70 | | | | | | Hanover | | 40 | | | | |

The following table shows the absolute quantities (in English acres) of the ground so occupied.

| State | Agriculture | Meadows | Garden-land | Wine-land | Woods and Forests | |-----------|-------------|---------|-------------|-----------|------------------| | Austria | 15,299,812 | 5,217,162| 862,110 | 415,732 | 15,850,837 | | Prussia | 18,667,581 | 3,074,151| 693,358 | 38,241 | 8,869,652 | | Bavaria | 8,265,641 | 2,589,024| 213,859 | 79,487 | 5,622,170 | | Württemberg | 2,645,859 | 686,269 | 94,628 | 64,347 | 1,493,862 | | Baden | 1,444,628 | 391,129 | 34,669 | 53,978 | 1,251,641 | | E. of Hesse | 875,561 | 292,584 | 42,908 | 788 | 588,183 | | G. D. Hanse | 767,561 | 265,851 | 365,885 | 23,341 | 483,327 | | Nassau | 431,396 | 121,123 | 4,415 | 9,462 | 493,327 | | Saxony | 1,838,939 | 412,578 | 104,090 | 4,415 | 1,131,121 | | Weimar | 494,944 | 81,280 | 18,294 | 473 | 225,214 | | Coburg Gotha | 278,967 | 31,926 | 10,750 | 1,570 | 162,239 | | Altenburg | 231,697 | 25,636 | 10,750 | 1,570 | 162,239 | | Mecklenburg | 269,187 | 43,528 | 13,247 | | 228,476 | | Hanover | 2,752,413 | 1,606,154| 168,438 | | 1,292,082 | | Brunswick | 340,090 | 74,440 | 15,771 | | 290,655 | | Oldenburg | 464,939 | 155,190 | 27,126 | | 232,099 | | Mecklenburg | 2,942,261 | 287,038 | 40,374 | | 372,834 | | Schwerin | | | | | | | Meck. Strelitz | 425,826 | 43,528 | 7,570 | | 135,633 | | Ludwigslust | 281,260 | 61,823 | 10,093 | 1,705 | 199,294 | | Lüneburg | 152,068 | 164,022 | 8,201 | | 32,804 | | Holstein | 1,463,793 | 316,688 | 25,234 | | 167,807 | | Lauenburg | 173,484 | 29,650 | 4,418 | | 29,650 | | Other States | 1,188,636 | 237,201 | 35,327 | 1,198 | 592,727 | | Totals | 60,551,618 | 16,174,454| 2,513,944 | 692,737 | 40,341,433 |

Great attention has been paid for the last 30 or 40 years to the breeding and rearing of all sorts of useful animals, and every encouragement and facility have been given by the governments to the improvement of the breeds. The following table, from Winderlich's Deutschland, shows the number of the principal kinds of stock in the German states, in or about 1848. The whole Austrian territory produces yearly about 7000 marks of gold, whereof five-sixths in Hungary and Transylvania; silver, 180,000 marks, whereof three-fifths in Hungary and Transylvania; copper, 15,000 centners, whereof four-fifths in Hungary and Transylvania; iron, 2,000,000 centners, whereof only one-seventh in Hungary and Transylvania; quicksilver, 6000 centners; lead, 110,000; cinnabar, 1000; zinc, 12,000; tin, 950; coal, 7,500,000; salt, 5,500,000; cobalt and nickel, 20,000; arsenic, 1800; sulphur, 18,000; alum and vitriol, 160,000; graphite, 35,000; and about as much sulphuric acid. Of the German provinces, Bohemia produces silver, tin, iron, vitriol, and coal, the last equal to three-fifths of the produce of the whole empire; Austria and Styria produce half of the whole quantity of iron; Illyria, the quicksilver and most of the lead; and Galicia most of the salt.

Prussia:—No gold; 23,000 marks silver; 40,000 centners of lead; 36,000 of copper; 230,000 of zinc; 7000 of small; 3360 of arsenic; 35,000 of vitriol; 4,500,000 of iron; 46,000,000 of stone-coal; 11,000,000 of brown-coal; 1,750,000 of salt; and stone-quarries to the value of 1,500,000 thalers, = L240,000. Silesia produces zinc, iron, coal, arsenic, vitriol, and sulphur; Saxony, silver, copper, iron, &c.; the Rhine provinces, iron and coal; Westphalia, coal, and some metal and salt. Nearly 3,000,000 tons of coal are extracted yearly from the coal-field on the banks of the Ruhr; and 4 miles above Bonn are the large brown-coal mines and alum works of Friederich.

The produce of the other states amounts to about 60 marks of gold, and 125,350 marks of silver; 1,200,000 centners of iron; and the various other articles above mentioned in comparatively small quantities.

In many branches of manufacturing industry the Germans have reached a high degree of excellence. German linen is known to the whole world; and the linens of Bielefeld and Silesia in particular are equally valued in America as in Europe. Of late years, however, the introduction of cotton, and the high prices obtained for corn, have tended greatly to lessen the cultivation of flax, which was formerly a principal staple of agricultural industry, and the linen manufacture has suffered in consequence. With the improvement of the breeds of sheep within the last half century, the woollen manufacture has made great progress, the German cloth being now not merely equal but even superior in quality to the cloths of England and Belgium. The chief seats of the cloth manufacture are in Brandenburg, Saxony, Bohemia, Moravia, and the Prussian Rhenish provinces, from which it is exported to all parts of the world. The cotton manufacture has been established and is rapidly extending in Saxony, Austria, and along the Rhine; the silk manufacture is carried on successfully in Vienna, Roveredo, Gorz, Berlin, Elberfeld, Erefeld, and other places. Works in metal, especially iron and steel, are produced in great perfection, and large quantities in Styria, Austria, Rhenish Prussia, Westphalia, and the district of the Hartz; brass work, in Rhenish Prussia, Bavaria, and Brandenburg; gold and silver work in Augsburg, Vienna, and Berlin. Pottery and glass-making have reached a high degree of perfection; the porcelain of Vienna, Berlin, and Meissen is much in request, on account not only of the fineness of its material, but also for the tasteful elegance of its forms and ornaments. Bohemian glass is to be met with in all parts of the world. The manufacture of leather is particularly extensive in Rhenish Prussia; of soap, tallow wares, and wax, in many places. Paper-making is carried on to a great extent, and of late has been very much improved in quality. Sugar-refining is carried on in Hamburg, Berlin, Potsdam, and other places; brewing of beer, to a great extent in Bavaria; and ardent spirits (Braunwein), to a still greater extent in the north. Ship-building and the connected trades are of little importance; but German industry is much distinguished in the making of mathematical, physical, surgical, and musical instruments; the chief seats of these branches of trade being Munich, Vienna, Berlin, and Cassel. German clocks and wooden articles, manufactured in the Tyrol and other mountain provinces, are exported to all parts of the world.

The great progress which the Germans have made in manufacturing industry since 1815, is chiefly the result of extraordinary exertions on the part of the German governments. In every district industrial schools have been established or extended; and in all the chief towns there are schools and institutions for instruction in the higher branches of art, where pupils are trained in both theory and practice, at the expense of the government. Numerous societies also have been formed for the promotion of art and industry.

The commerce of Germany has always been extensive; but the abolition of the innumerable state custom houses and tolls, and the long-continued peace, have given an immense impulse to its activity. Germany exports corn and timber to England and the Netherlands; linen to Spain, Portugal, Poland, Russia, America, and Africa; woollen cloth to Western Asia, and even to China; iron wares to every part of Europe; and lead to France. The exportation of fat cattle to England is also becoming a great trade. The other principal articles of export are horses, glass wares of all kinds, cobalt, galmei (siliceo-carbonate of zinc), potash, porcelain, hides and skins, honey, wax, lime, gypsum, copper, horns, bones, rags, millstones, turnip seed, swine's bristles, vitriol, tin, and spirits. The chief articles of import are sugar, coffee, tea, cacao, rice, vanilla, rum, and other colonial produce, spices, drugs, dried fish, cheese, tobacco, olive-oil, and southern fruits, French, Spanish, and Portuguese wines and liqueurs, cotton, raw silk, cotton and silk stuffs, leather, train oil, and many smaller articles. The intercourse within Germany is much facilitated by excellent carriage roads; and all the chief towns are now connected by railways. The principal rivers are also made available for the transport of bulky commodities, and were connected by several canals, before the introduction of the far superior method of locomotion by railways.

The principal seats of the inland trade are Vienna, Prague, Reichenberg, Brunn, Olmütz, Troppau, Linz, Steyer, Salzburg, Grätz, Botzen, Roveredo, and others, in the Austrian provinces; Berlin, Breslau, Cologne, Magdeburg, Frankfort-on-the-Oder, Naumburg, Posen, Tannstadt, Aachen, Coblentz, Elberfeld, Erfurt, Munster, Minden, and others, in the Prussian territory; Leipzig, in Saxony; Munich, Augsburg, and Nurnberg, in Bavaria; Frankfort-on-the-Maine, Cassel, Brunswick, Hanover, Mentz, &c. But of all these places four hold the first rank; Vienna for the south-east; Augsburg, for the south-west; Frankfort-on-the-Maine for the northwest; and Leipzig for the north-east. Large fairs are held twice or thrice a year in Leipzig, the two Frankforts, Brunswick, and other places; but it is only in those named that these fairs are of much importance. Those of Leipzig are celebrated for the sale and exchange of books. Great wool-markets are likewise held in Berlin, Breslau, Dresden, Magdeburg, Prague, Stettin, &c.

The principal commercial seaports are Hamburg, Bremen, and Embrden on the North Sea; Lübeck, Rostock, Stettin, Dantzig, Königsberg, and Memel on the East Sea; and Trieste on the Adriatic. Hamburg is one of the principal commercial towns of Europe, and with its neigh- Germany. hours Altona (in Holstein), Bremen, and Embden and the Baltic ports, connects Germany with the countries of the north and west, and with America, India, &c. Trieste forms the communication with the south of Europe and the Levant.

Commerce was not a little impeded by the different money systems of different parts of Germany; but, on the other hand, it was much facilitated by the establishment of banks and exchanges in the principal towns. Of late years also the postal system has been very greatly improved, but the German governments have not yet seen their way to the adoption of the British penny postage. They cannot indeed expect, in the circumstances of their country, that enormous increase of the number of letters that would compensate the diminution of rates.

The internal trade of Germany has been greatly facilitated by the formation of the customs unions and commercial treaties, of which an account has already been given in the article Europe.

The following table shows the proportions of revenue drawn by the different states.

An Account showing the proportion of the Revenues of the German Customs Union raised in the different States respectively, in the year 1851, and the distribution thereof according to Population. Compiled from the official "Centralblatt der Abgaben," &c., Berlin, 1852. By J. G. Flügel, United States Consul, Leipzig.

| STATES | Population | Amount of common gross receipts | Import duties | Amount payable to each State according to its population | Export and transit duties payable to each State, according to its population | To pay | To receive | |--------|------------|-------------------------------|--------------|----------------------------------------------------------|-----------------------------------------------------------------|--------|-----------| | Prussia | 16,669,153 | 15,672,929 | 14,347,476 | 11,211,383 | 244,203 | 11,455,586 | 3,111,161 | | Luxemburg | 189,783 | 77,114 | 10,445 | 127,845 | 2,241 | 129,886 | ... | | Bavaria | 4,596,650 | 1,210,639 | 904,991 | 3,044,546 | 534,663 | 3,600,609 | 2,166,621 | | Saxony | 1,894,431 | 2,119,847 | 1,995,287 | 1,274,161 | 29,736 | 1,303,997 | 786,761 | | Württemberg | 1,805,558 | 348,527 | 330,237 | 1,214,387 | 21,325 | 1,235,712 | 899,766 | | Baden | 1,360,599 | 652,625 | 353,482 | 915,115 | 16,070 | 931,185 | 534,069 | | Hesse Cassel | 731,584 | 433,046 | 342,256 | 492,651 | 8,641 | 500,692 | 157,434 | | Hesse Darmstadt | 862,917 | 412,803 | 402,501 | 580,383 | 10,192 | 590,575 | 191,371 | | Thuringian States | 1,014,954 | 391,793 | 391,793 | 682,640 | 15,931 | 698,571 | 206,489 | | Brunswick | 247,070 | 390,143 | 229,623 | 166,175 | 3,534 | 169,709 | 63,289 | | Nassau | 425,686 | 74,829 | 71,319 | 286,309 | 5,028 | 291,339 | 219,591 | | Frankfort | 861,492 | 638,384 | | | | 649,541 | |

* The thaler is very nearly worth 2s. 11d. of our money; more exactly, it is equal to 2s. 10½d.

Frankfort is regulated by a specific arrangement, and not by population. A special payment by Prussia, on account of the Union.

In respect of mental cultivation the German nation stands in a high rank; and according to Professor Berghaus it may be said without vanity, that Germany stands on the highest step of the ladder of civilization. In no country of Europe, he continues, are education and true enlightenment so generally spread over all classes of society, from the richest to the poorest, as in his fatherland. This result has been brought about only in recent times, and it is ascribed to the unceasing exertions of the state governments to free their people from the darkness of ignorance and superstition. There is not a village in Germany that has not its school to spread intelligence among its people; but the present or probable effects of this universal teaching upon the moral condition of the country form still a grave subject of discussion among German philosophers. In a moral point of view there are great differences among the Germans, and it is admitted that there are among them some extremely lamentable moral (or immoral) phenomena highly deserving of general attention, with a view to amendment. In this respect it may be said generally that the Northern Germans are more moral than those of the south, though, whether that is to be ascribed to the prevalence of Protestantism in the former, and of Popery in the latter, is a question we will not presume to determine.

For the purposes of education there are, especially in Protestant Germany, numerous schools or institutions for elementary instruction in all the towns, for both the higher and the working classes. For the higher civic professions and employments there are real professional and commercial schools, seminaries for the training of schoolmasters, gymnasiaums and lyceums for the higher branches of education, and for the highest of all there are twenty-three universities, to which may be added the German University of Königsberg, in East Prussia, making in all twenty-four.

The institutions preparatory for the universities are the gymnasia, in which the educational course consists chiefly of classical studies, that is to say, Greek and Latin, with French, mathematics, and a considerable portion of the natural sciences. The basis of their constitution lies in remote times, and there have been but few and slight alterations in their plans of study since the beginning of the present century. Owing, however, to the smallness of the emoluments, and the consequent low estimation in which the office of teacher is held, there is not a sufficient number of qualified competitors to supply the vacancies that occur. The government has been obliged in consequence to raise their emoluments, and thereby obviate this increasing evil. A more recent class of institutions are the real-schulen (or high town schools), in which Latin is the only ancient language taught, the other branches being modern languages, especially French and English, mathematics and natural philosophy. These schools have for a long time enjoyed much approval as preparatory institutions for many departments of civil life. Industrial schools are of still more recent origin. They have been established by government in the larger towns of every province; the one half of the expense of maintaining them being defrayed by the government, and the other half by the municipality. Their purpose is purely industrial; drawing, mechanics, mathematics, physics, and chemistry, are the subjects taught; languages are excluded.

The following tables contain the names of the twenty-four universities; the dates of their respective foundations; the number of professors and other teachers; the number of students that attended them during the winter session of 1853-4, and the numbers that attended each branch:— The teachers consisted of the following classes, viz., 1. Ordinary professors; 2. Extraordinary professors; 3. Honorary professors; 4. Private teachers or tutors; 5. Language and exercise-masters. The students consisted of—

1. Students of Protestant theology ........................................... 1692 2. Roman Catholic theology .................................................. 1696 3. Law, statecraft, and forestry .............................................. 6394 4. Medicine, surgery, and pharmacy ......................................... 3644 5. Philosophy and philology .................................................. 2592 6. Not matriculated ............................................................. 1708

In the matter of education Prussia is the ruler and guide, and whatever is established or pursued in that kingdom comes sooner or later into operation in other states. Since the beginning of the present century education has occupied the attention and received a new impulse at the hands of the other governments; but it is only since 1848 that the school organization of Prussia has been transplanted into the Austrian territory, where, however, it still continues to experience the opposition of the nobles and clergy. The ignorance which formerly prevailed among the lower classes has almost entirely vanished in Northern Germany at least, and there is no class in which scholarly culture and scientific attainments may not be expected. The constant care, however, and determination of the government to make all partakers of a certain amount of education has made it seem necessary to constrain all parents by fines or other punishments to send their children to school. Peculiar attention is at present being paid to educational institutions, and the governments are seeking to reform them so as to prevent the recurrence or continuance of those evils that are believed to have flowed from them, and to have occasioned, in a great degree, if not entirely, the popular outbreak in 1848.

Mental cultivation and the general diffusion of knowledge are largely promoted by means of numerous public libraries established in the capitals, the university towns, and other places. The most celebrated public libraries are those of Vienna, Berlin, Göttingen, Munich, Dresden, Hamburg, Wolfenbüttel, Stuttgart, Frankfort-on-the-Main, and Weimar. Besides the public ones there are throughout Germany many private libraries of extraordinary richness in literary treasures of all kinds. There are also numerous societies and unions, among which the most distinguished are the academies of sciences at Berlin and Munich, and the society of sciences at Göttingen, which are state institutions. With scientific collections of all kinds every place is richly provided, either at the public expense or by the favour of private persons. The observatories of Altona, Berlin, Breslau, Göttingen, Mannheim, Munich, Prague, Seeberg near Gotha, Vienna, and Königsberg in Prussia, are distinguished for the promotion of astronomy and other branches of physical science. The taste for astronomy is very great in Germany, as is evidenced by the existence of many private observatories, among which those of Olbers at Bremen, and of Beer near Berlin, are the most celebrated. In this department Germany can boast of the names of Copernicus, Kepler, Herschel, Olbers, Bessel, and many others.

The fine arts likewise are carefully fostered. There are Fine arts academies at Berlin, Dusseldorf, Munich, and Vienna, whose object it is to spread a taste for painting, sculpture, architecture, and music; and to improve the technics of art. The taste for art has struck deep root among all the educated Germans, particularly in the north, and is directed and represented by three schools, those of Berlin, Dusseldorf, and Munich, which have produced some of the finest proofs of German genius. Besides the academies, there are numerous art-museums and collections of pictures and antiquities, particularly in Berlin, Cassel, Dresden, Munich, and Vienna. In sculpture German genius has of late years greatly excelled, as in the works of Dannecker, Schwanthaler, and Kiss; and architecture has received the greatest encouragement in the erection of both public and private buildings of great magnificence, of which the late king of Bavaria showed the most magnificent example in the embellishment of his capital Munich, and the erection of the German Valhalla, near Ratisbon, though the attempt to adapt the Grecian temple style, without regard to climate and other circumstances, to modern buildings, intended for very different purposes, has failed as completely there as it has everywhere else.

The activity of the German mind on the wide fields of book art and science has, through the effect of general intercourse and exchange of ideas, produced a liveliness of which the Germans believe there is no parallel to be found in any other country of Europe. The German book trade, in respect of the position it has gradually acquired since the Reformation, must be considered as a prime mover in the mental culture of Germany; while, in a material point of view, it has acquired an extent and importance elsewhere unknown. Thousands of people find in it employment and maintenance, as printers, typefounders, machinemakers, paper-makers, and bookbinders; and the productions of the press are spread over all Germany with the most marvellous rapidity. Leipzig is the central point of this important branch of industry. The general taste for the beautiful has had its effect on the art of printing, in requiring the use of fine, close, white paper, clear type, and elegant binding, instead of the gray-brown blotting-paper, and worn out and broken type, that were formerly used. The periodical press is very active; but political discussion is not free. On political subjects freedom of speech does not suit the German governments, and offences of this kind are very severely punished, as happened in 1854 with Gervinus in Baden. On religion, however, and philosophy, the utmost freedom of publication is allowed; and the effect has been almost to root out ancestral faith and dogmatic theology from the minds of most educated people, though, of late years, an evangelical reaction seems to have made, or to be making, considerable progress. The publication of Kalendars, which have been of late years vastly im- Germany, proved, is of much importance in the instruction of the people. Almost every town in Germany has its own daily newspaper, and of these five have acquired a European reputation, if not for the excellence, at least for the importance of their contents. These are the Austrian Observer and the Prussian State Gazette, the organs of their respective governments; the Hamburg Correspondent, and the Augsburg and Leipzig General Gazettes. Of the number of weekly newspapers and popular instructive publications, their name, says Dr Berghaus, is legion. The higher branches of learning and of art are equally well attended to by their respective journalists.

No field of knowledge has been left uncultivated by the Germans; but much of the best talent of the country has been wasted in the attempted cultivation of the barrenest of all fields, that of speculative philosophy, or, if it be not a contradiction in terms to call it so, the science of the unknowable. In this science the most eminent professors have been Fichte, Schelling, and Hegel, whose doctrines, promulgated during the first thirty years of the present century, almost entirely superseded those of the sober-minded Kant, and prevailed to a wide extent; for in Germany, as elsewhere, says Schlosser, whenever a new direction is taken in philosophy or theology, a new head of a sect appears, or a new school is formed, a multitude of followers at once adopt, and devote themselves to, the new prophets with blind zeal and madness. The doctrines of these philosophers have, in succession, superseded each other, only to be superseded themselves in turn by some new phase of Idealism, or systematized play of words. The Hegelians have split into sects, or factions, and Kant is again in the ascendant. The Germans, however, seem to be awakening from their dreams, and to be now directing their attention more and more to the cultivation of the concrete, the positive, and the practical, instead of the abstract, the speculative, and the mystical, which have occupied so long the attention of their fathers. Speculative philosophy is said indeed to be almost already dead. There is not one celebrated professor to represent it in any German university. The governments dislike and discourage it; and the lectures of its remaining adherents are delivered in empty halls. Notwithstanding, however, this unfortunate predilection of the German mind for the speculative and the useless, Germany can boast of many names that have acquired pre-eminence distinction in the cultivation of physical science, and in philology, now no longer confined to Greek and Latin, but become of paramount importance in enabling us to trace the affinities of nations, and the early history of the earth's inhabitants. In this latter department the names of Adelung, Klaproth, Grotefend, William Von Humboldt, Bopp, Grimm, Lassen, and Lepsius, have become familiar even in Britain.

In theology, which, as treated by the Germans, must be considered as a branch of speculative philosophy, and not the least barren portion of it, they have been pre-eminently busy, the country swarming with theologians, and biblical critics and commentators, who have carried the Protestant principle of private judgment to its natural but very utmost extreme. In the art of explaining away the obvious meaning of the Bible they have never been excelled. Their theology, indeed, and criticism have degenerated into neology and rationalism, and even into a wide-spread pantheism, which seems to be the inevitable result of Hegel's principles carried out to their legitimate consequences. Supernaturalism, however, still asserts its right to hold the mind in bondage, and a strong evangelical party have roused themselves to oppose the prevalent scepticism and infidelity, with what success remains to be seen. Roman Catholic theology likewise still clings to the authority of the fathers and the decrees and canons of the church.

In the cultivation of their native tongue, the Germans long remained behind other nations. The language of Germany books dates from the Reformation, but it has been only since the middle of the eighteenth century that it has been strenuously and systematically cultivated. This cultivation began with Gellert (1715-1759), Lessing (1729-81), Klopstock (1724-1803), and Wieland (1733-1813). Since their time the language has been cultivated to the utmost; and the rich fancy of the Germans has expressed itself in lyric poetry, ballads, idylls, fables, and epics. Lessing was the founder of dramatic poetry and true representation, which have been cultivated to excess. Novels, tales, and romances have given employment to thousands of persons, and pastime to millions of readers, but not always to the moral improvement of the nation. The multitude of writers in the department of belles-lettres defies enumeration.

Other German prose writers have been neither fewer nor less able than the poets and romancers, but their names have not had the good fortune to be so far renowned as those of Goethe, Schiller, Lessing, Richter, Tieck, and others. In history and geography many excellent works have been produced. In classical and biblical literature many Germans have acquired distinguished reputation as critics and editors. Many others have exhibited the most indefatigable zeal in ransacking all the treasures of ancient and modern learning; collecting materials for new judgments on every point of history, philosophy, science and art; and throwing, perhaps, as much doubt as light on many established opinions, venerable for their antiquity.

As settled by the treaty of Vienna in 1815, Germany Political was divided into forty sovereign states, or portions of states; but the number is now reduced to thirty-five, as stated in the following table:

| NAMES | Area in square English miles | Population in 1832 | Title of Sovereign | |------------------------------|-----------------------------|--------------------|--------------------| | Austrian provinces | 75,979 | 12,919,200 | Kaiser. | | Prussian provinces | 71,287 | 12,937,228 | King. | | Bavaria | 31,292 | 4,559,452 | | | Hanover | 14,769 | 1,819,253 | | | Württemberg | 7,632 | 1,733,269 | | | Saxony | 5,772 | 1,987,832 | | | Hesse-Cassel | 4,439 | 755,350 | Elector. | | Baden | 5,018 | 1,355,943 | Grand-Duke. | | Mecklenburg-Schwerin | 4,815 | 542,763 | | | —— Strelitz | 767 | 93,750 | | | Hesse-Darmstadt | 3,761 | 854,314 | | | Oldenburg | 2,421 | 285,226 | | | Luxemburg | 2,908 | 394,262 | | | Saxo-Welmar-Eisenach | 1,419 | 262,524 | | | —— Coburg-Gotha | 799 | 150,451 | Duke. | | —— Melanchin-Hildberg | | | | | —— Altenburg | 888 | 166,364 | | | —— Holstein and Lauenburg | 510 | 132,849 | | | Nassau | 3,719 | 550,000 | | | Braunschweig | 1,757 | 429,060 | | | Anhalt Dessau-Cothen | 1,507 | 267,177 | | | —— Bernburg | 686 | 111,759 | Prince. | | Waldeck | 340 | 52,641 | | | Lippe-Detmold | 461 | 59,697 | | | Schwarzburg-Rudolstadt | 437 | 106,615 | | | —— Sondershausen | 410 | 69,038 | | | Reuss, elder | 359 | 74,956 | | | —— younger | 145 | 34,896 | | | Schaumburg-Lippe | 448 | 79,824 | | | —— Liechtenstein | 206 | 29,000 | | | —— Hesse-Homburg | 53 | 7,000 | | | —— Hamburg | 166 | 24,941 | Landgrave. | | —— Lubeck | 151 | 211,250 | City. | | —— Bremen | 142 | 48,425 | | | —— Frankfort | 106 | 88,000 | | | —— Totals | 91 | 73,150 | |

The Saxon principedom of Gotha became extinct in 1826. by the decease of the last grand-duke, and his territories were divided by compact among his collateral relatives, the princes of Coburg, Meiningen, and Hildburghausen, the last of whom ceded Hildburghausen to Meiningen, and assumed instead the additional title of Altenburg, from the chief town of that portion of the Gotha territory that fell to his share. The prince of Coburg-Saalfield likewise ceded Saalfield to Meiningen, and received Gotha in its stead. In 1846, the lordship of Kniphausen was absorbed in Oldenburg; in 1847, Anhalt-Cöthen became annexed to Anhalt-Dessau; and in 1849, the two princes of Hohenzollern abdicated the government of their states in favour of their kinsman, the king of Prussia.

These states exhibit every form of government from absolute autocracy to democracy; but even in those that are constitutional, the authority of the sovereign is but feebly limited by his states. They are all united into a confederation, the object of which is the maintenance of the external and internal security of Germany, and the independence and inviolability of the several states. The confederation is represented by the diet which is composed of the plenipotentiaries of all the states, and is the constitutional organ of its will and action; but the diet has no power of self-action, the plenipotentiaries that compose it acting only according to the special instructions of their respective sovereigns; and there is no central executive government to carry its resolutions into effect. In fact it has been found that there is no power of ensuring the combined action of the members for any object or purpose whatever, either civil or military; though, having many interests in common, and the territories of the smaller states, in multiform parcels, being so intermingled that with most of them separate action would be impossible, they naturally follow the same course of policy, modified by the influence of the powerful neighbours at whose mercy they would seem to lie.

The management of the ordinary business of the bund is entrusted to an ordinary and permanent diet, at which the plenipotentiary of Austria presides; but there are only 17 votes to be divided among the 35 states, Austria, Prussia, and the larger states having one each, and only six being allotted to the smaller states and cities. When fundamental laws are to be made or changed, when measures are to be taken that relate to the federal act itself, when changes of organic institutions or other arrangements of general interest are to be adopted, when war or peace is to be made, or when a new member is to be admitted, the diet becomes a general assembly, a plenum, in which 70 votes were originally distributed among the members in classes, Austria, Prussia, Bavaria, Saxony, Hanover, and Württemberg, having each four; five others having each three; three having each two; and the smaller states each one vote.

The diet holds its sittings at Frankfort-on-the-Main, and has ostensibly at its disposal, in terms of the federal act, a numerous army, of whose constitution and efficiency we have already given an account in the article EUROPE.

(Das Europäische Staaten System, &c., Von Dr Heinrich Berg-Authori- hans.—Vol. iv. of his Allgemeine Länder und Volkerkunde.—Das tie- Deutsche Land und seine Bewohner, von Carl Windelacker. Leipzig, 1822. Deutschland und das übrige Europa. Von Dr Freiherr Fried- rich Wilhelm von Reden. Wiesbaden, 1854. Universal Lexikon, &c. von H. A. Pfeifer, Vierter Band. Altenburg, 1860; articles Deutschland, &c.)