alities. Heretofore the history of one great nation has been that of the civilized world, changing its name only as power passed, from time to time, into the hands of a different people. Henceforth there are to be not one but many centers of civilization.

Teutonic Settlements.-The Teutons or Germans (p. 322) were the chief heirs of Rome. By the 6th century the Vandals had established a province in northern Africa; the Visigoths had set up a Gothic kingdom in Spain and southern Gaul (p. 268); the Franks, under Clovis, had firmly planted themselves in northern Gaul; the Burgundians had occupied southeastern Gaul; and the Anglo-Saxons had crossed the Channel and conquered a large part of Britain.

The Ostrogoths, under Theodoric (489), climbed the Alps and overthrew Odoacer, King of Italy (p. 269). Theodoric established his government at Ravenna, under a nominal commission from the Emperor of Constantinople. The Visigoths accepted him as chief, and his kingdom ultimately extended from the heart of Spain to the Danube. An Arian, he yet favored the Catholics, and, though unable to read or write, encouraged learning. "The fair-haired Goths," says Collier, "still wearing their furs and brogues, carried the sword; while the Romans, wrapped in the flowing toga, held the pen and filled the schools."

Character of the Teutonic Conquest.2-In Italy,

1 The thoughtful student of history sees in the middle ages a time not of decay, but of preparation; a period during which the seeds of a better growth were germinating in the soil. Amid feudal chaos, the nations were being molded, language was forming, thought taking shape, and social forces were gathering that were to bear mankind to a higher civilization than the world had ever seen.

2 While the Teutonic conquest, in the end, brought into mediæval civilization a new force, a sense of personal liberty, and domestic virtues unknown to the Romans, yet, at the time, it seemed an undoing of the best work of ages. During the merciless massacre that lasted for centuries upon the island of Britain, the priests were slain at the altar, the churches burned, and the inhabitants nearly annihilated;

Gaul, and Spain, the various Teutonic tribes did not expel, but absorbed, the native population. The two races gradu. ally blended. Out of the mingling of the German and the Roman speech, there grew up in time the Romance languages, Spanish, Italian, and French. Latin, however, was for centuries used in writing. Thus the Roman names and forms remained after the empire had fallen. The invaders adopted the laws, civilization, and Christian religion of the conquered. The old clergy not only retained their places, but their influence was greatly increased; the churches became a common refuge, and the bishops the only protectors of the poor and weak.

On the contrary, the Anglo-Saxons, who conquered Britain, enslaved or drove back the few natives who survived the horrors of the invasion. Not having been, while in Germany, brought in contact with the Roman power, these Teutons had no respect for its superior civilization. They did not, therefore, adopt either the Roman language or religion. Christianity came to them at a later day; while the English speech is still in its essence the same that our forefathers brought over from the wilds of Germany.

The Eastern, Greek, or Byzantine Empire, as it is variously called, was governed by effeminate princes until the time of Justinian (527), who won back a large part of

while the Roman and Christian civilization was blotted out, and a barbaric rule set up in its place. The cruel Vandals in Spain (p. 269) found fertile, populous Roman provinces; they left behind them a desert. The Burgundians were the mildest of the Teutonic conquerors, yet where they settled they compelled the inhabitants to give up two thirds of the land, one half of the houses, gardens, groves, etc., and one third of the slaves. Italy, under the ravages of the terrible Lombards and other northern hordes, became a "wilderness overgrown with brushwood and black with stagnant marshes." Its once cultivated fields were barren; a few miserable people wandered in fear among the ruins of the churches,-their hiding-places,while the land was covered with the bones of the slain. Rome became almost as desolate as Babylon. "The baths and temples had been spared by the barbarians, and the water still poured through the mighty aqueducts, but at one time there were not five hundred persons dwelling among the magnificent ruins."

the lost empire. His famous general, Belisarius, captured Carthage,1 and overwhelmed the Vandal power in Africa. He next invaded Italy and took Rome, but being recalled by Justinian, who was envious of the popularity of his great general, the eunuch Narses was sent thither, and, under his skilful management, the race and name of the Ostrogoths perished. Italy, her cities pillaged and her fields laid waste, was now united to the Eastern Empire, and governed by rulers called the Exarchs of Ravenna. So Justinian reigned over both new and old Rome.

The Roman Laws at this time consisted of the decrees, and often the chance expressions, of the threescore emperors from Hadrian to Justinian. They filled thousands of volumes, and were frequently contradictory. Tribonian, a celebrated lawyer, was employed to bring order out of this chaos. He condensed the laws into a code that is still the basis of the civil law of Europe.

During this reign, two Persian monks, who had gone to China as Christian missionaries, brought back to Justinian the eggs of the silkworm concealed in a hollow cane. manufacture was thus introduced into Europe.

Silk

The Lombards (568), a fierce German tribe, after Justinian's death, poured into Italy and overran the fruitful plain that still bears their name. For about 200 years the Lombard kings shared Italy with the Exarchs of Ravenna. The Papacy.-During these centuries of change, confusion, and ruin, the Christian Church had alone retained its

1 Among the treasures of Carthage were the sacred vessels of the Temple at Jerusalem taken by Titus to Rome, and thence carried to Carthage by Genseric. As these relics were thought to presage ruin to the city which kept them, they were now returned to the Cathedral at Jerusalem, and their subsequent fate is unknown. According to the legend, contradicted by many historians but eagerly seized by poets and painters, Belisarius in his old age was falsely accused of treason, degraded from his honors, and deprived of his sight: often thereafter the blind old man was to be seen standing at the Cathedral door, begging “a penny for Belisarius, the general."

organization. The barbarians, even the Lombards,-the most cruel of all, were in time converted to Christianity. The people, who, until the overthrow of the emperor, had been accustomed to depend upon Rome for political guidance, continued to look thither for spiritual control, and the Bishop of Rome was acknowledged throughout western Europe as the head of the Catholic Church. Thus for centuries the papacy (Lat. papa, a bishop) gained strength; the Christian fathers Ambrose, Augustine, Jerome, Gregory the Great, and a host of other active intellects, shaping its doctrines and discipline. Finally "a new Rome rose from the ashes of the old, far mightier than the vanished empire, for it claimed dominion over the spirits of men."

The Patriarch of Constantinople also asserted the preeminence of his See, and, on account of the opposition he met from Rome, the Eastern or Greek Church gradually separated from the Western or Roman, in interest, discipline, and doctrine.

EARLY GERMAN CIVILIZATION.

Two thousand years ago, in the dense forests and gloomy marshes of a rude, bleak land, dwelt a gigantic, white-skinned, blue-eyed, yellow-haired race.

The Men, fierce and powerful, wore over their huge bodies a short girdled cloak, or the skin of some wild beast, whose head, with protruding tusks or horns, formed a hideous setting for their bearded faces and cold, cruel eyes. Brave, hospitable, restless, ferocious, they worshiped freedom, and were ready to fight to the death for their personal independence. They cared much less for agriculture than for hunting, and delighted in war. Their chief vices were gambling and drunkenness; their conspicuous virtues were truthfulness and respect for

women.

The Women-massive like the men, and wooed with a marriage gift of war-horse, shield, and weapons-spun and wove, cared for the household, tilled the ground, and went with their lords to battle, where their shouts rang above the clash of the spear and the thud of the warах. They held religious festivals, at which no man was allowed to be present, and they were believed to possess a special gift of foresight; yet, for all that, the Teuton wife was bought from her kindred, and was subject to her spouse. As priestesses, they cut the throats of warcaptives and read portents in the flowing blood; and after a lost battle they killed themselves beside their slaughtered husbands.

The Home-when there was one-was a hut made of logs filled in with platted withes, straw, and lime, and covered by a thatched roof, which also sheltered the cattle. Here the children were reared, hardened from their babyhood with ice-cold baths, given weapons for playthings, and for bed a bear's hide laid on the ground. Many tribes were such lawless wanderers that they knew not the meaning of home, and all hated the confinement of walled towns or cities, which they likened to prisons.

Civil Institutions and Government.-Every tribe had its nobles, freemen, freedmen, and slaves. When there was a king, he was elected from a royal family,-the traditional descendants of the divine Woden. All freemen had equal rights and a personal voice in the government; the freedman or peasant was allowed to bear arms, but not to vote; the slave was classed with the beast as the absolute property of his owner.

The Land belonging to a tribe was divided into districts, hundreds, and marks. The inhabitants of a mark were usually kindred, who dwelt on scattered homesteads and held its unoccupied lands in