THE NOTES OF A TRAVELLER ON THE SOCIAL AND POLITICAL STATE BY SAMUEL LAING, ESQ., AUTHOR OF THE FIRST AND SECOND SERIES OF "NOTES OF A TRAVELLER," 66 JOURNAL OF A RESIDENCE IN NORWAY," A TOUR IN SWEDEN," 66 Ꭺ TRANSLATION OF THE HEIMSKRINGLA," ETC. LONDON: LONGMAN, BROWN, GREEN, AND LONGMANS. PREFACE. DENMARK is a country peculiarly interesting to the English traveller. It was the home of his forefathers. The three tribes who invaded England in the fifth century, the Juti, Angli, and Frisi of the venerable Bede, came unquestionably from the districts of Denmark still called Jutland, Angeln, and Friesland on the Eyder. They were unquestionably a seafaring people who, although pagan, had made such progress in civilisation and the useful arts, as to build, rig out, victual, and navigate vessels of considerable size, and consequently could be no strangers to the use of iron, the trades and tools of the blacksmith, carpenter, weaver, and the co-operation of various workmen required for the construction of ships, however rude, that could cross the ocean. They had advanced beyond the social state and civilisation of hunters, shepherds, or even mere husbandmen. Whether he favours the theory of a German origin of this people, or of a Scandinavian distinct from the German, whether he calls them Anglo-Saxons or Scandinavians, he must come to the conclusion, from the historical fact of the invasion itself, that, in the fifth century, they were in a very different social state and stage of civilisation from the inland inhabitants 509631 of Germany, who had no access to, or pursuits on, the ocean, and who, in their ordinary way of living, had no occasion or opportunity to acquire and exercise the numerous arts and trades connected with ship-building and navigation, even in the most rude and imperfect forms. Their habits, character, and social state could not have been the same as those of the German people, because the circumstances which form these were naturally and essentially different. It is but a play of words to talk of them as the same people, because the name of Saxons was at a later period annexed to one of the three tribes of the invaders. These Juti, Angli, and Frisi, moreover, had never been subject to the Roman Empire, nor in direct communication with countries subject to it. They were pagans for five centuries after the whole Roman world had been Christianised, and continued pagans in their original homes five centuries after their descendants in England, and all the German populations, had embraced the Christian faith and church establishments, for they remained pagans until the close of the tenth century. Charlemagne and his successors occasionally crossed the Elbe with large armies, and penetrated beyond the Eyder to chastise or convert the pagan inhabitants, but made no permanent conquests or settlements beyond that boundary. The English traveller is almost entitled, from these circumstances, to expect, in this country of his forefathers, that some traces of the spirit, energy, and character which so remarkably distinguish the people of England and of the United States from the people of Germany at the present day, may |