CHAP. I.]

ST. JOHN OF JERUSALEM.

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—before or since Tacitus — they deserve to becalled Northmen; just as much on the Elbe orRhine, as on the Seine or Thames. They were afated and dangerous race; yet carried a sort ofcompensation with them—the seeds of freedom.And leaping over several centuries, the landwehr,or insurrection, brings us to the times of Charle-magne; for not only in deed, but name, too, thatMilitia dates so far back. Yet, if it be true thatthe Irish missionary sent to convert those of Wurz-burgh, was murdered there in the eighth century,is it not surprising that the capital of Franconia,whence so many emperors derived, should be solate of conversion? learned antiquaries informingus that also the French were from Franconia; asits very name implies, land of the French!

But neither Militia nor Christianity seem tohave remedied the reigning evils much; for openrobbery was more in vogue in Germany than any-where else, since the strongholds of those theycalled nobles spread terror over the whole country;they making it a practice not only to plunder thetravellers they seized, but likewise to sell them intoslavery, when promised no sufficient ransom.Bondage within their own castles, or to somewherein the vicinity, was their sale at first; but whenthere came to be Saracens, they were sold to the