340

THE UPPER EHINE GOEÖE.

beino- less noble than themselves, tliat they ordained, thatwhile tlie estate should become the inheritance of the eldestson alone, all the co-heirs should alike assume the title of thefamily, fnd thus every one of the sons of a duke, with theexception of the eldest, came to be nominal dukes—instead ofmere counts and barons, as in the 9th Century—and those of acount, nominal counts. Accordingly, in a few years the nationgot to swarm with beggarly dukes, counts, and barons, asthick as rats in a barn, and who, in influence and often ineducation, are to this day only on a rank with the lowest classof English gentry; and, what is far worse, as stupid as pea-cocks in their pride, so that they still believe any industrialoccupation to be servile.

Hence, what with the ancient custom of partitioning anestate, however small, among the members of a class whowere wedded only to hunting and fighting, and who lookedupon all arts, as well as all commerce and agriculture, asfit only for creatures on a level with beasts of bürden, andwho, in the Vagabundage of their spirit, thought it ignobleeven to dwell with the settlers in a city — and what with theinheritance of the title of a family by all the sons, while theproperty devolved to one alone, so that the greater portion inmany cases were left with only a suit of mail and a horse tosupport their noble name—it can be readily comprehendedhow Germany at one time came to be overrun by a plague ofhuman locusts; and how such a class of besotted do-notl)ings,lacking the sense, or rather the real nobility to labour for theirliving, would naturally resort to their swords and lances —from the exercise of which alone they fancied honour came—■as a means of obtaining some portion of the wealth begotten bythe industry which they despised.

Thus, when the System of knight-errantry got to prevailthroughout Christendom after the return of the Crusaders