III. had either not the means or the desire to pursue CHAP. schemes of offensive conquest or ofvengeful devastation beyond the precincts of Germany. He drove back the Roman empire from the Weser to the Rhine. He restored to his countrymen the possession of their native soil up to the latter river; destroyed all the Roman forts on the Ems, the Weser, and the Saal; and when Tiberius hastened to relieve the capitol from its dismay, the imperial general could gain no decisive laurels from the cautious patriot." Thus Arminius raised Germany into a new military and political position. Having learned himself all the Roman discipline, he diffused among his countrymen as much of it as they could be persuaded to adopt, and prepared them to receive more; and from this period the wars of these fierce people became every year more formidable to the Roman empire, and more instructive to themselves. Nearly twenty years had elapsed between the time that Tiberius had marched to the Weser and the period in which Arminius effected his revolt. During all this space, "There is a history of Arminius by Kenler, 1 Schard. p. 501-518. In the dialogue on his military merit by Hutt, ib. 426., the German prince says to Hannibal, with some truth, "Nam eorum qui res preclaras gesserunt, nemo majoribus difficultatibus enisus, aut gravioribus circa impedimentis eluctatus est. — In summa rerum aut hominum inopia, misera egestate, desertus ab omnibus, impeditus undique, tamen ad recuperandam libertatem, viam mihi communivi; citraque omnem extra opem, omne adjumentum, hoc solo præditus et suffultus animo, a me ipso rerum initia petivi et bellum extremè periculosum, non antea cœptum sed ab omnibus desperatum prosequutus sum." He details his exertions, and contrasts them, with more patriotism than critical judgment, with the exploits of Scipio and Alexander. II. BOOK the Germans had all the Roman habits and peculiar civilisation in their immediate contemplation: and all that intercourse occurred, which, so large a portion of the country, from the Rhine to the Weser, being made Roman provinces; which, the serving of their chiefs and people in the Roman armies, and acting with them as allies; and which, their perpetual communications with the numerous Roman forts and stations, could produce. Germany was thus constantly advancing to improvement from the time that Augustus established the Roman armies on its continent; and the successes of Arminius kept it from being too Romanised. By driving back the Romans to the Rhine, he preserved to his countrymen and their neighbours the power of continuing, not merely in independence, but of preserving their native manners and customs, with only so much addition of the Roman civilisation as would naturally and beneficially harmonise with these. Many new ideas, feelings, reasonings, and habits, must have resulted from this mixture; and the peculiar minds and views of the Germans must have been both excited and enlarged. The result of this union of Roman and German improvement, was the gradual formation of that new species of the human character and society which has descended with increasing melioration to all the modern states of Europe. GERMANY was not at this time very populous. The Hercynian forest, sixty days' journey in length, overspread a large portion of its surface. Each state made a little desart around it for its defence; and the Suevi who were in Suabia and Franconia, used this desolating protection so abundantly, that they kept the country for 500 miles around them III. in a devastated condition. The population of Ger- CHAP. many was, therefore, but scanty, and dwelt chiefly near the rivers, at their mouths, and on the seacoasts. The Roman invasions repeatedly thinned the numbers of their tribes, by the slaughter of their battles and subsequent cruelties; and when new populations multiplied, as these existed under new circumstances, and amid many alterations of native manners around them, every succeeding generation differed from its predecessors: and this difference, from the continual intercourse with the only civilised empire which then existed, was that of progressive improvement producing progressive power, until Rome became their conquest, and its provinces their spoil, and the sites of their new kingdoms. GERMANICUs renewed the victories of his father Drusus, and endangered for a while the independence of the barbaric continent. His warfare, though his name lives in the panegyric of Tacitus, can be only compared with that, which we have witnessed in our days in St. Domingo. His first expedition was undertaken for the express purpose of human slaughter. One part of his legions, having destroyed their mutinous comrades, desired to attack the enemy, to appease, by the blood of the Germans, the manes of their rebellious fellowsoldiers. They accordingly rushed to the massacre of the Marsi. Germanicus, to spread the slaughter as wide as possible, divided his men into four battalions. The country fifty miles round was laid waste with fire and sword: neither sex nor age excited pity; nor any places, holy or profane; their sacred temple, the Tanfanæ, was destroyed. This slaughter was perpetrated without their receiving a BOOK wound, because the enemies they attacked were sunk in sleep, or unarmed and dispersed." 13 II. THE surprise of the Catti, against whom Germanicus sent Cocina, was one of their next exploits. "His arrival was so little expected by the Catti, that their women and children were either immediately taken prisoners or put to the sword: Mattium, the capital, was destroyed by fire, and the open plains were laid 14 waste." In subsequent battles we usually find the addition, that "no quarter was given to the barbarians;" and in the progress of the Romans, the country was always desolated. In one battle we have this ferocious plan of warfare, even commanded by the applauded hero of the historian: "Germanicus rushing among the ranks, besought his men to give no quarter; he told them they had no need of prisoners, and that the extirpation of the barbarians would alone end the war! !2-15 TRAINED amid their soldiery to such sanguinary habits, it is not surprising, that the Roman emperors should have carried to the throne, the cruelties of the camp, and have exhibited there the merciless character, which in such campaigns as these they must have acquired. But to destroy the uncultivated nations of Europe, however unoffending, was no crime in the popular estimation at Rome. A surname from a country subdued was a charm which made its chieftains deaf to all the groans of humanity and the clamours of violated right. They pursued this trade of sanguinary ambition, though Greece had taught the Romans to philosophise on III. morality; and their orators, to destroy an obnoxious CHAP. governor, could sometimes declaim as if they had felt themselves the advocates of mankind! AFTER these massacres of the Marsi and the Catti, Germanicus sailed up the Ems, and marched his army to the Weser. At this juncture Arminius 16 was not wanting to his countrymen; but the superior knowledge of his competitor, and the discipline of the invading troops, were rapidly annihilating the rude liberty of Germany. Its bravest tribes fell fruitlessly in its defence; the survivors trembled for the awful issue; when the jealous policy of Tiberius, who had succeeded to the empire, rescued them from absolute conquest. He called back Germanicus from his victorious progress; although he asked to continue in his command but one year more, and would have extended the Roman empire to the Elbe. 17 THE Conquests of Germanicus were in truth so many depopulations. The Germans always fought till they had not men enough for further battles; and every war was the destruction of the largest portion of the generation that waged it. But new races sprang up rapidly in the vacancy thus made, and under circumstances that were continually becoming more promotive of their improvement, especially in war, and in all the mental 16 Many have thought that the famous Irmensul was a monument of Arminius, whose heroic actions the Germans long celebrated in their songs; but there is no reason to believe that Arminius was ever venerated as a deity. 17 Tacit. Ann. lib. ii. s. 26. It is painful to read that Arminius fell a victim to the treachery and ingratitude of some of his countrymen; or to his love of power and their love of liberty. |