300

THE DECLINE AND FALL

CHAP.

IX.

doned their immense forests to the exercise ofhunting, employed in pasturage the most con-siderable part of their lands, bestowed on thesmall remainder a rude and careless cultivation,and then accused the scantiness and sterility ofa country that refused to maintain the multi-tude of its inhabitants. When the return of fa-mine severely admonished them of the import-ance of the arts, the national distress was some-times alleviated by the emigration of a third,perhaps, or a fourth part of their youth." Thepossession and the enjoyment of property arethe pledges which bind a civilized people to animproved country. But the Germans , who car-ried with them what they most valued, theirarms, their cattle, and their women, cheerfullyabandoned the vast silence of their woods forthe unbounded hopes of plunder and conquest.The innumerable swarms that issued, or seem-ed to issue, from the great storehouse of na-tions, were multiplied by the fears of the van-quished, and by the credulity of succeeding ages.And from facts thus exaggerated, an opinion wasgradually established, and has been supportedby writers of distinguished reputation, that inthe age of Caesar and Tacitus , the inhabitants ofthe north were far more numerous than they are

(Casar de Bell. Gal. i, 29). At present, the number of people in thePays de Vaud (a small district on the banks of the Leman lake, muchmore distinguished for politeness than for industry) amounts to 112,591.See an excellent tract of M. Muret. in the Memoires de la Society deBern.

° Paul Diaconus, c. 1, 2, 3. Machiavel , Davila, and the reft ofPaul’s followers, represent these emigrations too much as regular andconcerted measures.