source was in the clemency of the king of the Goths, who was prevailed on to accept a large ransom, and to raise the siege. The Huns, who had migrated from the confines of China to those of Germany, under the command of that formidable barbarian Attila, became the terror of the world: they defeated the Roman armies, A. D. 452, laid waste the territories of the east and west, and urged the rapid downfall of the Roman empire. Another eruption of uncivilized tribes, from unknown regions, soon followed. Villages, cities, provinces, were plundered and destroyed; and the western world was re-peopled by those rapacious invaders.

Africa was seized by the Huns; Spain by the Goths, Alans, and Suevi; Gaul by the Franks; and Great Britain by the Saxons.

Odoacer conducting the Heruli, Turcilingæ, &c. from Prussia into Italy, A. D. 476, put an end to the western empire, in the reign of Augustulus, whom this successful barbarian compelled to resign the purple, and caused himself to be proclaimed king; but in 493 he was defeated, and put to death by Theodoric, king of the Ostrogoths, who erected a new kingdom in Italy.

This first Gothic king of Italy, and several of his successors, were princes of great prudence and humanity. Ravenna was the seat of their court, and in real magnificence vied with ancient Rome, as their equitable administration did with the reigns of Trajan and Antoninus. They were at last subdued by Belisarius, the general of Justinian, emperor of the east, who had the pleasure of uniting Italy once more to the Roman eastern empire.

Soon after the expulsion of the Ostrogoths, great part of Italy was seized by the Lombards, under the command of Albinus, their first sovereign. He and his successors made Pavia the place of their residence. The government of Italy was now entirely changed. Albinus settled the principal officers of his army, under the name of dukes, in the chief cities of every province. On the death of Albinus, who was slain by the treachery of his wife Rosamond, kingly power was abolished

for the space of twelve years and a half, and each duke became sovereign of his own city and its district. The Lombards during this interregnum extended their conquests in Italy, but being threatened by foreign enemies, they saw the necessity of a close unity, and of committing the care of the war to one person.

Twenty-one Lombard kings reigned in Italy; the last of whom, the unfortunate Desiderius, was defeated and imprisoned by Charlemagne, king of France, A. D. 774, who put an end to the kingdom of the Lombards, after it had subsisted two hundred and six years.

The duration of the eastern empire reached from the year 395 to the year 1453, in which year Constantinople was taken by the Turkish sultan, Mahomet II. In the course of this period it never equalled the ancient Roman empire in power or splendour; and it presented always a spectacle of weakness, folly, superstition, and crimes. It was gradually dismembered, and rent in pieces. The Bulgarians claimed one part of it; and the Saracens, a race of people who inhabited the deserts of Arabia, conquered Syria, Palestine, Egypt, and other neighbouring countries. On the ruins of the eastern Roman monarchy, Mahomet II. established the Turkish empire, and his descendants still possess the finest country on the globe. Greece, where civil liberty was first known, and where arts and sciences were first brought to perfection, continues to this day to be the seat of ignorance, barbarism, and despotism.-Turner.

CHAPTER XI.

GERMANY.

Its ancient Limits.-Conrad, the first Emperor.-Contentions between the Emperors and Popes.-Guelphs and Gebelines.-Charles V.-The Peace of Westphalia.

The warlike Germans, who first resisted, then invaded, and at last overturned, the western monarchy of Rome, have the next claim to our attention.

Ancient Germany extended over one third of Europe. It included almost the whole of Germany, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Livonia, Prussia, and the greater part of Poland. This extensive empire was governed by an infinite number of independent princes, and peopled by a variety of tribes under different names, whose complexion, manners, and languages, denoted a common origin.

In the fifth and sixth centuries many of these nations left their native country, and founded empires of their own under the general or chieftain who led them forth. Wherever these barbarians marched, their route was marked with blood. The most fertile and populous provinces were converted into deserts. Italy, and Rome itself, were often pillaged. New invaders, from regions still more remote and barbarous, drove out or exterminated the former settlers, and Europe was successively laid waste, till the North, by pouring forth its myriads, was drained of people, and the sword of slaughter tired of destroying. *

The first proper emperor of Germany, after it was wholly detached from France, and the imperial dignity became elective, was Conrad. This extensive country was at that time nearly confined within its present boundaries.

Conrad, at the time of his election to the empire, was count of Franconia. His reign was one continued scene of troubles, though he took every necessary measure to support his authority, and preserve the tranquility of the empire. He died without male heirs in 919, after recommending to the Germanic body, as his successor, Henry, surnamed the Fowler, a prince of great abilities, who re-established the affairs of Germany. His son Otho I. triumphed over many rivals, subjected Denmark and Bohemia to tribute, and became the most powerful prince of his age. He had the honour of re-uniting Italy to the imperial dominions; and he procured a decree from the clergy, that he and his successors should

• Modern Europe.

have the power of nominating the pontiff, and of granting investures to bishops. He died in 973, after a reign of thirty-six years; during which, by his generosity and courage, he had justly acquired the appellation of OTHо THE GREAT.

Otho II. surnamed the Sanguinary, on account of the blood spilt under his reign, succeeded his father at the age of eighteen. Nothing of importance happened during this, or the reigns of several succeeding emperors, till

Henry IV. surnamed the Great, who at the age of five years succeeded his father, in 1056. This prince maintained a perpetual struggle with the popes through the whole of his reign. These troubles were occasioned by a famous decree passed in a council of one hundred and thirteen bishops, ordaining, that, for the future, the cardinals only should elect the pope, and that the election should be confirmed by the rest of the Roman clergy, and the people. This Henry opposed; and on being accused of still continuing to nominate bishops and abbots (a right which his predecessors, in common with almost all princes, enjoyed, notwithstanding the apostolic decree to the contrary) the formidable sentence of excommunication was pronounced against him by Gregory VII. and his subjects withdrew their allegiance.Alarmed and astonished, he undertook a journey to Italy, in the midst of winter, accompanied only by a few domestics, to ask absolution of his tyrannical oppressor. Being stripped of his clothes, and wrapped in sackcloth, he approached the haughty pontiff as a suppliant, and with difficulty obtained forgiveness. Henry V. his son. surrendered up the right of investiture, (A. D. 1122) to the disgrace of the imperial dignity. This unnatural brute, at the instigation of the popes, caused his father's body, as the carcase of an excommunicated wretch, to be dug out of the grave where it was buried, in the cathedral at Liege, and be carried to a cave at Spire. He married Maud, or Matilda, daughter of Henry I. king of England, by whom he had no children; so that the

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empire after his death, which happened in 1125, was left without a head.

The states conferred the imperial dignity on Lothario, duke of Saxe-Suplembourg, distinguished by a passionate love of peace, and an exact distribution of justice. Being seized with a dangerous distemper, which carred him off in the 12th year of his reign, he was succeeded by

Conrad III. nephew to Henry V. But the imperial throne was disputed by Henry the Haughty, duke of Bavaria, the name of whose family was Guelph: hence those who espoused his party were called Guelphs; an appellation afterwards usually bestowed on the enemies of the emperors. The imperial army was commanded by Frederic, duke of Suabia, the emperor's brother, who being born at the village of Hieghibelin, gave his soldiers the name of Gibelines; an epithet by which the imperial party was distinguished, while the pope's adherents grew famous under that of Guelphs.* Conrad increased the authority and influence of the prince. His nephew and successor, Frederic, duke of Suabia, surnamed Barbarossa, extended the prerogative, and supported the dignity of the empire, with equal courage and reputation. He died in an expedition to the Holy Land; and was succeeded, A. D. 1190, in the imperial throne, by his son Henry VI. who copied his example. This prince detained Richard I. king of England, on his return from the Holy Land, prisoner, and loaded him with irons; but afterwards ransomed him for 150,000 marks of pure silver, about 300,0001. English money--an enormous sum in those days!-The Normans rebelled; and on being conquered by Henry, he condemned their chiefs to perish by the most excruciating tortures. One Iornandi, of the house of the Norman princes, was tied naked on a chair of red hot iron, and crowned with a circle of the same burning metal, which was nailed to his head. The empress, shocked at such cruelty, renounced her faith to her husband. Herry soon after

• Modern Europe.