i iiMliipilljIi l ijj ll li | ! i ! !l! !l:i ! i^»i!!^ --— — iljiiiliiiji;- -. i ;|j i;i|iii!j!!Jii Imsmsr Jilillslii!!; 1 i i; niiii&aiJiii iffl Wi'i! liiifli Hi 111 1 ' ■ ■■ iiiliifif t sii s I : s » ■ I * i >•■ ■ : :-• IP iiili ill llj J nil! ;Sh:i ill i f!|?H | iiini i {if m wmmm Hi m MEMOMAM A* F * Lange 7C Queen Elizabeth Behind her is busy, prosperous England with its encircling sea and its flying ships .—11 I I I I OUR ANCESTORS IN EUROPE AN INTRODUCTION TO AMERICAN HISTORY BY JENNIE HALL FRANCIS W. PARKER SCHOOL, CHICAGO EDITED BY J. MONTGOMERY GAMBRILL ASSISTANT PROFESSOR OF HISTORY, TEA.CHERS COLLEGE COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY LIDA LEE TALL SUPERVISOR OF GRAMMAR GRADES, PUBLIC SCHOOLS BALTIMORE COUNTY, MD. SILVER, BURDETT AND COMPANY BOSTON NEW YORK CHICAGO COPTRIGHT, 1916, By SILVER, BURDETT AND COMPANY J.L.. INTRODUCTION It is still generally admitted that the most important his- tory for every child is that of his own country, but happily the old narrow conception of the American story as a thing apart from the rest of the world seems to be rapidly passing. The roots of American civilization are in Europe. Our be- ginnings and early development form a part of one of the most far-reaching changes of history : the expansion of Eu- rope beyond the ancient limits of the Mediterranean world, the discovery of the American continents, the opening of direct sea routes to India and the far East, the commercial revolution, the first stages of the Europeanization of the world. Only in this larger setting can the history of the United States become really intelligible. If we are to under- stand our own country and how it came to be what it is, we must know something of the story of our ancestors in Europe and of the heritage we have received from them. It was to serve the purpose of such an introduction to American history that the pressnt volume was planned. The general field and larger topics have been chosen to meet the requirements for the sixth grade prescribed by the Com- mittee of Eight of the American Historical Association, while that freedom in the choice and treatment of details which the Committee itself so wisely urges, has been exercised. The book may also serve its purpose apart from the Com- mittee's course in any of the grammar grades or early years of the "junior high school." Among the original proposals of the editors were the fol- lowing : a special effort to combine historical accuracy with attractive style and adaptation to the understanding of chil- dren ; concreteness of treatment with adequate detail for clear vi ' •' IFl&J INTRODUCTION visualization abd the consequent sense of reality ; vivid char- acterization of persons ; the type-study idea ; careful atten- tion to the inter-relations of events and the concept of change in institutions and ways of living. As one important aid in realizing these aims it was suggested that the children be al- lowed to make the acquaintance of some of the most interest- ing contemporary writers. The words of Herodotus and Caesar, of Einhard and Roger of Wendover, of Chaucer and Piers the Plowman, of Columbus and Hakluy t, have a unique interest and a value that no effort of the modern writer can replace. Such material Miss Hall has succeeded with remark- able skill in weaving smoothly into her story. Moreover, these old writings, the pictures drawn by people of ancient and medieval times, and the photographs of material remains, supply within the covers of this volume ready means for pre- senting simply and naturally the idea of evidence and of how historical knowledge is obtained. Author and editors agree in dissenting strongly from the theory that the way to be simple is to be brief. Probably the chief vice of history textbooks has been the tendency to epitomize, to indulge in sweeping generalizations, to mislead through over-compactness. This book is accordingly some- what longer than is usual, but in no sense heavier ; on the contrary, it is more interesting and easier to study because the topics are limited in number, and sufficient space has been allowed to treat them clearly and vividly. Miss Hall has given to her task not only several years of painstaking labor and the consideration of much searching criticism, but her rare skill as a teacher of children, her un- usual gifts as a teller of stories, and the experience of travel in Greece and Italy. She has produced a book of distinctive character, one which children will read with pleasure as well as with profit and teachers will welcome as a contribution to the study of history in the grades. J. MONTGOMERY GAMBRILL TO TEACHERS " Have we always been what we are ? " " Why are we so like Europeans and unlike Chinamen ? " " Men and animals grow ; does civilization grow ? " " Before America what was there ? " Thoughtful children ask themselves such ques- tions. Less thoughtful ones ought to be led to ask them. The inquiring attitude of mind, the question formed on the lips or in the brain, are the necessary preludes to right study. The moment when such a question is voiced is the psycho- logical moment for opening this book. As the children con- tinue to read, this initial question should pass through Protean changes and should become at every stage more definite. " What have we learned from the Greeks ? " " How did men learn more about the earth than they knew at first?" Under purposeful teaching, teaching that trains intelli- gence rather than crams with facts, such questions will be continually forming. Along beside them will come a host of little ones: "How long was a knight's spear?" "Did the Greeks kneel when they prayed ? " " How large was Columbus' ship ? " These are honest and intelligent ques- tions, questions well worthy of answers. They show a mind active and eager for accuracy, for definiteness. Children hunger for details. They reason inductively. It is the vivid image that stirs them to make a generalization. I never saw a generalization stir them to anything but revolt. This book tries to rouse these larger questions and the smaller ones, and it tries to give material for answering them. But it needs the help of an inspiring teacher to com- plete it. She must make the recitation a discussion, not a quiz. She must in scores of ways stimulate questioning and vivid imaging. She must alternate hard, close thinking vii viii TO TEACHERS with gratification of the play instinct. She must see to it that children's hunger to express is satisfied. She must have supplementary material for investigating minds. The thing that quickens and invigorates nature study is the fact that it makes absolutely necessary the use of real materials to be studied. The danger for history lies in the fact that most of its material is only a reflection preserved in books. We must search diligently for the real material, the substance of the reflection. The men we are reading about did things, said things, made things. Their deeds are gone, though hosts of books give us accounts of them. Can we hear any of the things they said, that we may judge the speakers? Their voices are dead, but their writings yet exist. Let us study them. Can we see any of the things they made ? Fortunate the class whose teacher or members have traveled and seen the temples and castles of Europe. Fortunate the school in a city with a good museum, having armor, tapestry, lutes, illuminated manuscripts, models of old buildings. Lacking these good things, we still have the multiplicity of pictures with which our press supplies us. I hope, then, that this book will be a center about which will accumulate a little library especially of sources, a mass of mounted pictures, a small collection of illustrative models. The making of those models will be a thing to save the souls of some hand-minded children, and the acquaintance with them will vivify and vitalize everybody's thinking. A Greek lyre, a Greek scroll, a Roman house, a catapult, a bat- tering ram, a knight's shield, a castle, an illuminated page, a Viking boat, a tapestry frame, an astrolabe, a series of sketches illustrating a page's life — let us substitute these for description and dissertation. Let us in all ways possible give our classes a chance to make their own observations and to build their own generalizations. I hope that after reading this book children will say : "What happened next? We are different in some things TO TEACHERS ix from the people of 1600 : how did these changes come about ? " Children of twelve are not too young, I think, to begin to see human history as a series of changes, a series, too, without end. The point may take in their minds some such crude form as this : " When my father was a boy some things were different from what they are now. What things will be different when I am an old man from what they are now ? " For a teacher to arouse this question would be a great accom- plishment. To bring it about, the children's eyes must be turned from books to look questioningly upon the society about them, to see it as an elastic and flexible thing that is the outcome of great changes during the past and is inevi- tably destined to numberless changes in the future. Every intelligent teacher who uses this book will work out original and interesting questions, dramatizations, con- struction, plans for composition, and like devices for adding vigor to the study and like methods of carrying the study over into living. Such discoveries and inventions would be of service to other teachers. The author would welcome such material with a view to incorporating some of it in the questions and suggestions of subsequent editions of the book. Letters may be addressed to her in care of the publishers. JENNIE HALL ACKNOWLEDGMENTS The writer has had the benefit of much assistance. Pro- fessor W. S. Ferguson of Harvard University has criticised the chapters dealing with the ancient world, and Professor George C. Sellery of the University of Wisconsin those on the Middle Ages. To Miss Lida Lee Tall, supervisor in the Baltimore County public schools, I am indebted for sugges- tions such as only a thoughtful, inspired teacher can give. Mrs. Eunice Fuller Barnard I gratefully acknowledge as the collector of the illustrations and as the painstaking editor of the entire book. Yet it is a pleasure to pay my largest debt of thanks to Mr. J. M. Gambrill of Teachers College, Columbia University. Not only has he performed most of the arduous labor necessary on the maps, but he has been the severe and stimulating critic of the whole manuscript. Upon none of these kind critics may I lay the responsibility for any of the faults of the book, but I send it out with more assurance because of their assistance. J. H. CONTENTS PART I. THE ANCIENT WORLD CHAPTER PAGE I. Greece, the Explorer and Teacher i The World before Our Time i Early Greek Exploration 3 Ancient Peoples of the Mediterranean . . . .11 Colonization 13 II. What Greece Had to Teach the World ... 20 Religion 20 Art 21 The Olympic Games 2 9 Greek Cities . . 34 Athens 38 Education 45 v Government . . . . . . . . 51 III. Greece and Her Neighbors 53 The Persian War 53 The Delian Confederacy 59 Macedon Conquers the World 62 Greek Influence on Civilization 70 IV. Rome Grows Strong 74 Rome Conquers Italy 74 Roman Life yj V. Rome Conquers the World 90 How Rome Conquered Carthage 90 Rome's Conquest of the East 96 Caesar's War in Gaul 99 Conquest Changes the Romans no VI. The Roman Empire 117 How Rome Ruled the World 117 A New Religion in the Ancient World . . . .128 Results of Roman Rule 135 xi xii CONTENTS PAET II. THE NEWER NATIONS CHAPTER PAGE VII. The Barbarian Conquerors . . . . . . 140 The Germans . . . 141 The Conquests of the Goths 144 The Franks 148 Charlemagne's Empire . 151 The Vikings , 157 VIII. How Germany and France Began . . . .161 • Charlemagne's Empire Divided . . . . . 161 Germany 163 France 173 IX. Hew England Began . . . . . . .181 The Angles and Saxons Take Britain . . .181 The Reign of King Alfred 187 The Norman Conquest 192 The Good Laws of Henry II 200 King John and the Great Charter 205 X. Castle Life 213 Feudalism, or How Men Got Land . . . .214 The Castle . .217 A Siege . . . 224 The Warlike Spirit of the Age 228 Knightly Ideals and Training . . . . . 232 Knightly Pleasures 239 The Time of Chivalry 247 XI. The Workers 249 Farmers • • 249 Townsmen . • 263 Traders . . 277 XII. Religion in the Middle Ages ..... 296 Christian Missionaries • 296 Church Organization 298 Monasteries 3°° Saints and Pilgrimages 316 Mohammedanism, the New Religion in Asia . . 322 The Crusades . . .329 CONTENTS xiii PART III. BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES CHAPTKE PAGE XIII. Great Changes . . . 334 National States 334 How the World Began to Read ..... 336 A Change in Religion . 337 XIV. Ships in Strange Seas 341 Early Sailors and Their Ways 341 Wanted : A New Route to India . . . . . 346 Portugal's Great Explorers 349 Spanish Ships in a New World 360 Rival Explorers 368 The Results of a Century's Work 377 XV. Spain and Her Rivals 379 Spaniards in America . 379 Spain and Her Enemies : 1. France . . . . 385 Spain and Her Enemies : 2. The Netherlands . . 388 Spain and Her Enemies : 3. England .... 393 England in America 408 England's Rivals in the New World .... 412 Important Dates 417 Further Reading 422 Index . . .423 LIST OF MAPS AND PLANS PAGE Greece about 500 b.c. 7 Map Showing Greek Colonization . . . .15 Athens and the Bay of Salamis . .. . . . 45 The Persian Empire about 490 b.c 54 Alexander's Empire .64 Italy in Relief 75 Rome and Her Hills 76 Rome and Carthage at the Beginning of the Second Punic War 93 Rome and Carthage at the End of the Second Punic War 95 A Roman Camp . . . . . . . . 108 Modern Countries Included in Roman Empire at Its Greatest Extent .116 Part of a Roman Map of the World. From a map of the 4th century. (Reproduced in Synge, A Book of Discovery) . 123 Trading Districts of the Ancient World .... 126 The Germanic Kingdoms 149 Empire of Charlemagne and Its Divisions . . . 162 Europe about the Close of the Twelfth Century Between pp. 212 and 213 A Castle. (After Viollet-le-duc, Annals of a Fortress) . . 218 Plan of a Manor 251 Trade Routes in the Middle Ages . . . . 282-283 Ninth-century Plan of a Monastery (St. Gall, Switzerland) 315 Europe about the Middle of the Sixteenth Century Between pp. 334 and 335 A Map of the World Made in Alexandria about 150 a.d. Ptolemy's map. (From Fiske, Discovery of America)* . 341 A Sailor's Map of Europe and Africa, Made in 1351. From the Laurentian Portolano . . . . . 343 Exploration Moves down the African Coast. (From Fiske, Discovery of America) * ....... 356 Western Africa. From Martin Behaim's globe, 1492. (Re- produced in Synge, A Book of Discovery) .... 357 The World as Europeans Knew It before 1492 . . 360 Part of a Globe Made in 1492, just before Columbus Sailed. From Behaim's globe. (From Fiske, Discovery of America) *.........• 362 Part of a Globe Made in 1531. From the globe of Orontius Finaeus. (From Fiske, Discovery of America) * . . . 370 The Great Discoveries, 1486 to 1600 . . . . . 376 * By courtesy of Houghton Mifflin Company. xiv LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS In order that they may give accurate evidence of the life of other times, the illustrations in this book are taken, with few exceptions, from material contem- porary with the periods described. Vase-paintings, statues, buildings, mosaics, illuminations from old manuscripts, early wood-cuts and engravings have all been drawn upon. This list gives the source in each instance, usually citing also the name of a modern work where the illustration in question and others of the same period may be found reproduced. For volumes referred to more than three times the following abbreviations have been used : Baumeister = Baumeister, A., Denkmaler des klassischen Altertums, Munich, 1887. Cults = Cutts, E. L., Scenes and Characters of the Middle Ages, London, 1872. Gardiner = Gardiner, S. R., Students' History of England, 1904. Lacroix = Lacroix, Paul, Manners, Customs and Dress during the Middle Ages, London, 1876. Lacroix et Sere = Lacroix et Sere, Le Moyen Age et la Renaissance, Paris. Rawlinson = Rawlinson, George, The Seven Great Monarchies of the Ancient Eastern World, 1884. Stothard = Stothard, C. A., The Tapestry of Bayeux, London, 1827. Synge = Synge, M. B., A Book of Discovery, London, 1912. Viollet-le-duc = Viollet-le-duc, Dictionnaire raisonne du mobilier frangais, Paris, 1875. PAGE Queen Elizabeth. From an engraving published in 1596. Frontispiece Assyrian King Hunting. From a relief at Koyunjik. (Rawlin- son) . . . . . . . . . . . 2 Assyrian Lion Hunt. From a relief at Nimrud. (Reproduced in Layard, Monuments of Nineveh) 3 The Monster Scylla. From an Etruscan urn. (Baumeister) 5 The Acropolis of Corinth 9 A Greek Ship. From a Greek vase-painting. (Reproduced in Chatterton, Ships and Ways of Other Days) ... 10 Zeus, Here, Poseidon, Demeter. From a Greek vase. (Bau- meister) 20 The Parthenon in Ruins 22 Greek Horsemen. From a photograph of the Parthenon frieze 24 Venus of Melos. From the statue in the Louvre, Paris . . 27 Hermes of Praxiteles. From the statue in the museum at Olympia *,■■; . . .28 Temple of Zeus at Olympia. (Baumeister) . . .31 xv xvi LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS PAGE Harnessing a Chariot. From a Greek vase. (Baumeister) . 33 Three Greeks. From the relief of Orpheus, Eurydice and Hermes in the Villa Albani, Rome 35 A Greek Potter at Work. From a Greek vase. (Baumeister) 37 The Acropolis of Athens 39 A Greek Lady and Her Slave. From a grave relief in the Na- tional Museum, Athens 41 A Greek School. From a Greek vase. (Baumeister) 46 and 47 Socrates. From the bust in the National Museum, Naples . 48 Persian Soldiers. From a relief at Persepolis. (Rawlinson) . 53 A Persian King. From a Greek vase. (Baumeister) . . 55 Persian Foot-soldier. From a relief at Persepolis. (Rawlinson) 56 Noble Persian Guard. From a relief at Persepolis. (Rawlinson) 57 Soldier of Marathon. From a grave relief in the National Museum, Athens 58 Darius, the Persian King, in his War Chariot. From a mo- saic at Pompeii. (Baumeister) . . . . .66 The Harvard University Stadium 71 A Court in a Roman House. At Pompeii .... 78 Romans Going to Make Sacrifice. From reliefs in the Uffizi Gallery, Florence 80 and 81 A Roman Woman Sacrificing. From a statue in the National Museum, Naples 83 A Roman Sacrifice before a Temple. From a relief in the Palazzo dei Conservatori, Rome ...... 85 A Trireme. (Baumeister). ........ 91 The Dying Gaul. From the statue in the Capitoline Museum, Rome . . 100 A Movable Tower. (A modern drawing in Viollet-le-duc, Annals of a Fortress) 102 Storming a Town. A modern drawing 104 A Roman War Scene. A detail from Trajan's column, Rome. (Baumeister) . . . . ... . . . 106 A Triumphal Arch. A drawing of the Arch of Titus, Rome. (Baumeister) . . . . . . . . .112 The Cold Plunge in a Roman Bath-house. (Viollet-le-duc) . 119 Wax Tablet, Inkhorn, Scroll or Book. (Real Museo Bor- bonico, 1824) 122 A Statue of the Emperor Constantine. At Barletta, Italy . 134 A Frankish Barbarian of Early Times. (Lacroix) . . 142 A German Warrior. (Lacroix) ...... 143 Clovis. From a statue on his tomb formerly in the Abbey of St. Genevieve. (Lacroix) 150 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS xvii Pope Crowning Charlemagne. From a 14th century manu- script. (Lacroix) ......... 152 Charlemagne. From a miniature at the University of Paris. (Lacroix) 155 Viking Ship. From the reconstruction of Professor Montelius. (Synge) 158 Holy Roman Emperor. From a 12th century manuscript. (Synge) 161 The Pope on His Throne. From a 15th century manuscript. (Cutts) 165 The Greatness of the Emperor. From a 9th century manu- script. (Lacroix) 167 A Caravan in the East. From a 14th century map. (Synge) 170 A King of the Franks on His Carved Chair. From a 10th century manuscript. (Viollet-le-duc) 175 St. Louis. From a 13th century manuscript. (Lacroix et Serf) 178 A Saxon Warrior. From a print in the British Museum. (Cutts) 182 Saxon Horsemen. From the British Museum. (Gardiner) . 184 The House of Parliament in England To-day . . . 186 Norman Ship. From the Bayeux Tapestry. (Stothard) . . 193 Saxon Foot-soldiers and Norman Horsemen. From the Bayeux Tapestry. (Stothard) 194 Death of King Harold. From the Bayeux Tapestry. (Stothard) 195 Norman Horsemen. From the Bayeux Tapestry. (Stothard) 196 King William's Ship. From the Bayeux Tapestry. (Stothard) 198 A Norman Banquet. From the Bayeux Tapestry. (Stothard) 200 Pilgrims Leaving a Town. From a manuscript in the British Museum. (Cutts) 202 Paying Toll on a Bridge. From a painted window at Tournay. (Cutts) 203 King John. From a manuscript in the British Museum. (Re- produced in Fairholt, Costume in England) .... 206 The Castle of an English Baron. A modern drawing . . 207 An English Merchant in Rich Clothes. "Chaucer's mer- chant" from the Ellesmere manuscript. (Reproduced in Jusserand, English Wayfaring Life) . . . . .211 Beginning of a Tournament. From a manuscript in the British Museum. (Cutts) 213 A Vassal Swearing Fealty. From a 14th century manuscript. (Lacroix) .......... 215 A Sally across a Drawbridge. From a 14th century manu- script. (Cutts) . . . . . . . . .220 xviii LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS PAGE A King Giving Orders to His Builder. From a manuscript in the British Museum. {Gardiner) 223 Besieging a Tower. From a manuscript in the British Museum. (Cutts) 225 Battering Ram. From a 15th century manuscript. (Cutts) . 226 A Tournament. From a 14th century manuscript. (Cutts) . 229 A Knight of the Thirteenth Century. From a manuscript in the British Museum. (Cutts) 231 Crossbowman. From a manuscript in the British Museum. (Cutts) . . 234 A Tournament of Froissart's Time. From a 15th century manuscript. (Cutts) 237 The Knighting. From a 13th century manuscript. (Lacroix et Sere) 238 A Gentleman Hawking. From the Loutterell Psalter. (Gar- diner) 240 The King Dines. From an early 14th century manuscript. (Cutts) 243 A Lady. From a statue in Chartres Cathedral. (Reproduced in Gautier, La Chevalerie) 245 A Royal Harper. From an early 14th century manuscript. (Cutts) 246 A Knight. From a manuscript in the British Museum. (Cutts) 248 The Ox-plow. (This and the following illustrations of farm activities from the Loutterell Psalter. (Gardiner) . . 250 Cutting Grain 252 Stacking the Sheaves 252 Hauling the Cart-load Uphill. (Reproduced in Jusserand^ English Wayfaring Life in the Middle Ages) .... 254 Harrowing . . .-. 255 Threshing With Flails 259 John Ball. From a 15th century manuscript of Froissart's Chronicles. (Cutts) ........ 261 Medieval Shops. (Lacroix et Sere) 264 A Goldsmith's Shop. From a manuscript in the British Museum. (Cutts) 266 An Old View of Florence. From a wood-cut in a Florentine manuscript dated 1495. (Reproduced in Staley, The Guilds of Florence, London, 1906) .'-■-., 269 A Corner of a Market in Florence. From a wood-cut in a Florentine manuscript dated 1495. (Reproduced in Staley, The Guilds of Florence) 270 A Street Corner in Florence. From the painting of St. Stephen preaching, by Fra Angelico 272 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS xix PAGE The Bronze Doors of the Baptistry. In Florence . . 274 The Bell Tower. In Florence . . 275 The Arms of the Apothecaries and Physicians. From the plaque by Luca della Robbia 276 Landing at a Seaport. From a manuscript in the British Museum. (Cutts) 279 Merchant Ships Carrying Soldiers. From a 15th century manuscript of Froissart's Chronicles. (Cutts) . . . 280 Traders Landing at an Eastern Town. From the Livre des Merveilles, 14th century. (Synge) 286 A Fair. From a painted window at Tournay. (Cutts) . . 289 The Doge of Venice Going in Procession through the City. From the engraving by J. Amman, 16th century. (Lacroix) 292 Merchants Welcoming a Queen. From a 15th century manu- script of Froissart's Chronicles. (Cutts) .... 294 Members of the Choir Sitting in Their Stalls at Church. From the Book of Hours of Richard II in the British Museum. (Cutts) . 296 A Bishop Ordaining a Priest. From a 12th century manu- script. (Gardiner) 299 A Cathedral of the Middle Ages. From a photograph of the Cathedral at Rheims . . 301 A Monk with Gifts for His Monastery. From a manuscript in the British Museum. (Cutts) 304 An Abbot. From the same. (Cutts) ..... 305 The Crowning of the Virgin Mary. From the painting by Fra Angelico 306 A Monk in a Library. From a manuscript in the Library of Soissons. (Cutts) 308 A Picture Painted by a Monk in an Old Book. From a min- iature in the "Terence" of King Charles VI. (Lacroix) . 309 Initial Letter from an Old Manuscript. (Lacroix et Sere) . 310 A Gift to the Monastery. From a manuscript in the British Museum. (Cutts) 313 A Monastery Cloister. In the mission of San Juan Capistrano, California 314 A Tomb. In the church of Santa Maria del Popolo, Rome . 319 A Pilgrim. From a manuscript in the British Museum. (Cutts) 320 A Great Noble Goes on a Pilgrimage. From a manuscript Life of Richard Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick. (Cutts) . 321 A Vista in a Saracen Palace. The Alhambra in Spain . . 327 Jerusalem. From a wood-cut in Liber Chronicarum Mundi, Nuremberg, 1493. (Lacroix) 331 XX LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS PAGE Soldier with an Early Form of Firearm. From a drawing in the British Museum. (Cutts) 335 A Printing Office of the Sixteenth Century. From a con- temporary engraving 337 Martin Luther as a Monk. From an engraving made in 1520 338 A Portuguese Ship. From a wood-cut of about 1516 in the British Museum. (Synge) 345 Marco Polo. From a wood-cut in the first printed edition of his book, 1477. (Synge) . 347 The Polos Begin Their Journey. From the Livre des Mer- veilles, 14th century. (Synge) . . . . . . 348 Kublai Khan. From an old Chinese encyclopedia. (Synge) . 349 Henry the Navigator. After a print by Simon de Passe. (Re- produced in Chatterton, Ships and Ways of Other Days) . 352 Vasco da Gama. From a contemporary portrait. (Synge) . 358 Columbus, Departing on His First Voyage, Takes Leave of the King and Queen. An old print .... 364 The Santa Maria. From a wood-cut of 1493. (Reproduced in Ruge, Geschichte des Zeitalters der Entdeckungen) . . . 366 A Fleet of Magellan's Time. From Mercator's Mappe Monde, 1569. (Synge) .371 Magellan's Victorious Ship. From Hulsius, Collection of Voyages, 1602 .374 Spanish Conquest of Mexico. From an ancient Aztec drawing. (Synge) 380 San Domingo in 1586. From A Summarie and True Discourse of Sir Francis Drake's West Indian Voyage .... 383 Emperor Charles V. From the painting by "Titian . . 386 Philip II. From the painting by Titian 389 English and Spanish. From De Bry, Collections of Travels and Voyages, 1599 395 Francis Drake. From an engraving by Hondius, 1582 . . 397 The Ark Royal. From an engraving in the British Museum . 403 The Armada Fight. From Adams, Series of Views of the Armada in the British Museum 405 God's Providence House. In Chester, England . . . 406 Royal Procession of Queen Elizabeth to Visit a Lord. A painting. (Reproduced in Nichols, Progresses and Public Processions of Queen Elizabeth. London, 1823) . . . 407 An Indian of Virginia. From a water-color drawing by John White of Raleigh's expedition (1585). In the British Museum 410 The Town of New Amsterdam, or New York, as it Ap- peared in 1673. From a contemporary engraving . 412-413 Old Spanish Gate at St. Augustine . . . . . 414 OUR ANCESTORS m EUROPE PART I. THE ANCIENT WORLD CHAPTER I GREECE, THE EXPLORER AND TEACHER The World before Our Time As you very well know, there was a time when no white man lived in America. In 1500 Europe and Asia and northern Africa were the only homes of civilized people. Even in that small world the people of the East and the people of the West knew little of each other. France, Italy, Spain, Germany, England really made up a world of their own. Architects had filled these coun- tries with beautiful churches and castles and palaces. Painters and sculptors had adorned them with pictures and statues. Poets and philosophers and historians were writing great books, and people all over Europe were reading and studying. But it had not always been so. Fifteen hundred years before the discovery of America, northern Europe had been a wilderness inhabited by barbarians. There men had lived in mean little houses and had dressed in skins. They had wandered from place to place in search of new pastures for their cattle or of fresh fields for game. They had been unable to read or to write. It was Rome who had taught these barbarians THE ANCIENT WORLD Assyrian King Hunting Carved on the wall of the king's palace about 2800 years ago. Notice the king's embroidered robe. Attendant protects him with spear and shield and had civilized them. But long before that time Rome herself had been half barbarian and had had to learn from older nations. Greece was her great teacher. And Greece in turn had been ignorant and had been taught by Egypt, Phoenicia, Assyria. When Greece was young, the civilized world was a nar- row fringe around the eastern end of the Mediterranean. There men wore beautiful clothes of marvelously dyed and embroidered cloth. They lived in huge stone palaces gay with carved and painted walls. They drove in char- iots and made great walled cities. They built monu- ments and carved histories upon them. They studied the stars. They dug mines for gold and silver and copper and made shining vases and cups and plates and bracelets and rings and crowns and necklaces. Their bodies and their walls were gorgeous with precious ornaments. Out of this rich old world grew up Greece, the queen of learning. All western peoples to-day look back to her as the mother of their thought and their art. To show a little how these teachers of civilization did their work and how others carried it on, is the purpose of this book. GREECE, THE EXPLORER AND TEACHER j»^?=l vvl ' IIbzI € "^^ ^rg* ■■...,. WmkhL Sir Assyrian Lion Hunt Notice the elaborate harness. The king carries a sword slung over his shoulder by a strap. Two attendants have bows across their shoulders Early Greek Exploration Greece is a sailor's country. Long arms of bays cut into the land and invite men to try the gentle water. Long points of land jut into the sea like ships' prows, and islands close together beckon a boat from one to another out from the mainland. So Greeks very early became seafaring people. Some of their oldest stories show them venturing into unknown waters, finding wild, un- civilized lands, and meeting many dangers. Jason and his friends, fifty young heroes, planned a search for a certain marvelous ram's fleece of gold, so the story goes. They built a boat of fifty oars — the greatest ship of her time — and when they had finished her, these inexperienced ship-builders could not e . g0 ~ launch her but had to lure her into the sea by magic songs, the story says. Then every hero took an oar, and they rowed toward the strange North, hugging the shore for safety or feeling their way out to near-by islands. They passed through the narrow Hellespont and on into the Propontis, where few Greeks had ever gone. 4 THE ANCIENT WORLD Here giants with six arms fell upon them at night and would have killed them except for godlike Herakles. And again some of the heroes had a battle with the monsters of the whirlwinds. After many days of bitter toil and danger, they came out into what we call the Black Sea, but they called it Axinus, or the Sea Unfriendly to Strangers; for it stretched before them broad and empty and shoreless. There were no snug harbors where they might hide from storms. No safe islands offered refuge and resting place. Mists hung over the marshy shores, and the sky was gloomy. Yet the heroes pushed on, and dangers enough they met, according to the old tale — hot rivers and savage people and wander- ing rocks that clashed together with a great spouting of the sea. But at last, with magic help, they obtained that Golden Fleece and started homeward. Then adventures fell thick about them. For days a storm raged and hid the shores and the sky. Because they had no way to steer but by the sun in the daytime and the stars by night, they lost their course and wandered they knew not where. They met cannibals and the magic-singing sirens, who would have eaten them, and horrid Scylla, with six long necks and ravenous dogs' mouths that snatched at them as they passed her cave. They encountered shoals and fogs and quicksands and deserts. But at last they came to the island-sown iEgean Sea, where they were safe. After their many years of strange adventuring around the edges of the world, they finally reached home. Another famous sailor of the old stories was Odysseus, who started out from Troy in Asia Minor on his home- ward voyage to Ithaca, around on the western side of Greece. But the ships of those days were frail craft, and the storms crushed them. Sailors GREECE, THE EXPLORER AND TEACHER The Monster Scylla She is snatching some of Odysseus' men. Odysseus wears a Greek sailor's cap did not know how to tack against the wind, and there- fore unfriendly gales whirled Odysseus out of his way. For ten years he sailed about from unknown shore to unknown shore, visiting lands no other Greek had ever seen. He was buffeted by storms, at- tacked by savages, tempted by enchantresses. He saw such marvels as a one-eyed giant, the story says, and lazy people who drugged themselves with a flowery food, and men bewitched and changed to animals. He lost all his ships and men, but at last he, himself, reached home, full of tales of the wonderful lands outside of Greece. I cannot think that these stories are utterly untrue. Imagine yourself lost at sea and wrecked upon the shore of Greenland, the first white man to see it. What a marvelous tale you would tell when w^T 11686 you again reached home! "It is a huge piece Show of ice floating in the sea," you would say. "Men there have hair all over their bodies. The sky burns." In your hurry to get away you had not waited to investigate very closely, and you had seen such won- ders that you could not find fit words to tell of them. If some one who heard you should tell some one else the marvelous tale, and he should pass it on to another, the last story might be very astonishing and yet founded upon fact. So it is, I think, with these old Greek stories. Man is a land animal, and the sea of old time was full of terrors for him. So the very monsters of these tales, told and 6 THE ANCIENT WORLD even written down as early as 800 B.C., hint that the ancient Greeks went exploring outside of their own iEgean, that they actually did find uncivilized lands, that they met whirlpools and whirlwinds and dangerous rocks, that they saw strange and warlike peoples, that they found gold and treasure. When one man has traveled a new route and comes back with interesting stories, other men become ambitious Reasons ^° see ^ ne same wonders and to push a little for Greek farther. Many ships, therefore, followed in the Expior- wake of the first one that entered the Black Sea and of the first one that struck out into the open waters west of Greece. Besides men's natural curiosity and love of adventure, there were other reasons that drove the Greeks to exploring. Greece is a very beautiful land. It is a tangle of mountain chains, sharp and steep, with snow-capped peaks here and there. Between are little valleys with winding rivers. The rock is mostly limestone, and springs have cut it full of holes and caves. Long arms of the blue sea run inland and bring the sea air. Cliffs and headlands boldly rise from the water. Greek plants are lovely and interesting — grapes and currants and laurel on the hillsides, olives and figs and pomegranates in the valleys, oleanders and narcissus and violets and roses along the watercourses. The Greeks, loving their land for its beauty, thought f,hat it possessed every other virtue, even fertility. They spoke of it as "fruitful," "deep-soiled," "deep-bosomed." Yet in reality it is not a fertile country. Most of the land is mountainous and cannot be used for farming at all. The valleys are small. Thessaly, the largest plain in Greece, is not sixty miles square. And even in many of the valleys the soil is light. The climate, moreover, #40 mr *> pip <3 [7] 8 THE ANCIENT WORLD is dry, so that farmers have always had to irrigate. Yet ancient Greece was crowded with people living mostly in cities and villages, and busy with farming, mining, and manufacturing. Therefore, although every piece of farming land was used for garden or orchard or vineyard, yet Greece could not raise enough wheat to feed herself, and she wanted more gold and silver and copper and iron than she could find in her own mines, and more fish than her own sea would furnish. Neither was there enough timber in the country for all the ship-building and house-building. So her men were forced to go exploring. The country became crowded, too, and young men were eager to try their fortunes in a new land. Another thing that tempted the Greeks out into un- known waters was the example of still earlier and greater The voyagers, the Phoenicians. These people had Earlier gone everywhere. They had built towns in Sicily Explorers an( j a g rea t city called Carthage in Africa. They had a colony in Spain, at the very end of the world. They had even ventured out into the unknown great ocean past the Pillars of Hercules, and had sailed away north to Britain, where they worked rich tin mines. Herodotus, an ancient Greek historian, says, indeed, that they made a three years' voyage from the Red Sea around the whole of Africa, doubling its very southern end and coming north- ward and back into the Mediterranean through the Pillars of Hercules, which we call the Strait of Gibraltar. 1 Phoenician merchants were continually landing, too, upon Greek coasts, telling of foreign lands and selling foreign goods. The quick-witted Greeks bought the goods, gave eager ear to the tales, studied the boats, and copied them. Soon they began to follow in the wake 1 g*e pag* S64. A *a o a 5 a 1 d M a> >»^s -*s © E) o A Bf H « l9l IO ■ THE ANCIENT WORLD of the daring vessels flying past into the strange waters of the North and the West. The ships in which the Greeks did their voyaging were small, not often over a hundred feet long and per- haps a fourth as wide. They were, moreover, shallow, A Greek Ship The sail is furled, while the men row. The pilot uses oars instead of a rudder. Notice the eye painted on the prow, that the ship may see its way. There is a small decked cabin in the prow. A ship had more rowers than this, but the old vase-painter liked his picture better with few men. Read a story of Odys- seus and the sirens, and you will understand about the man bound to the mast carrying what would seem to us a very small cargo. One mast stood amidships and held a square sail. There was no centerboard, and every sailor s ^. ee knows what that means : the ship could only run before the wind. If the course lay north, and the wind was blowing from that direction, the sail was furled, the mast taken down and stowed away, and the men sat down to row ; for the ship carried perhaps twenty or thirty long oars in case of need. There was no such rudder as we have, but a broad oar was fastened to the GREECE, THE EXPLORER AND TEACHER n ship's side and projected past the stern. With this the pilot steered, with no lighthouses to warn him off the rocks, no map to guide him, and no compass to give him directions. When the ship reached its harbor, the men leaped out and pulled it up on the o beach. They camped on shore, cooking at a bonfire and sleeping on the sand. On the voyage they must have lain on the open deck or in the hold, curled up among the cargo. It sounds like a camp- ing party, living in the open and exploring the wilderness for the fun of the thing. Yet these were the great traders and sailors and civilizers of their time. Ancient Peoples of the Mediterranean The Mediterranean world which these early voyagers saw, eight, seven, six hundred years before Christ, was very different from what it is now. At the eastern end were the old and civilized nations of the world — the Egyptians in Africa, the Hebrews and the Phoenicians on the shore of Asia, the Lydians north of them, the Assyrians behind them. Still farther east was the half-known, mysterious India, and beyond that no man knew what. The Greeks, younger children of civilization, inhabited the western fringe of Asia Minor and -the islands of the iEgean, as well as the mainland of Greece. But all of Europe except Greece, and all Africa except Egypt, was wilderness, inhabited by uncivilized warlike tribes. The Euxine Sea, that is, the Black Sea, says Herodotus, " except for the Scythians, exhibits the most ig- norant nations." Then he describes the Scyth- ians. "They have neither cities nor fortifications, but carry their houses with them. They are all equestrian archers, living not from the cultivation of the earth but from cattle, and their dwellings are wagons." And he goes 12 THE ANCIENT WORLD on to tell how after a battle they made drinking cups from the skulls of their slain enemies, hanging the scalps from the bridles of their horses. The people of Spain, and the Gauls in what is now France, were only a little less savage. The tribes of northern Africa were gentle brown people, Africans mos ^ °f them "nomads who eat flesh and drink milk," Herodotus tells us. Of one tribe he says, "In the summer they leave their cattle on the coast and go [inland] in order to gather the fruit of the palm trees." And others of them cut their hair in strange fashion and " bedaub their bodies with vermilion." In the middle part of Italy were the Latins, from whom later came the great Romans. These people, when the Greeks began to colonize the West, seven hundred years before Christ, were already settled farmers, raising grain and grapes, making flour and wine. They spun and wove garments of wool. There were dyers to make the cloth beautiful, and fullers to clean their robes. They had sandal makers and gold- smiths and coppersmiths and carpenters and potters. They sailed the sea and traded with their neighbors. A king ruled over them with senators to help him make the laws ; and those laws were good and just. Yet these people had no alphabet, and therefore could not read nor write ; had no schools ; and made no beautiful buildings or statues. To these half-civilized shores went the adventurous Greeks. Their trading parties carried with them gold Trading jewelry, bronze pots, brilliant cloth, wine, stations oil, swords — such things as uncivilized people ^d would be eager for. They made a tempting Factories di S pi a y f these goods on the shore and sent inland to invite the natives to come and buy. But GREECE, THE EXPLORER AND TEACHER 13 barbarian people never have money, so they brought down with them whatever they had — sheep, cattle, cheeses. A good trade was made, both sides were pleased, and the Greek ship went home laden with a new cargo to be sold in the city. Another time it returned and traded again. The merchant perhaps bought a little piece of shore from the natives, put up a storehouse and stocked it with goods, and left two or three men to keep up the trade with the barbarians while the ship went to and fro. Sometimes the natives had nothing that the Greeks wanted, but the exploring trader might find veins of metal or forests where he could cut timber. At his next visit he would bring a company of men and establish a lumber camp or a mining camp and would get natives to help in the work. Or perhaps he would find broad, fertile plains that were good for raising wheat. He would bring seed and plows and workmen and plant a crop, and during a few seasons he would teach the people of the country to till the ground. Then he would be sure of a cargo that would sell well in any city of crowded little Greece. Colonization If trade or industry prospered at one of these stations, it would be talked of in Greece, and people would become interested, especially men who liked novelty, or who were in trouble of some kind. " We will begin over again in a new place," these men would say. Word would go about that a company was to start out from a certain city to found a colony in such and such a place, and other people who wanted to go would flock there. But the Greeks, although they were great travelers, were also great lovers of home. They dreaded cutting 14 THE ANCIENT WORLD the ties that bound them to the place where their fam- ilies had lived for generations. So before this company of colonists started, they went to the hearth Cokmy g & °^ their city- For besides all other temples every Greek town had a little building with an altar, where burned always the sacred fire of the city that seemed like its very breath. A little of that holy fire the colonists took with them in their ship and carefully tended it on the voyage. And a little of the home earth from beneath the altar they took, and a priest. In the new land they spread out the handful of earth and planted the new altar upon it. Upon the altar they put the holy fire that they had brought. So the new town was born, and the people felt that she was the daughter of their old home city. ; In this way hundreds of colonies were formed all around Extent of ^ ne e( ^S es °f the Mediterranean. One city Greek alone, Miletus in Asia Minor, was the mother Coioniza- f eighty towns, most of which were on the Black Sea. On the shores where once the Argonauts had found the Golden Fleece, Greek miners collected gold from the rivers and dug it from mines. In the mountains they found iron and cut timber. On the level plains that border the sea at the north and west they grew wheat. Odessa, a Russian city of to-day and one of the greatest wheat markets of the world, is named after one of those old Greek colonies planted in the wheat region. The native Scythians about this district were shepherd people, and they traded beeves and hides and wool for armor and golden ornaments. To-day people are digging for the graves of these ancient barbarians, and they find in them, hundreds of miles from Greece though they are, beautiful Greek cups and necklaces and bracelets. [iSl 16 THE ANCIENT WORLD • Another of the greatest industries of this northern region was fishing. The Propontis (or Sea of Marmora) Towns an d the mouth of the Borysthenes (or Dnieper) of the River swarmed with tunny. Fleets of Greek Black Sea fi smn g boats were busy here, and on the shores were lines of sheds, where the catch was dried and salted. Another commodity the Greeks got from the Black Sea district, — slaves. It is a terrible thought to us that men should be bought and sold like cattle, but the ancient world had not yet learned that all men have a right to freedom. Every nation used great numbers of slaves — to work mines, farms, and factories, to row ships, to help in the work of the house, and to serve as personal attendants. The people living north of the Black Sea were made up of many tribes that were continually at war with one another, and the victors were glad to carry their captives down to the shore and sell them to the Greeks. Besides slaves, gold, iron, fish, and lumber, the Greeks got from the Black Sea country flax and pitch, wax and honey. Indeed, so full of treasures was this region that, in spite of the fact that the sea was still dangerous to navigate, the surrounding country often ice-covered, and some of the natives hostile, yet they changed its old name of "Sea Unfriendly to Strangers" and called it "Euxine, " "Sea Friendly to Strangers" ; and scores of Greek towns lined its shores. Greek ships had gone west as well as north and had found Italy and the great fertile island of Sicily. It was the very kind of country to please these people itaf 7 *"* — mountainous like their own, but with broader plains between the mountains. It had, too, the same jagged coast, full of harbors, and the same brilliant sky. So colony after colony was founded here about the GREECE, THE EXPLORER AND TEACHER 17 shores of Sicily and of southern Italy, until the land was as Greek as Greece itself and even took the proud name of " Magna Grsecia" or " Great Greece." Many of the towns grew to be larger and richer than their own mother cities in the East. Their kings had stables and fine race horses and elegant chariots. Phi- losophers and poets lived there and wrote, and learned men from the older countries were glad to visit in the courts of Sicily. The greatest industry here was wheat raising; in fact, this island was one of the granaries of the world. But on the mountains back from the shore there was, also, much herding, and Sicilian cheeses became famous. Indeed, Sicily was a land of varied riches. Still farther west than Italy, the Greeks settled along the coast of Spain and France. The present French city of Marseilles is the old Greek colony of Massilia. When the Greeks first visited these shores, six hundred years before Christ, they found here a Phoeni- cian settlement, as they did in many another place. But they drove out the earlier people and made a Greek city. And this Massilia herself planted other colonies, until the southern shore of Gaul (as France used to be called) was a fringe of Greek towns with good harbors and a long road to connect them, running from Spain into Italy. There were fisheries on the shores ; for these are the very waters where we now get our best sardines. Back in the Spanish mountains were mines of gold and silver and copper. Spain, indeed, was the " California of ancient days/' with its rich gold finds. The settlers made salt, traded with the natives for slaves and dyes and honey and cattle, and grew grapes and olives in the fertile plains. Best of all, down the Rhone River, that reaches far back into France, came native traders who had met other traders from far-off Britain and had brought down from 18 THE ANCIENT WORLD there precious tin, a metal that the Greeks much needed in the making of their weapons and dishes and vases and statues of bronze. So the Gallic colonies prospered. On the northern shore of Africa, in a fertile spot, was another line of Greek settlements. Behind them stretched the mysterious desert, and brown men "came Africa. to the shore with horses and camels, with black slaves, with apes, parrots, and other wonderful animals, with dates and rare fruits." And at the very door of rich old Egypt, too, the Greeks planted cities and bought her wheat and linen and ivory and beautiful things. Into these new lands where the colonists settled they Effect of carried their own customs. They planted olive Greek orchards and made oil, vineyards and made Coloniza- wine. They built temples like those at home 41011 and worshiped the same gods. They made walled cities set close with houses that had flat roofs and pleasant inner courtyards. They furnished their rooms with simple, graceful furniture. They used beau- tiful vases of clay and bronze. They had banquets and sang songs. They practised gymnastic games and dances. In fact, they lived in the colonies as they had lived in their Greek homes. The barbarians from round about all of these trans- planted Greek cities continually visited the towns to buy or sell, and they stayed to gaze at the wonders. Many of them the Greeks employed. Barbarian fathers, seeing Greek books and men reading interesting things in them, sometimes sent their sons to live in a Greek family that they might learn to read and write. It often happened that Greek men married native women, and their children grew up as Greeks. Many barbarians, too, came to live in the colony, and their grandchildren forgot that they were not real Greeks. GREECE, THE EXPLORER AND TEACHER 19 So Greek learning and Greek ways of living spread. One of the tribes of Sicily became so thoroughly saturated with Greek ideas, or so Hellenized (as we say), that they tried to build towns like the Greek cities, and perhaps half the population of the civilized and elegant Magna Graecia were Hellenized natives. The same thing hap- pened in southern Gaul. Even far up the Rhone Hellen- ized Gauls built towns on Greek models and lived lives after the Greek manner. Over in eastern Europe two strong young nations, Thrace and Macedon, half Greek to begin with, grew up in the north country under Greek teaching. We shall hear of Macedon again as the land of Alexander the Great. 1. In the map of Greece count the islands. (Yet these are only a few of them.) How many good harbors can you find ? On which side are most of them? Can you see why Greece had most of her dealings with countries east of her? Find good farming land. Find shut-in valleys. 2. Write an ignorant sailor's account of a voyage past a volcano. Is it in any way like the descriptions that the Argonauts made of the wonders they saw? 3. Make as full a list as you can of the peoples of the ancient world. 4. How did your own town begin? 5. What other ancient people made trading posts like those that Greece established? 6. What modern countries have important colonies? Where are those colonies? Name some way in which they are different from Greek colonies. 7. Find out what you can about Herodotus (from an encyclopedia, a history of Greece, or the introduction to Everyman edition of Herodotus). What opportunities did he have for learning the true facts for the stories he tells ? If you read any of these stories, notice some of the different ways in which he learned about what he tells. 8. From your geography find what to-day are the products of the places mentioned on pages 14 to 18 as the districts colonized by the Greeks. Zeus Here Poseidon Demeter Zeus carries his thunderbolt, Poseidon his fisher- man's trident, Demeter her wh$at heads CHAPTER II WHAT GREECE HAD TO TEACH THE WORLD Religion What was the Greek life to which the people of the Mediterranean had been introduced? We have learned a better religion than the Greeks knew, and yet there were many beautiful things about that belief of theirs. The world seemed to them too great and too varied for one god to rule, so they thought there were many. These great beings were like men and women, but taller, more beautiful, and wiser. They lived in a marvelous city in the sky with a wall of bronze running around it, and within it were golden palaces set in gardens. One of the old poets, speaking of this Olympus, the dwelling place of the gods, says : "Not by winds is it shaken, nor ever wet with rain, nor doth the snow come nigh thereto, but most clear air is spread about it cloudless, and the white light floats over it. Therein the blessed gods are glad for all their days." 20 WHAT GREECE HAD TO TEACH THE WORLD 21 Those gods it was who brought all things to pass in the earth and in the sky. Every day Apollo drove the chariot of the sun on its course through the heavens to light the world and to warm it. Zeus, the king of gods and men, sent rain upon the earth to water it. Poseidon stirred up storms on the sea and calmed them. Dionysus guarded the vineyards and filled the grapes with sweet juice, and Demeter brought all heads of grain to yellow ripeness. The gods read men's hearts also, punished them for evil deeds, and encouraged them to live righteously. The gods gave help, too, in the common work of men's daily lives. A sailor prayed to Hermes for a favorable breeze. A bronze worker, laboring on a beautiful shield, asked Hephaestus, the blacksmith god, to help him. A hunter prayed to Artemis, goddess of the moon and of the chase, to send his arrow to the mark. A shepherd prayed to Pan for fat flocks and thick fleeces. A man in doubt how to act asked help from Athene, the wise giver of good counsel. Here is an ancient prayer that men used to sing to Hephaestus: "Sing, shrill Muse, of Hephaestus renowned in craft, who with gray-eyed Athene taught goodly works to men on earth, even to men that before were wont to dwell in mountain caves like beasts; but now, being instructed in craft by the renowned craftsman, He- phaestus, lightly the whole year through they dwell happily in their own homes. Be gracious, Hephaestus, and grant me valor and fortune." Art Men sang these prayers with hands and faces uplifted to the bright sky where the gods dwelt, and they stood before altars of stone or turf or ashes whereon were burn- [22] WHAT GREECE HAD TO TEACH THE WORLD 23 ing sacrifices of flesh or of holy cakes. Sometimes the altars were out of doors, — in the woods, by the roadside, in the street, in the market-place, — but often they had beautiful temples built about them. Always there were priests to tend them, and people brought gifts of love to deck the place. All over the Greek world, from Asia Minor to Spain, were thousands of these altars and inclosing temples. Every city had scores of them. Every day prayers were going up to the gods, and on festival days men were singing hymns or dancing sacred dances in their honor. The most beautiful of all Greek temples was the Par- thenon in Athens. It is, of course, in ruins now, as all ancient Greek buildings are; for, during two thousand years, rain and blowing dust have been Parthenon at work wearing off the stone ; earthquakes have shaken walls ; fighting armies have battered them down -or blown them up with powder ; careless men have torn them to pieces to build new houses or to throw into the lime-kiln. Yet, even to-day, the Parthenon is so beautiful that it makes a man's heart leap to see it. In ancient times it was a low marble house with a porch on all sides of it. A great procession of columns held up the roof. They were big and strong . and solemn, yet so delicately was every one curved as it rose that it seemed not crushed down by its own great weight but light and lithe like an athlete. In the shade of the high porch men could walk and look up at a carved procession of horsemen and charioteers and men and women afoot, going around the building at the top of the marble wall. Above the porches in the gable ends were great groups of marble statues large as life, showing deeds of Athene, the goddess of the temple and the favorite goddess of all Athens. 24 THE ANCIENT WORLD This whole great building of marble — marble walls, marble floors, marble columns, marble statues, even marble tiles on the roof — was not a mass of blinding white. Rather there was a deep color in the flutes of the columns. Around the doors and along the edges of the wall was a painted border of leaves. On the peaks of the gable and the corner of the eaves were golden ornaments. The statues were delicately tinted so that Greek Horsemen From the carved marble frieze that goes in a band around the wall of the Parthenon porch the marble was of the color of flesh, the eyes were blue, and even the garments were tinted. Behind the statues was a reddish wall to set them out clearly to men's eyes. Inside this temple, in a great room where only a soft light entered through the thin marble tiles of Athene ^e r00 ^ anc ^ through the wide door that opened toward the morning sun, was Phidias' wonderful statue of Athene. She stood forty feet tall, gazing kindly down upon her people. Her face and hands and feet WHAT GREECE HAD TO TEACH THE WORLD 25 were of soft-gleaming ivory perfectly carved, and all her long, straight-falling robe was gold. Below her curled sweet smoke from a holy fire that burned always. On her birthdays the room was filled with her Athenians singing to her and bringing gifts. The architect who made that building spared no trouble in having it perfect. "A long, flat floor generally looks high at the ends and sunken in the middle, " The he said. "Now my floor must look flat. So Builder's I must raise it in the middle/' This he did, Work and every big block of marble that went into that long floor had to be chiseled carefully to fit the gentle curve. If the floor curved, then every other line must curve to correspond, and the stonecutters had to chip delicately at every block, as though they had been carving statues. Each column is made of eight pieces piled one on top of another, yet so perfectly were they fitted that even now, after war and earthquakes, there are joints that you cannot see ; and nowhere is there coarse mortar to fill cracks or to hold the stones together. When it was done, the whole building, walls and floor and all, was rubbed down in some way, so that the face of the marble shines like hard ivory. Those old Greeks were willing to spend time and thought and care in making beautiful things. In every temple, on street corners, in the market-place, at springs along the country roads, in sacred places around altars, in the courts of houses, were statues. Sta.tu.es Hundreds of them have been lost. Perhaps people long ago melted up the bronze ones in time of war to make weapons. Some of the marble ones barbarous people threw into lime-kilns and burned up to make lime to plaster their houses. But if all those that we have found could be brought together into one place, they would make a large town of marble and bronze people, 26 THE ANCIENT WORLD and every one of them would be beautiful and graceful and perfect, as common people are not. There would be in that silent company people doing most of the things that ordinary men did. Some would be driving chariots and riding horses ; some would be throwing quoits and boxing and wrestling and running. Others would be swinging swords and pushing lances and shooting arrows. A few would be playing with babies. Some would be bathing or putting on their cloaks or tying their sandals. Some would be praying or dancing ; and many would be idly sitting or standing about waiting for friends, talking with companions, or musing about pleasant things. Many of them would be gods and god- desses, and others would be men, — orators, poets, athletes, warriors. Almost all of them would be sadly broken. The arms would be gone, or the legs would be missing, perhaps even the head would be lost or the nose broken off. But after a while you would cease to be troubled by this broken condition, because in spite of it the statues would be so beautiful. The marble would be creamy and smooth, the bronze would be coated with soft green. The bodies would be slender and straight-limbed, with firm muscles like a young athlete's body. The faces would be of lovely shape, with a gentle, musing look. Besides, the very fact that they were broken would make them all the more interesting. It would remind you that they are hundreds and hundreds of years old, that they have seen wars and earthquakes, that they have watched generations of men come and go and have seen governments and civilizations swept away and new ones established. Many of them have been found in modern times buried in the ground, but what accident has brought them there we seldom know, 28 THE ANCIENT WORLD For instance, the statue of Aphrodite, or Venus, in the picture, the goddess of love and beauty ; was found about a hundred years ago on the island of Melos. Melos A Greek peasant happened to see a glint of marble at the back of a cave as he passed its mouth one day. Going in, he found a statue, with arms already broken off and lost. He had never been taught to know and enjoy beau- tiful things, yet he thought this might be worth taking home, — any piece of mar- ble was. He tied a rope around it and, harnessing his horse to it, dragged it down the stony road to the shore. It happened that a Frenchman was visit- ing the island at the time, and when he saw the statue he eagerly bought it and presented it to the French king. Now it is one of the most precious treasures of the Louvre, a great art museum in Paris, and half the world has learned to love it. Many people have tried to fancy what Aphro- dite was doing with those lost arms, how they were bro- ken, when and why she was hidden, just where she stood originally, and who made her, but we really know almost nothing of her history. The statue of Hermes we know more about. Praxiteles Hermes of Praxiteles WHAT GREECE HAD TO TEACH THE WORLD 29 made it, and the Greeks thought him one of the best of their sculptors. For years it stood in Here's temple in Olympia, where the great game-festival was held. But after the world became Christian, Pr e ™* t e les these games were stopped, and Olympia was deserted. An earthquake shook down the walls and toppled over the statues. A little river that flowed near by flooded and covered the ruins with sand, and grass and trees grew above the buried statues. Then at last, about forty years ago, some Germans who loved the beautiful old Greek things went to the place and dug, hoping to uncover something interesting. Under fifteen feet of sand and clay they found this Hermes, arms and legs gone, but otherwise perfect. On the sandal of a broken foot they even found the gilding that the artist had laid on two thousand years before. The Olympic Games This Olympia where Hermes was found was one of the most interesting places in Greece. The Greeks thought that the most beautiful thing in the world is the human body when it is properly de- G J 1 £~ veloped. So the whole afternoon of every schoolboy's day was given up to gymnastic exercises. Not only was he taught to jump, to wrestle, to run, to throw the disk and the spear, and to dance ; but he was given calisthenic drills and exercises with dumb-bells in order to make him graceful and to strengthen the muscles that were weak. For the purpose of all this training was not to make professional athletes who should be able to do special tricks, but to develop a strong and beautiful and healthy body. Not only did schoolboys have this training, but in every town were large free gymnasiums for grown men, 30 THE ANCIENT WORLD and every day all the citizens who had any leisure went there and exercised so that they should not grow weak or too fat or too lean as age came upon them. These exercises, moreover, were out of doors ; for the gym- nasium was really only a large yard surrounded by lines of small, low sheds used for dressing rooms. There was a shady porch before these rooms where men might lounge and rest after the games, before they took the bath. Sometimes the gymnasium was in a grove of olive trees or plane trees, where men strolled about. The Greeks, loving joy and beauty, believed that the gods also loved these things. One way in which they . chose to please and honor the gods, therefore, was to play games for them to see. There were several places in Greece where temples and gym- nasiums and race courses had been built for the purpose of holding these game-festivals, and Olympia was the greatest of them all. For hundreds of years Greeks from all over the Mediterranean world had gathered there for the games. Building after building had been erected until it was like a city of the gods. There were no dwell- ing houses ; for nobody lived here permanently except a few priests to care for the sacred place. When visitors came every four years to the festival, they camped on the plain in tents and huts. But there were temples — a great one for Zeus and another for Here, his wife. In the Zeus temple was a gold and ivory statue of the god. Phidias, who had made the Parthenon Athene, had made this one also, and most men of the ancient world thought it the most beautiful of all statues. Modern men have never seen it or any other of all the gold and ivory statues; for some one of the enemies of Greece WHAT GREECE HAD TO TEACH THE WORLD 31 who conquered her tore them all down, melted up the gold to coin money, and carved over the ivory into little statuettes, perhaps. But in the time of Olym- piad glory two thousand years ago, the golden Zeus Zeus sat on his great golden throne, and men by hundreds and thousands, from the far corners of the world, came before the statue to sing praise to the real Temple of Zeus at Olympia It is now in ruins, but the floor and parts of columns, walls, and statues remain. From studying these and from reading an old Greek book which describes the temple, a modern man made this drawing god, who was looking down, they thought, from his high throne in Olympus, while all the other gods stood about him to watch the festival. And every one of them had his altar out of doors somewhere in the sacred grounds of Olympia. For in one way the Olympic games were very unlike our modern athletic meets. Men went to them to wor- 32 THE ANCIENT WORLD ship the gods, and the first day of the festival and the last were given over to religious processions from altar to altar, to prayers and hymns and sacrifices, and to the presenting of gifts to the gods. Standing about these temples and altars were thousands of statues of gods, heroes, and athletes. It was like a great, beautiful playground with men of marble and bronze at exercise. Around the grounds went a wall to keep all safe. Out- side were still more interesting buildings. Here was the big gymnasium where men and boys trained for nine months to be ready for the great games. Here was the open course for the chariot races, and here were the long tiers of marble seats down the straight track where men and boys ran and boxed and wrestled and leaped and threw the disk and the spear. On these marble seats every four years sat thousands of men come from all parts of the world to watch the Olympic games. There were Greeks from Gaul, Sicily, Africa, Asia Minor, and the Black Sea country, come home once more to their own beloved land. Perhaps they brought with them friendly Gauls and Scythians and Italians who were eager to learn the Greek ways. There were men from the still older civilizations of the East — Persians, Egyptians, Phoenicians, Hebrews. The winner of an Olympic game had his name and his fame carried around the world and his story told in a score of languages. When he went home to theWinner n * s own c ^^' ^he P eo P^ e threw open the gates and poured out to meet him, crying his name aloud. A chorus of young men danced in his honor and sang a song that a poet had written to glorify him. Here is part of such a song written by famous Pindar for the boy Asopichus, winner of the short foot race four hundred seventy-six years before Christ. When he 33 J 34 THE ANCIENT WORLD returned to his home town, a chorus of boys sang it in a temple of the Graces. These were the three goddesses of song and art and all beautiful and polite and graceful things. Their lovely names occur in the first part of the song. ". . . O lady Aglaia, and thou Euphrosyne, lover of song, . . . children of the mightiest of the gods, listen and hear ; and thou, Thalia, delighting in sweet £? . sounds, and look down upon this triumphal Song company, moving with light step under happy fate. . . . Concerning Asopichus am I come hither to sing, for that through thee, Aglaia, in the Olympic games [his city] is winner. Fly, Echo, to Per- sephone 's dark-walled home [that is, the land of the dead] and to his father bear the noble tidings, that seeing him thou mayst speak to him of his son, saying that for his father's honor in [Olympia's] famous valley he hath crowned his boyish hair with garlands from the glorious games." The victor wore on his hair a simple little wreath of olive leaves in sign of his triumph. His family would treasure it forever, hanging it over their family altar and pointing to it with pride when it should be nothing but a dry twig. And perhaps his city would erect his statue in some public spot and carve his name below it, and his victory. If the boy's family was wealthy, in gratitude to the god who had helped him to win and in love for Olympia the glorious, they might set up another statue there, among all those that crowded the sacred field. Greek Cities Most of these Greeks were town dwellers. To be sure, there were peasants who lived in the country, but most farmers chose to have their houses in little villages and to WHAT GREECE HAD TO TEACH THE WORLD 35 Three Greeks The one at the left is Hermes, the messenger of the gods. He has a traveler's broad hat pushed back on his shoulders. The men's costume is such as was worn by all young men. All women wore a costume like that of the central figure go out from there to work their fields. For the Greeks were sociable people, liking to meet their neighbors often, liking to sing and dance together, liking to hear the news and to talk politics and to discuss religion and philosophy. So the country was filled with thousands of villages and hundreds of cities. Every little valley had its great town that was mistress 36 THE ANCIENT WORLD of the land and people round about it. The mountains cut it off from its next neighbor, and there was little travel across the ranges. So the people of each valley came to have their own ways of thinking and doing things, their own king or leader, their own patron god, even their own dialect. The people of one valley felt very closely bound together and very loyal to their own city and very sure that their own god, their own speech, their own ways, were best. They were often scornful of their neighbors' customs and sadly jealous and likely to fly to arms. So every town had its wall to protect it in time of war. There were, indeed, great differences among the cities ; and a stranger going to Greece to choose a home would have had a difficult time deciding among all the interesting and varied places. There was, for instance, Sparta. There the people were ruled by very strict laws. The whole aim of a Spartan's life was to be a brave soldier and to fight for his city. Everything he did from the time he was a little boy was done to help accomplish this purpose. He was taken away from his home and his mother, and he lived in a military camp among men and boys. Every day he had military drill and gymnastic exercises, and that was his school. He had coarse food and coarse clothes — only one tunic a year. He had to forage for his food. He had to learn to endure hunger and pain without murmuring. In fact he lived always like a soldier. There was very little beauty in Sparta. The houses were rough buildings of squared logs. The furniture was scanty and crude. There were few vases or pictures or statues in the whole city. There were temples, but they were not lovely like the Parthenon. Yet if you WHAT GREECE HAD TO TEACH THE WORLD 37 A Greek Potter at Work He is painting a vase. Notice how he holds his brush. Athene, the goddess of handicraft, is going to crown him. The spear and helmet show her also as goddess of war count courage and temperance and love of country as enough virtue for men to possess, then you would have chosen Sparta as the noblest of all Greek states. Plu- tarch, an ancient Greek writer and a lover of Sparta, says: "No man was at liberty to live as he pleased, the city being like one great camp where all had their stated allowance and knew their public charge, each man con- cluding that he was born, not for himself, but for his country. . . . [They thought] nothing more disagreeable than to live by (or for) themselves. Like bees, they acted with one impulse for the public good, and always assem- bled about their prince. They were possessed with a thirst of honor, an enthusiasm bordering upon insanity, and had not a wish but for their country." 38 THE ANCIENT WORLD But if you had wanted kind family love and a com- fortable home ; if you had wanted to go to good schools and get learning ; if you had wanted to live among beau- tiful things, and to meet travelers from distant lands ; if you had wanted to hear poets and philosophers talk and see artists at work, you would not have chosen Sparta. It might have been iEgina, whose men were sailors and even pirates, some of them. It might have been Chalcis, the busy and prosperous city of bronze Ofr er workers, the mother of more than twenty colonies. Or you might have chosen Corinth, the famous merchant town, where ships were always going and coming, and foreign traders were walking the streets, where the best vases of Greece were made, and where great sculptors worked. Athens But probably you would have chosen Athens, the city of the greatest poets and architects and painters and sculptors in the world, and of famous orators and brave generals. Here, as in every Greek city, was an Acropo- lis, or hill, as the heart of the town. This in earlier times had been a fort, placed for safety where the steep hillsides were difficult for the enemy to climb. The town was clustered at the foot. But later a wall had been run around the whole city. Then the Acropolis, safe inside the wall, had become, not the fort, but the sacred place, where the most holy temples and statues were. It was a shining glory of marble. The Parthenon was there. It stood high above the city, clearly to be seen; and I think that Athenians must have lifted Acropolis . eager eyes to it early every morning. But it did not stand alone on the flat hilltop. Near it was WHAT GREECE HAD TO TEACH THE WORLD 39 another temple of Athene, with delicate carvings and a marvelous porch with maidens' figures for columns. Surrounding both the temples were statues of marble and bronze. The road that wound up the western end The Acropolis of Athens of the hill near the top met a wide marble stairway, that climbed to broad porches before the bronze entrance doors of the sacred ground. Into the stony side of the Acropolis was cut a huge half circle, and marble benches were built here, tier above tier, until there was room to seat all the people of Athens, facing a stage and a dancing-circle. This was the theater, sacred to Dionysus, the god of the vineyard and of wine, god of joy and the dance. Once every year plays were held in his honor, and Athenians saw acted out old stories of their heroes and their gods. Leading from one of the theater doors was a street, lined on both sides with grace- 40 THE ANCIENT WORLD ful little monuments of marble, topped with bronze tripods, won by the men who had given the best plays. And beautiful things those old plays are ; they have been read and studied and imitated by men of all times. The high-lifted buildings on the Acropolis were the chief beauty of Athens, but not its only one. There were scores of temples, small and large, scat- Scenes tered through the city, no one of them so beautiful as the Parthenon, but all of them built on much the same plan and all of them lovely. Here and there along the streets were fountains — little streams of water falling into carved marble basins, where the maidservants came every morning early with vases on their heads, to get water for their households. The city wall stood high and broad with nine gates, where the citizens might go out and in. It was about five miles around. A man could walk from end to end of the town in half an hour. Inside this small space was crowded a city of over a hundred and fifty thousand people. There was no room for lawns or parks. Houses were built close Streets together, and their fronts were on the very street. Those streets were narrow and unpaved and without sidewalks ; because the ground was hilly, they were crooked, winding about on the level places. The houses were uninteresting from the outside with their flat roofs and blank walls with only one great door. But the best of them must have been pleasant to live in ; for when the great door was passed, the home-comer walked down a short hall and came to a court open to the clear sky, with a fountain, perhaps, playing in the center. Before the entrance stood a little altar of Zeus, the protector of strangers, for all Greeks were hospitable, , and liked to entertain guests. A Greek Lady and Her Slave These figures are carved on a Greek gravestone. The seated lady represents the one who is dead. She is examining her jewel box brought by the slave [41 42 THE ANCIENT WORLD All about was a porch, and back of this opened shallow rooms with only draperies to shut them off. Many of these were guest rooms. Behind this court was another and larger one, with shrubs and perhaps a tree or two to make it green and cool. This one was sacred to the family, and visitors only rarely came here. There were pleasant porches about, where the women sat to spin and embroider. Children romped here, swinging, rolling hoops, playing knuckle- bones. Around this court, also, were airy rooms where the family lived and worked. Here, too, was an altar, this one to Hestia, goddess of the hearth and home ; and every morning she received loving sacrifice and prayer. These houses were pleasant and comfortable, but were not very large and not costly. Sometimes the walls were of rough stone, sometimes of sun-dried brick. There was little furniture ; and while it was beautiful, it was very simple, too, for the Athenians hated extravagance. " Nothing too much" was a common Greek motto. Moreover, an Athenian man spent much of his time in the public places of the city, and it was these that he felt should have care and money spent upon them to beautify them. The market-place was an open paved square in the center of the city. It was ornamented with statues, and about the sides were beautiful little marble 7?® buildings where the officers of the city did Market- . . ° . _ . „ • _ J . place their work, and m one of them was the city hearth, with its undying, holy fire. Along one side of the square was a covered walk, with columns supporting the roof. The back wall of this portico was painted with pictures from brave Athenian history. This " Painted Porch/' as it was called, was one of the favorite lounging places of Athens. WHAT GREECE HAD TO TEACH THE WORLD 43 Meetings were sometimes held in this market-place; and on festival nights sacred dances were given here, and holy hymns sung. But the chief use of it was for buying and selling. Practically all the trading of the city was done here. Every forenoon it was the noisiest, busiest, most crowded place in Athens. Dozens of little tables cluttered the open square, some with awnings to shade them, all heaped with interesting produce. At every one stood a merchant, calling his wares, perhaps striking a gong to attract attention. And walking about from table to table were Athenian men, buying — fine gentlemen selecting food for the evening banquet, gay young fellows choosing perfume, serious millers and manufacturers inspecting samples of wheat and leather and wool. They could find there everything that was produced in the whole Mediterranean world — fresh fish from the Gulf sparkling three miles away, and salt fish from the Black Sea; goat's meat and mutton, milk and cheese and butter, vegetables and fruits, wine and olive oil from the farms round about Athens; wild honey from the mountains ; garlands of flowers from the meadows and river banks; shoes, hats, cloaks, vases, and bread from the shops of the city; statuettes and jewelry from the artists' benches ; armor and swords and knives and pots from the forges of bronze and iron workers ; painted scrolls and fine linen and curious objects from Egypt; medicines imported from the African colonies ; oint- ments and perfumes and boxes of sweet-smelling wood from Arabia; carved ivory combs and brilliant rugs from distant India ; skins and leather from Scythia ; salt and dyestuffs from Spain ; tin from far-away Britain. How did all these things come to Athens? Three miles away was her port, Piraeus. The harbor shores 44 THE ANCIENT WORLD were lined with storehouses, not ugly things of red iron or dirty brick, but long, graceful buildings of white mar- ble, with stone steps leading into the water. Here the little Greek ships, with their square sails and their twenty or thirty oars, were going and com- ing continually. The marble docks were filled with slaves carrying goods on their backs, with captains giving or- ders, with merchants buying wheat, with money lenders giving little bags of clinking coin to the outbound traders. And in the harbor, on guard, were long ships of war, with their three banks of oars and their sharp, bronze beak at the prow, ready to ram the enemy. The town of Piraeus had straight, broad streets and fine, marble houses — a spick and span new town, neater but less lovely than her mother, Athens. She, also, had a wall to protect her. The road that led to Athens had to be made safe ; otherwise, in time of war, an army might have camped between the two towns, have cut off Athens' supplies from the sea, and starved her people. So a high wall stretched straight on both sides of the road, making it like a giant's fenced lane. These " Long Walls," as people called them, made one city of Pirseus and Athens. All these dignified temples, planted thickly through the city, these pleasant porticoes and graceful monu- ments and fountains along the streets, these statues that graced the Acropolis and the market and the temples, these theaters and gymnasiums and public groves, the orderliness and roominess and elegance of Pirseus, made Athens the most beautiful city in p e . the world. Visitors from every shore journeyed to her to enjoy her beauty. Young artists went there to work under her great painters and sculp- tors and architects. Poets and philosophers gathered there, because Athens appreciated and inspired them. WHAT GREECE HAD TO TEACH THE WORLD 45 Merchants and workmen from other states flocked to Athens, because there they could find work and a good living. It was a city not only beautiful but well-ruled, well-policed, prosperous, and happy. She was, as one of her own great men called her, "the school of Greece." Education The men who crowded the market-place and the docks were not ignorant sailors and traders. All but the very poorest of them had been to school from the time they Notice the " Long Walls " between Athens and Piraeus were seven until they were eighteen. Plato, an old Greek writer, says: "[His parents] send the child to teachers, and enjoin them to see to his manners even more than to his reading and music ; and the teachers do as they are desired. And when the boy has learned his letters and is beginning to understand what is written, . . . they put into his hands the works of great poets, which he reads at school. In these are contained many admoni- tions and many tales and praises of ancient famous 46 THE ANCIENT WORLD A A M School This and the next picture are painted on the inside of a shallow, round drinking cup. At the left a boy is learning to sing, while the teacher accompanies him on the double flute. In the middle a teacher is correcting a boy's exercise, written on a wax tablet. At the right a slave is waiting to take the boys home. On the wall hang a book or scroll, a wax tablet, a lyre, a drawing-square men, which he "is required to learn by heart, in order that he may imitate them and desire to become like them. "Then again the teachers of the lyre take similar care that their young disciple is temperate and gets into no mischief. And when they have taught him the use of the lyre, they introduce him to the poems of other excellent poets, who are the lyric poets, and these they set to music, and make their harmonies and rhythms quite familiar to the children, in order that they may learn to be more gentle and harmonious and rhythmical, and so more fitted for speech and action; for the life of man in every part has need of harmony and rhythm. Then they send them to the master of gymnastics, in order that their bodies may better minister to the virtuous mind, and that the weakness of their bodies may not force them to play the coward in war, or on any other occasion." After the boy was eighteen, perhaps he joined a phi- WHAT GREECE HAD TO TEACH THE WORLD 47 .t the left a boy is learning to play the lyre. In the middle a boy is reciting rhile the teacher holds the scroll. A slave waits. On the wall are two drink- ing cups, two lyres, a lunch basket, and a flute (osopher's class and studied about more difficult things geometry, astronomy, religion, science, rhet- oric. These classes were not held in buildings, our college classes are, but in the shelter of the porch of the gymnasium, or in the covered walk beside the market-place, or under the trees in the park. Nor did the students sit at desks with pads and pencils, but in friendly fashion on benches or on the floor of the porch, or they strolled up and down the walks, while the master talked. Grown men, too, often listened to the class and entered into the discussion. Some of the things they discussed were great scien- tific problems; and the decisions they came to guided men's thinking for hundreds of years and en- lightened the minds of people all over the world. They talked of the stars and the sun and the moon. They discussed the causes of eclipses and of the change in the length of day. Some of them believed that the earth and the planets revolve about the sun, and that it is the sun that lights the moon. They knew that the earth is Learning 48 THE ANCIENT WORLD a sphere, and they considered how to divide it by merid-. ians of longitude and parallels of latitude, and so to determine locations of places. They studied geometry, as we now study it in our high schools and colleges, draw- ing figures, finding the areas of squares and circles and triangles, and the contents of cubes and spheres and cylinders. They discussed what the earth is made of, and what existed before the earth, and how man and the animals were created. They speculated about whether or not the soul is immortal, about what makes beauty and ugliness, about what light is, and how sound is caused. And a hundred other things they discussed, which our astronomers and geometers and scientists and philosophers are still dis- cussing. One of the greatest of these teachers was Socrates. He was a poor Socrates man, a stonecutter by trade. Yet he devoted his life to the good of his fellow citizens. Xenophon, one of his friends, in writing about him says: "He was constantly in public ; for he went in the morning to the Socrates His name and one of his sayings are carved in Greek letters on the marble WHAT GREECE HAD TO TEACH THE WORLD 49 places for walking, and to the gymnasiums ; at the time when the market was full, he was to be seen there ; and the rest of the day he was where he was likely to meet the greatest number of people ; he was generally engaged in discourse, and all who pleased were at liberty to hear him." Young men, especially, nocked around him to listen and to learn wisdom; yet he never took classes for money, because he thought he was not wise enough to teach. His purpose in thus going about the city and talking with all men, high and low, he himself explained. " While I have life and strength I shall never cease from the practice and teaching of philosophy, exhorting any one whom I meet after my manner, . . . saying: *0 my friend, why do you, who are a citizen of the great and mighty and wise city of Athens, care so much about laying up the greatest amount of money and honor and reputation, and so little about wisdom and truth and the greatest improvement of the soul, which you never regard or heed at all ? Are you not ashamed of this V" As we look back at Socrates now, we see that he lived a wonderfully pure, unselfish, and useful life, and many of his fellow Athenians thought so, too. Xenophon says : "Of those who knew what sort of man Socrates was, such as were lovers of virtue continue to regret him above all other men, even to the present day, as having contributed in the highest degree to their advancement in goodness. To me, being such as I have described him, so pious that he did nothing without sanction of the gods ; so just that he wronged no man, even in the most trifling affair, but was of service in the most important matters to those who enjoyed his society; so temperate that he never preferred pleasure to virtue ; so wise that he never erred in distinguishing better from worse, needing no 50 THE ANCIENT WORLD counsel from others, but being sufficient in himself to discriminate between them ; so able to explain and settle such questions by argument ; and so capable of discern- ing the character of others, of confuting those who were in error, and of exhorting them to virtue and honor, he seemed to be such as the best and happiest of men would be." Yet he made many enemies. When he reproached a man with being dishonest and proved another one un- duly conceited or showed the selfishness of a third, these people sometimes, instead of being thankful to Socrates for making their faults known to them and instead of trying to reform, grew angry and hated him. And when vain people are angry, they are likely to say all kinds of false things. Finally this charge was made against Socrates: " Soc- rates offends against the laws in not paying respect to those gods whom the city respects and in intro- ducing other new deities ; he also offends against the laws in corrupting the youth." He was tried in court, and in spite of all his friends could do and in spite of his good and noble life he was sentenced to death. He died bravely, even smilingly, and without a murmur at the injustice of his fellow citizens, refusing to let his friends buy his pardon or bribe the prison guards to allow his escape, because he thought such things were dis- honorable. Nor did he fear death, but rather welcomed it. "Let a man be of good cheer about his soul," he said, "who has cast away the pleasures and ornaments of the body as alien to him, ... and has followed after the pleasures of knowledge in this life ; who has adorned the soul in her own proper jewels, which are temperance and justice and courage and nobility and truth — in these arrayed WHAT GREECE HAD TO TEACH THE WORLD 51 she is ready to go on her journey to the world below when her time comes." Government Such an education as the Athenians received and such busy and interesting lives as they led made freedom-loving men. They had early done away with kings, and ruled themselves. On the Pnyx hill in Athens was arranged an open-air meeting place with a platform for speakers. Here, about four times every month, came all the free- men of Athens, rich and poor, to elect their officers, to make their laws, to levy taxes, to decide on matters of war and commerce and building. The government was what we call a democracy, not a republic like ours. We elect men to do our country's business for us ; in Athens every citizen directly voted on all questions. Such a thing is not pos- sible except in a small state: in all Attica (the state ruled by Athens) there were not more than 50,000 voters. Pericles, one of the greatest of Athenians, spoke of his city's government much as follows: "It is called a de- mocracy because it is carried on for the benefit not of the few but of the many. Before its laws all men enjoy equality in the matter of their private affairs ; while, in regard to public rank, every man is given office accord- ing to his merit. No man is prevented by poverty or obscurity from doing the state any good service of which he is capable." Any Athenian freeman might hold any office of his country, just as in America. Indeed, the Athenians went one step further in their desire to give every man a chance to work for the state : some officers they chose by lot. Yet two faults prevented this government from being the perfect thing that it seems. One was this : no for- eigner might ever get the right to vote, not though he 52 THE ANCIENT WORLD lived and worked in Athens for many years ; nor might his sons or grandsons after him become Athenian citizens. And " foreigners" to Athenians meant not only Persians and Egyptians but men from any other state than Attica, even Spartans and Thebans. Another great fault was this : there were more slaves in the country than freemen, and they, of course, had no voice in making laws or in planning their lives. Freedom of all men and the right of all men to vote did not come in any country for many hundred years. While Athens had a democracy, other Greek cities had different forms of government. There were kings in some states. In others there were tyrants, or men Forms w ^° ^°^ ^ e P ower m ^° their own hands and ruled until a rebellion or some turn of affairs expelled them. Sometimes a small number of people from old, noble families or from rich families controlled the city. And in most of the states the government fre- quently changed, as people became dissatisfied. All of them began with kings, even as Athens did ; most of them at one time or another were seized by tyrants ; and many of them tried a democracy for a longer or a shorter time. Every Greek had an interest in government and a sense of freedom that no other ancient people felt, except the Romans. And because of this freedom and the love of it these little quarrelsome states did many brave and notable things, and the bravest work of all, I think, was the Persian war. 1. Make a cardboard model of a Greek house. (Plan on page 36, Gardner and Jevons, Manual of Greek Antiquities.) 2. Look at the buildings around you and see whether any of them have copied anything Greek. 3. Are there any places in your neighborhood that the Athenians would have beautified ? 4. What things were necessary to make a person an Athenian citizen? What is necessary in America? Persian Soldiers At the sides are common foot-soldiers. One car- ries a bow over his shoulder, the other has his in a case at his side. The two central figures are men of the king's guard with the head-dress of nobles. Notice the bow and • quiver at the back of the one on the left CHAPTER III GREECE AND HER NEIGHBORS The Persian War By 490 B.C. Persia, over in Asia, had become the greatest country in the world — the richest and the largest, stretching from India to the African desert. She had conquered Egypt, old Babylonia and Assyria, Phoenicia, Palestine, a score of old and new nations, and all the Greek cities in Asia Minor and Thrace. In fact she had conquered all the eastern world except Greece. Of course she was not willing to allow an exception. Now Greece was only a little spot compared with the great empire of Persia, so when the king sent messengers to the cities of this little country, asking them for earth and water as a sign that they recognized him as master of all lands and lord of all the seas, he thought that surely they would send it, out of fear. And some of them, to their shame, did it ; but the Athenians threw the messen- 53 54 THE ANCIENT WORLD gers over a cliff as they did their criminals, and the Spar- tans threw them into a well, saying, " Take earth and water from there." Then King Darius in wrath sent a great fleet across, and the ships of that fleet the con- quered Phoenicians and the conquered Greeks of Asia Compare the size of Greece with the size of Persia Minor had to supply ; for Persia was an inland country and had no boats. When that great fleet landed in Attica, there was only a little army of Athenians with a few of their good friends, the Platseans, to meet them ; for, as usual, the Battle of other states were jealous and distrustful of one 400 B c another or thought that there was no hurry. But in the face of this Asiatic host that was perhaps three times its number the little army waited until a favorable moment, when the Persians were off their guard. Then the Greeks charged at the run, pushing the enemy into the water, slew more than 6000 of them, burned some of their ships, and sent them back to Persia beaten. This was the battle of Marathon, which for hun- GREECE AND HER NEIGHBORS 55 dreds of years the Athenians celebrated as their bravest victory. "They first endured the sight of the Medic garb and the men that wore it," Herod- otus says of the warriors of Marathon; "but until that time the very name of the Medes [or Persians] was a terror to the Greeks." The Persian king was eager for revenge for this defeat, but other wars busied him for a time ; and then he died. The installing of the new king, Xerxes, still further delayed vengeance, so that there were ten years of waiting. And marvelous use the Athenians made of that time under the advice of Themistocles, one of the ablest ^ ork . of citizens Athens ever had. Plutarch, an old tocles Greek writer, says, "While others imagined the defeat of the Persians at Marathon had put an end to the war, [Themistocles] considered it as the beginning of greater conflicts ; and for the general benefit of Greece he was preparing himself and the Athenians against those conflicts, because he foresaw them at a distance." He knew that the Persians would come by sea. There- A Persian King As a Greek vase-painter drew him, showing the East- ern gorgeousness 56 THE ANCIENT WORLD fore he urged the Athenians to build ships of war; for up to that time they had fought little on water. He per- suaded, pleaded, threatened, talked in the street, in the market, in the barber shops, at banquets, in the public assembly, until he succeeded in getting the Athenians to make a port at Pirseus and to build 200 ships. Then the Persians descended upon them again with a great army moving down the coasts and a thousand vessels sailing beside it. Nothing could stop Xerxes, the Great King. He built a bridge of boats across the Helles- pont and cut a canal through a rocky neck of land, that his ships might avoid a stormy headland. Millions of men he had, it was said, drawn from all the na- tions of the Persian empire — Scythians and barbarians from the North, Arabs and Egyptians and savage African tribes from the South, the polished Greeks of Asia Minor, Phoenician sailors, Assyrians, even men from India, the edge of the world. The very names of them all would take a half page of print. They were clothed in all manner of costume — in the skins of panthers and lions and foxes, in leather armor, in helmets of horses' skulls, in long white cotton garments, in brilliant silk. They carried all manner of weapons — spears tipped with bronze or with antelope horn, bows of cane and palm and ash, curved scimitars, knotted clubs, shields of wood or rawhide or crane's skin or bronze. It was a strange medley of nations, like a circus. Among them were fierce barbarian warriors and the well-trained, brave band of Persian soldiers that were the king's guard. They spread terror as they came. Peksian Foot- soldier GREECE AND HER NEIGHBORS 57 For once the Greeks realized that they must give over their petty jealousies and unite. Yet they were not ready when the great army swept down to the narrow Battle of pass of Thermopylae at the north of Greece. Ther- Then the Spartans showed the results of their mopyiae, lifelong training. Three hundred of them were 48 ° B,C ' there under their brave king, Leonidas. With about 4000 to help them, they held the pass for six days against that mighty army. Up to the time of fighting, the Spartans amused themselves in play- ing games and singing songs; for war was their sport. They laughed at the news about the number of the enemy. Rumor said that it made cities poor to feed that great army ; that the hosts drank rivers dry; that when they shot their arrows, the sun was hidden. "So much the better," laughed the Spartans, "we shall fight in the shade." On the last day most of the troops returned home. But the 300 Spartans, with 700 brave men to help them, even though they knew there was no hope of winning, stood their ground against the mighty host and died fighting, Leonidas and every Spartan but one. After that brave but useless battle the great Persian host flooded on into middle Greece. Then Themistocles had the hardest work of his life to do — to drag the Athenians out of their city and aboard ship. For he realized that they could not hold Athens, that the Persians would camp about it and starve them out, that the Greeks' only hope was in their fleet. He accomplished Noble Persian Guard Carrying bow and quiver Battle of Salamis, 480 B.C. 58 THE ANCIENT WORLD his purpose at last, and the Persians camped in the empty city and burned it. But the Greeks were ready for them on the sea, and while the Great King and his army sat on the shore to watch, in the bay of Salamis they met the Persian fleet of four times their number. In " The Persians," an old Greek play by iEschylus, a Persian messenger tells the story of the fight : "Then the fierce trumpet's voice Blazed o'er the main ; and on the salt sea flood Forthwith the oars, with measured plash, descended, And all their fines, with dexterous speed displayed, Stood with opposing front. The right wing first, Then the whole fleet bore down, and straight uprose A mighty shout. 'Sons of the Greeks, advance ! Your country free, your children free, your wives ! The altars of your native gods deliver, And your ancestral tombs — all's now at stake ! ' A like salute from our whole line back- rolled Soldier of Marathon A Greek gravestone. The man wears bronze greaves and body armor, with an undergarment of cloth or leather to keep the bronze from the skin. Gener- ally the helmet covered the ears, cheeks, and nose, and the soldier carried a shield and wore a sword GREECE AND HER NEIGHBORS 59 In Persian speech. No more delay, but straight Trireme on trireme, brazen beak on beak Dashed furious. A Greek ship led on the attack, And from the prow of a Phoenician struck The figure-head ; and now the grapple closed Of each ship with his adverse desperate. At first the main line of the Persian fleet Stood the harsh shock ; but soon their multitude Became their ruin ; in the narrow firth They might not use their strength, and, jammed together, Their ships with brazen beaks did bite each other, And shattered their own oars. Meanwhile the Greeks Stroke after stroke dealt dexterous all around, Till our ships showed their keels, and the blue sea Was seen no more, with multitude of ships And corpses covered. AIL the shores were strewn, And the rough rocks, with dead ; till, in the end, Each ship in the barbaric host that yet Had oars, in most disordered flight rowed off." After that, in the spring, the Greeks beat the Persians once more in the long and bloody battle of Platsea. " Of an army of 300,000 men," . . . Herodotus says, " not 3000 survived." The Persian invasion of Greece was ended for good and all. The Athenians returned to their ruined town and began to rebuild it into that beautiful City that was the wonder of the world. The Delian Confederacy When the war was over, many of the states of Greece looked to Athens as the queen of the sea and the savior of the Greeks. A great league of friendly states, called the Delian Confederacy, was formed, with Athens at the head. The league was sworn to protect Greece from Persia. Then Pericles, the Athenian, had a great dream. He saw his city as the head of a noble Greek empire. 60 THE ANCIENT WORLD The business of Athens should be to direct this empire, to keep peace, to see justice done, to build and train and operate a strong navy that should be the protector of the empire. Under this peace every state might go on freely with its work of commerce and manufacturing, with its arts and its education. The governments of the states were to be democratic, like the government of Athens. And Athens, through her beauty and her learning, through the freedom and wisdom and large-mindedness of her citizens, was to be worthy of her high place as head of this empire. The dream was partly realized. Pericles' wisdom brought it about. For thirty years his great mind planned V . . all Athens' actions. He tied the empire to- Pcnclcs gether with the swift-moving fleet. He col- lected dues and planned the spending of the money. He set artists and builders to work to beautify Athens and Piraeus. During his thirty years of service Athens became more democratic and more patriotic, better edu- cated, more beautiful, more prosperous. At the same time Athenian learning and art and law and manner of governing spread through half of Greece. Wealth, com- merce, comfort, increased throughout the league. The Delian Confederacy was the noblest government the world had thus far seen. Pericles was not the king or tyrant of this empire. For thirty years the citizens of democratic Athens, recog- nizing his greatness, elected him first to one office and then to another, and, whatever post he held, they generally followed his advice. Thucydides, an Athenian historian of the time, says that Pericles, " being powerful because of his high rank and talents and being manifestly proof against bribery, controlled the multitude with an independent spirit and was not led by them so much as he himself led them. GREECE AND HER NEIGHBORS 61 For he did not say anything to humor them; but he was able on the strength of his character to contradict them even at the risk of their displeasure. Whenever, for instance, he perceived them unreasonably and. insolently confident, by his language he would dash them down to alarm. And, on the other hand, when they were unreasonably alarmed, he would raise them again to confi- dence." This time, the time of the greatest b.c. 429 glory of Greece, is called "The Age of Peri- cles," because he was the great directing mind of the period. But even inside the Delian Confederacy the old jealousy was at work ; and, outside it, Sparta and her friends were eaten with envy. As soon as the danger from Persia was over, the old quarrels began again. T^ ousy For twenty-seven years there was almost con- tinuous warfare between Sparta and her allies on one side and Athens and hers on the other. The whole Greek world from the iEgean islands to Magna Grsecia was dragged into it. There was terrible slaughter of men and ruin of cities. A* 1 Athenian army of 40,000 was almost entirely wiped out in Sicily. Sparta captured 160 of Athens' ships and sentenced 3000 prisoners to death. Beaten on land and sea, cooped up and starving at home, the Athenians were forced to tear down the walls of Piraeus and the long walls that stretched from port to city, to be content with only twelve b°£~ 371 ships of war, and to obey the commands of Sparta. Then for thirty-three years Sparta ruled Greece with stubborn selfishness and cruelty. First one city and then another revolted and had to endure bitter punishment, until Thebes rose up and took vengeance upon the punisher, humbled Sparta, and devastated her land. 62 THE ANCIENT WORLD Macedon Conquers the World Meanwhile, north of Greece, Macedon had been grow- ing strong. Greek colonies on the coast and occasional Greek immigrants who traveled inland had Macedon in -, ^ -i i • i gradually spread Greek education there. The kings of one tribe, especially, became thoroughly Hel- lenized. They traveled in Greece, spoke Greek, enter- tained Greek poets and artists and teachers at their court, and even took part in the Olympic games. Philip, one of these Idngs, conquered the other six tribes of Macedon, held them firmly in his hand, made himself their beloved hero, and built up a marvelous army. With this well-trained army he conquered Greece when all her small states were quarreling among themselves. But he interfered little with their government, and in- vited rather than commanded them to help him in his great plan of humbling Persia. For though the Greeks had beaten her on their own ground and had driven her out of their country, yet she was still the proud mis- tress of Asia and often interfered in Greek affairs. Philip was killed before he could carry out his plan, and his son Alexander inherited the kingship of this young Macedon, inherited Philip's strong and a ?"w loyal army and his ambition to conquer Asia. In 334 b.c, when he was only twenty-two years old, with a well-knit little army of 35,000 men, Alexander set out to master an empire fifty times as large as his own country — an empire whose king had more gold in one treasure house than was in all Macedon together and servants in one palace more numerous than Alexander's whole army. The history of the next eleven years reads like a tale from the " Arabian Nighte." Alexander fought against GREECE AND HER NEIGHBORS 63 twenty times his number and never once lost. There were battles where the enemy rode on elephants and drove in chariots with scythes on the wheels to cut men down. Macedonian troops forded rivers and climbed slippery banks in the very face of the foe and yet won. About a great walled town they built a hill of earth two hundred and fifty feet high, that they might fight from it. Alexander conquered cities so old that their age seemed like a fable and so rich that Greece appeared a beggar before them. He captured treasures of a hundred million dollars and the Great King's tent with its basins and bath of gold and its scented water and its perfumed air. He gave banquets where nine thousand people sat down to table, and every one received a gold drinking cup as a gift. He sent a party to explore the great river Indus, which probably no Greek had ever seen before. The army climbed over a snowy mountain pass more than 13,000 feet high. For sixty days they traveled through a desert that was the hottest place on earth, where three-fourths of the division died of thirst and hunger and fatigue. At one time a wound brought the young conqueror near to death off at the world's end. There were passionate quarrels between the king and his army that ended in tears and embraces. And always the battles brought victory, until Alexander was master of the largest empire that had ever existed, and the whole civilized world was ringing with his fame. Aside from the marvelous things he had done, Alex- ander himself was a hero to stir men's hearts. No one could have been braver. He always rode in the very front of the troops in brilliant armor and JT. 61 with white feathers in his helmet, so that no eye could miss him. He was afraid to go nowhere. Once when he was besieging a city and was scaling the wall, 64 THE ANCIENT WORLD the ladder broke below him. Instead of leaping back among his army, he leaped forward into the city with only three men to help him. Being brave and straightforward himself, he liked these qualities in other men. Plutarch tells of his send- ing a gift to a far city in Italy because of a brave deed of one of her citizens done years before. And after having conquered a certain king who had made a brave fight, " Alexander asked him," Plutarch says, Compare with the map of the Persian empire, page 54 "how he desired to be treated. He answered, 'Like a king.' 'And have you nothing else to request?' re- plied Alexander. 'No,' said he; 'everything is com- prehended in the word king.' Alexander [being pleased with the answer] not only restored him his own do- minions immediately, which he was to govern as his lieutenant, but added very extensive territories to them." Plutarch reports that one of the conquered Persians once said, "Alexander is as mild in the use of his vic- tories as he is terrible in battle." x And he goes on to tell GREECE AND HER NEIGHBORS 65 how the Persian queen and her daughters were treated when they were captured after a certain battle. Alex- ander sent word to them "that they had nothing to fear from Alexander, for his dispute with Darius [the Persian king] was only for empire and that they should find themselves provided for in the same manner as when Darius was in his greatest prosperity. ... They [were, indeed, given] as many domestics and were served in all respects in as honorable a manner as before. . . . Though they were now captives he considered that they were ladies, not only of high rank, but of great modesty and virtue. ... As if they had been in a holy temple, rather than in an enemy's camp, they lived unseen and unapproached in the most sacred privacy." Having captured so many cities and cities so rich, he had a great mass of spoil ; but he seemed to have no love for wealth except to use it. He was continually making gifts to any who he thought deserved them. At one time he gave a great banquet for the Macedonians who had married Persian wives and "he paid off all their debts," says Plutarch. When his soldiers became wounded or ill or worn-out in his service, he sent them home with rich presents. Indeed, he was so lavish with gifts that his mother reproved him, saying that he would make kings of all his friends. In spite of the magnificence of the Persian life that he was taking part in, he seems himself to have preferred simplicity. Plutarch says: "He found that his great officers set no bounds to their luxury, that they were most extravagantly delicate in their diet and profuse in other respects ; insomuch that one had silver nails in his shoes, another had many camel-loads of earth brought from Egypt to rub himself with when he went to the wrestling ring; . . . more ntade use of rich perfumes [66 GREECE AND HER NEIGHBORS 67 than oil after bathing and had their grooms of the bath as well as chamberlains who excelled in bed-making. "This degeneracy he reproved with all the temper of a philosopher. He told them, it was very strange to him that, after having undergone so many glorious conflicts, they did not remember that those who come from labor and exercise always sleep more sweetly than the inac- tive and effeminate; and that in comparing the Persian manners with the Macedonian, they did not perceive that nothing was more servile than the love of pleasure or more princely than a life of toil. 'How will that man/ continued he, 'take care of his own horse, or furbish his lance and helmet, whose hands are too delicate to wait on his own person ? Know you not that the end of con quest is, not to do what the conquered have done, but something greatly superior?'" Yet with all his virtues Alexander had faults. He was boastful and liked to hear himself praised, becoming angry at those who did not do homage to him. He occasionally lost control of his temper and did savage things, once even killing a friend in a fit of anger. After- wards he repented most bitterly and in tears and tried to take his own life; for he had a hot disposition that rushed to extremes. Moreover, he was very supersti- tious and always had soothsayers and prophets about him to interpret dreams and omens, as did many men of his time. But you must not think that Alexander was an ignorant soldier. He had been educated by the Greek Aristotle, one of the greatest philosophers of the world, and he had been an apt pupil. Even during his campaigns he had books sent to him and read them eagerly. He welcomed philosophers and poets and knew what was going on in the learned world. Plutarch says, "He loved polite 68 THE ANCIENT WORLD learning, and his natural thirst for knowledge made him a man of extensive reading." He had great love and ad- miration for the " Iliad," the old Greek poem that tells the story of the Trojan war, and "used to lay it under his pillow with his sword." Moreover, he had studied medi- cine and sometimes prescribed for his friends. Indeed, he had a strong interest in all kinds of knowledge. But what did it all amount to, this march of thousands of miles, these eleven years of clever fighting, this con- quest of the world? He himself had a purpose Effects of i n ^e war. He wanted to unite Europe and quests Asia. Other Greeks had a great scorn of every- thing not Greek. Now, no one could love Greek manners and ways of thinking better than Alex- ander did. That was one reason, doubtless, for his want- ing to unite Greece to the rest of the world, that he might spread Greek education. Indeed, he seemed to carry seeds of Greek culture with him and to plant them wherever possible. Everywhere he built altars to Greek gods and sacrificed to them. He held Greek games and gave Greek plays among the Persians. He had 30,000 Persian boys educated by Greek masters. All through the East he built seventy cities on the Greek plan and left Greek and Macedonian settlers in them. Besides admiring the Greeks, he was interested in all people, felt a respect for different civilizations, and was eager to learn from them all. He adopted the Persian dress, married two Persian princesses, and encouraged his soldiers to take Persian wives. He sometimes made a conquered Persian the governor of a province. Thus in many ways he tried to unify his conquered world, and he largely succeeded. The fact that so many countries were under one head and were at peace, the GREECE AND HER NEIGHBORS 69 fact that a Greek army had penetrated into Asia and had wound its way from city to city there, was like open- ing closed doors. Travel and trade increased; and where travelers and traders go, settlers follow, and so do manners and customs. Although Alexander died in Persia before he had finished his work, and although after him there was no man strong enough to hold this great empire together, yet the doors stayed open, and Greek settlers and ideas and culture went all over the world. Countries grew up in Asia as Greek as Athens had ever been, having cities like her, filled with temples and theaters and statues, and famous for sculptors and painters and writers. In Egypt, far from Greece herself, was a city that was the very center of Greek learning and Greek influence. This was Alexandria, one of the towns which the great conqueror had founded. There were two great libraries here that at one time contained 700,000 books, all written by hand on rolls of papyrus. There was a famous museum " where scholars lived and worked together/' There was a group of buildings — a " temple of the Muses [the goddesses of learning and the arts], library, porticoes, dwellings, and ... a hall for the -meals, which were taken together. Its inmates were a community of scholars and poets, on whom the king be- stowed the honor and the privilege of being allowed to work at his expense, and with all imaginable assistance ready to hand." Many valuable things they found out through their study. The greatest geographers of ancient times worked there. They knew that the earth is a sphere, and they invented ways of measuring and mapping it. Eratosthe- nes figured out its circumference as 28,000 miles — not a very great mistake for the first worker. An astronomical 70 THE ANCIENT WORLD observatory was there ; men studied the stars and tried to find the size of the sun and the moon, and their dis- tances from the earth. Euclid, the greatest geometrician of ancient times, did his work there and wrote a geometry that is still used in some of our schools. What was found out in Alexandria was soon known all through the Mediterranean countries. 1 This was the effect of Alexander's conquests. He had Hellenized the ancient world. It was left for another nation to enlarge that world, to spread that culture through our Spain, France, Germany, England, and the rest of Europe. Greek Influence on Civilization The debt that we owe to the Greeks we can hardly state in words. We still read their poetry with joy, and many an English poet has some ancient Greek singer to thank for inspiration. Never a year passes, I suppose, that some one in America does not stage one of the old Greek plays. Some of the most precious things in the museums of Europe are the Greek statues that they have been able to get. People who love beautiful things travel for thousands of miles to see and enjoy them. Art students sketch them and model them in clay. Sculptors study them to learn the secrets of those earlier workers in marble and bronze. 1 There was a fault in the way the Greek scientist worked. If he saw some- thing that interested him — a falling star or a flash of lightning — he said, "I must make a theory about that." So, folding his hands and shutting his eyes, he thought long and earnestly and invented an explanation that seemed to him reasonable. A modern scientist, on the other hand, when he sees a thing he does not understand says, " I must investigate that." Then he begins to visit strange places, to collect many specimens, to tear things to pieces and to put them together, to use acids and machines and microscope and scales. Slowly he pieces his theory together as his investigations tell him this or that, and he is always ready to give it up if some new experiment proves it false. Our science is better than the Greek science, then, because people have been living and learning for 2000 years and at last have come to realize the great value of experiment. GREECE AND HER NEIGHBORS 71 The same thing happens with Greek buildings. Archi- tects measure their length and their width and their height, the proportion of their columns, the pitch of their roof. There lies on the Acropolis of Athens the broken capital of a column with a beautiful spiral carved upon it. In the center of the spiral is a little hole that has been worn by the dividers of visiting architects who have measured it to learn how it was made that it should be so beautiful. These men have gone home to draw, to ex- Copyright by J. F. Olsson and Company The Harvard University Stadium periment, to copy the curves, the proportions, and even the 'designs that they have found in Greek temples. If you look at the buildings about you, you may see here in America Greek columns or Greek pediments or Greek ornaments. On many of our athletic fields to-day you will see stadiums copied after the old Greek ones, and in them you will see young men playing games much as men played in ancient Greece. When we study grammar, we are studying ideas originated by the learned men of Alex- andria. In our science classes, where we investigate the actions of screws and lgvers and the weights of bodies 72 THE ANCIENT" WORLD and even electricity, we are studying subjects which the Greeks started for us. Half the books we read are full of „ Greek stories or fancies Greek Latin Russian German English . . 9r A or ideas. Great men, r> jj E *R B wno think about man's P q B (£ c ^ e an d how he ought to ^ D $ D act, get inspiration from E E g © E one or another of the z F }k J F Greek philosophers. H G 3 & G And I should think that H j £ H every time a mathema- 1 * k 2 tician measures triangles K T "^ © K anc ^ c ^ rc ^ es ano ^ cones, ^ M pt 2 L ever y time an astrono- M N O Wl M mer studies the move- N o II Sft N ments of the earth, every H P p £> time a sculptor lifts his Q T $ P chisel and mallet, every II R y D Q time an architect plans P S <|> m R a building or a poet 2 T n ? t ma kes a play, he must T H « U remember the Greeks, ^ z III ™ y the pioneers of learning. t? SB ■ W O ne other example Out * H j X of the many will show B 2) Y how the Greeks taught ^ 3 z us, how we have profited tq by the lesson, have H changed the matter a © little, and have half for- gotten that we did not always know it. Look at the Greek alphabet and then at ours. "How funny it is," you will say, "not at all like the English ! " Yet ours GREECE AND HER NEIGHBORS 73 is an imperfect copy of the Greek through the Roman. Some letters we have dropped, because the sounds that they represent do not occur in our language, and other letters we have simplified in form during our hundreds of years of use. It was the Romans who found the tribes of Europe without a written language and taught them their own letters. But theirs they had learned from the Greeks in that early time when the Greeks had gone colonizing into the West, as the Greeks had earlier learned theirs from the Phoenicians. So all the alphabets of Europe are children of one family. We must thank the Romans and their teachers, the Greeks, and the Phoenicians before them for that mar- velous power of looking on a page of little scratches and so hearing the words that men spoke hundreds of years ago and seeing the things that they did, and for that power of making records of the deeds and dis- coveries and thoughts of our own time that future gener- ations may profit by our work. 1. " Pretend that you are Athenians and hold a meeting to discuss whether you will send earth and water to the Persian king. 2. Make as long a list as you can of famous Greek men, statues, cities. 3. Look up the following words in a large dictionary and see what language they come from and what they meant in that language : alphabet, astron- omy, biography, Bible, chronology, geology, geometry, geography, history, poet, science, zoology. 4. You ean get for a penny apiece good pictures of Greek statues and temples and landscape from the Thompson Art Publication Company, Syracuse, N.Y. Make a collec- tion of pictures and mount them in a book. 5. Use the Greek alphabet to write a secret letter. Try to invent an alphabet unlike any that you ever saw. CHAPTER IV ROME GROWS STRONG Rome Conquers Italy In spite of their many colonies, the Greeks had civilized only the seacoast here and there. They had no love for the inland wilderness, with its dangers from wild beasts and from ambushes of hostile barbarians. The islands and shores of the Mediterranean made up their whole world. Herodotus had traveled much, was a careful observer, and had a very clear idea about geography ; yet he says, " Whether Europe is surrounded by water either towards the east or towards the north, has not been fully dis- covered by any man ; but in length it is known to extend beyond both the other continents." By "both the other continents" he means Asia and Africa, ..Now any school boy can look into his atlas and see that wise old Herodotus, the great traveler, was wrong; that Europe is not so large as either Asia or Greek Africa. But the men of that time knew only Ideas of . . ~ . . the World the northern part of Africa and the western part of Asia and could only guess about the rest. Herodotus even says, " Asia is inhabited as far as India ; but beyond this it is all desert towards the east, nor is any one able to describe what it is." We can see, there- fore, that China, one of the richest, most ancient, and most civilized countries of the earth, was unknown to the Greeks and their neighbors. Even the northern part of his own Europe Herodotus 74 ROME GROWS STRONG 75 did not know. After having told about a race of people who lived somewhere northeast of the Black Sea and who "are said to be bald from their birth," he says, "But beyond the bald men no one can speak with certainty; ITALY Italy in Relief for lofty and impassable mountains form their boundary, and no one has ever crossed them." All Siberia and Russia, you see, were quite unknown to travelers of Herodotus' time. This, then, was the Greek world: the shores of the Mediterranean and the wild, half-guessed outer border 7 6 THE ANCIENT WORLD full of things partly known and partly fancied. There was much left for explorers and civilizers to do. The next people to take up the work of civilizers were the Romans, that small tribe whom the Greek traders, 700 years before Christ, had found living as Favorable smi pi e farmers on the western plains of central of° Rome Italy. 1 In these early days the Romans were but one part of the Latin tribe, and Latins were but one of many tribes in Italy. Rome had about her only a small circle of land of perhaps a hundred square miles. But the city was fortunately located. It was on the Tiber River, up which the small seagoing ships of the time could row. Yet it was twelve miles from the seashore and therefore safe from the pirates, who were the pests of the coast towns. At this spot on the Tiber, moreover, was the only fordable place where the Etruscan traders from the North could cross into Roman territory to sell their goods. Rome was built on hills which overlooked the level plains around her. She could see her enemies ap- proaching and could have time to prepare against them. Her men, besides, were hearty and brave and loved their city with in- tense patriotism. They saw her surrounded by enemies. In the fertile plains north of her was Etruria, a nation of skillful artists and builders and sailors, eager to grow into a greater state with wider lands. To the south was the rich country of " Great Greece," with its beautiful 1 See also page 12. Rome and Her Hills ROME GROWS STRONG 77 cities and busy workshops and its boats coming and going. In the hills to the east were barbarous, warlike tribes who swooped down upon Rome like robber bands. All about her were other Latin cities, all hoping to grow great at the expense of their neighbors. In the early days hardly a year passed that the Romans did not have to fight for their lives. If Rome was to live, she needed to make herself stronger than her neighbors and to subdue them. So the Romans raised their arms against first one Latin city and then another, and compelled them all to bow to Rome. Then trouble began with Etruria, the foreign neighbor to the north. *®°J" There were years of warfare, until at last she f Italy was conquered. Rome next turned her hand against the other tribes of Italy. Sometimes she was beaten in bloody battles, but in general she won and kept adding new lands to her territory. As she worked southward in her conquests, Rome met the rich cities of Magna Grsecia. They felt that they could not allow this new barbarian power, as they called it, to grow too great. They took * ?T 275 the side of Rome's enemies, and even invited a warrior prince of Greece over into Italy to help them. Rome patiently fought with him and lost, and filled up her ranks with new men and fought again, waiting until his army should be worn out in this hostile land. After five years it was done ; and the prince fled back to Greece. Soon all of southern Italy was in the hands of Rome, ami by 266 b.c. she was mistress of all the land from the Arno River to the southern tip of the country — a great terri- tory 500 miles long. Roman Life What sort of people were these victorious Romans, these masters of Italy? Suppose that by some magic 7 8 THE ANCIENT WORLD you could be transported back to the year 200 B.C., carried for thousands of miles across the ocean, and set down in ancient Athens and then in ancient Rome. The two cities would seem to you much alike. In both you would see hills and a stone wall stretching about them. In both, low, flat-roofed houses would be packed close along crooked streets, with no room for A Court in a Roman House lawns or parks. In Rome and Athens alike you would see a market-place lying among hills, with public build- ings and statues of heroes and gods standing around it. In each market-place you would find men gathered for some public meeting. Both peoples would be in strange garments much alike — the common men in short chitons leaving neck, arms, and legs bare; the gentlemen with trailing, shawl-like cloaks wrapped around their bodies. Both peoples would be speaking a language strange to you. ROME GROWS STRONG 79 You would find the heart and the head of the city of Rome to be this market-place, or " Forum." You could walk the length of it in ten minutes, yet it was one of the most famous and most important places in the world. Every spot of ground here was made holy by old events and story. On the hills that surrounded it had been the little villages that had later grown into great Rome. For more generations than men know, the ances- tors of the Romans had been busy in this little marshy valley lying below the hills. Women had drawn water at the springs there. Men had met in the open space to consult upon laws or to prepare for war. There had been the market for buying and selling. Here the king had had his house. Romulus, the founder of Rome and the first of her kings, lay buried here, men said. Temple after temple had been built, and smoke and song con- tinually rose from them to the gods. As you walked the Forum, layer upon layer of older pavements and of older buildings would lie buried under your feet, and every spot would seem too old and too sacred to be trodden upon. Yet men would be hurrying about here on all sorts of business. A young nobleman with a crowd of friends and slaves surrounding him would be walking before the goldsmith shops that bordered the road on the southern side. A sick man in a curtained litter would be carried past you to drink the waters of the fountain of Juturna and to lie in a little room, waiting for the god of healing to visit him. You might, perhaps, stand with a great crowd before the rdstrum, or speaker's platform, and hear an orator speak to the people concerning a new law. You would see a man carrying some gift enter a temple, hoping to win the gods' help in a voyage he was about to make, 80 THE ANCIENT WORLD Romans Going to Make Sacrifice This and the next picture are of reliefs carved on a Roman altar. All of the men but one are wearing the shawl-like toga over the tunic Along the north side of the Forum you would find a street lined with butchers' booths and fish stalls, where gentlemen with hosts of friends and slaves would be buy- ing meat for the evening's banquet. Business and re- ligion and politics went hand in hand in the Roman Forum. Just as every family had a house and a hearth with a fire ever burning on it, so the great family of Rome had a house and a hearth and a hearth fire. The little round temple of Vesta, the home goddess, stood in the Forum. In it on an altar burned the sacred fire of the city, started afresh by the high priest every New Year's Day, and burning to the year's end. Six noble maidens of Rome were chosen to guard it. They were called Vestal Virgins, and they gave up their lives to being the daughters of Rome, guardians of her fire, mistresses of her house, makers of her holy bread, per- formers of her sacrifices, keepers of her most precious relics. Close to the temple of Vesta was the house where lived ROME GROWS STRONG 8r Romans Going to Make Sacrifice the high priest, the head of the Roman religion. Here were the sacred dishes and tools with which the priests offered wine and cakes to the gods or killed animals in their honor. Here were the holy books which described what men should do and say at the sacred festivals. Here were kept, too, the lists of officers elected year after year and the stone tablets of the calendar which set the holy days. Above an altar in this house, also hung two spears of Mars, the god of war and the favorite god of Rome. Whenever these two spears clattered together, it was an ill omen for Rome, and sacrifice had to be made to the displeased god. The gods were stern and severe and difficult to please. They demanded from men frequent sacrifice and prayer and strict obedience. They would not lend their aid unless men observed all the ceremonies that did them honor. So a Roman's life was full of religious rites — praying, pouring libations of wine, burn- ing holy cakes, and making gifts to the gods. Such things he did when he rose in the morning, before he ate a meal, 82 THE ANCIENT WORLD when he returned home from a journey, when he was beginning a piece of business, when the lands were plowed and the seed sown and the harvest reaped, when he was ill, when he recovered, when a child was born, when a member of his family died. In the same way Rome, the state, had to deal with the gods. Her newly elected officers sacrificed to them. The meetings of the people were opened with sacrifice. Before war was declared, sacrifice was made, and again when victory was gained. If ill fortune happened to Rome, it was because the gods were in some way dis- pleased, and gifts were made to them to soothe their anger. The first fruits of the harvest were given to the Vestals, who sacrificed them as a thank-offering from the whole state. For every god annual festivals were held ; and every five years the whole people with priests and officers, with song and sprinkled water and great pomp, walked in procession about the city and purified it, in order that it might be pleasing to the gods. After sacrifice had been offered, it was always neces- sary to know whether the gods had accepted it and would be kind. But it was difficult to know their will, and only men of the priestly colleges, trained for years in the science of reading signs and in the rituals of religion, could know the attitude of the gods. So always in matters of war or state an augur was consulted. He studied the color of the flame or the drifting of the smoke or the movement of the burning meat, or he watched for birds flying above or a sound from round about. In such signs he could read the pleasure or the displeasure of the gods and could advise whether to go on with the thing planned or to wait and perform further sacrifice. So the Romans seemed to walk continually under the frown of the gods, always trying to win their smiles. A Roman Woman Sacrificing [83] 84 THE ANCIENT WORLD Rome had begun her history under kings, but she grew dissatisfied with them, expelled them, and set up a republic. That is a government by which the Govern- people rule themselves through officers whom 509 (?) b.c. tne y e l ec t> as we do in the United States. The chief officer the Romans called, not president, but consul, and they chose two, one to check the other, lest one might try to make himself king. These consuls were elected by an assembly of the people, meeting in an open field, much like the assembly of Athens. There was a senate of three hundred members, whose business it was to advise the consuls and to help the assembly make laws. The republic was not perfect, and very soon people began to find fault with it and to try to improve it. There were always two classes in Rome : the patrician and the plebeian, that is, the noble and the common. When Rome first became a republic, only the patricians had privileges. The plebeians might not hold any office, did not have a fair chance to vote, might not marry a patrician, did not know what the laws were, and were in many ways ill treated by the patricians. But the plebeians grew richer, stronger, and better educated, and they would not endure being thus shut out. So after a struggle of two hundred years and more they gained equal rights with the patricians. In the senate sat rich commoners beside the patrician descendants of noble families that could trace their lineage back to the time when Rome had been a farming village. Below these men of wealth or blood was a great mass of commoners, poor, but with the right to vote and to hold office. From the first the Roman army had been the great pride and strength of the people. Every citizen between the ages of eighteen and sixty years owed military serv- A Roman Sacrifice before a Temple In the center stands a Roman emperor about to make the sacrifice. An assist- ant holds the ax that is to slay the bull. Behind him a man carries one of the holy dishes, and so does a boy standing next to the emperor. Another boy is playing the flute. The three-legged table in the center serves as altar [85 1 86 THE ANCIENT WORLD ice. No man received pay for this service ; it was his duty to the state. These citizen-soldiers were welded into close brotherhood. Neighbor touched el- £ he bow with neighbor when he stood in the Forum Army to vo ^ e or m the ^ e ^ to fight. Together these warrior citizens trained and exercised just out- side of Rome on the field of Mars. By such organi- zation and practice, a strong, patriotic, closely knit army had grown up in Rome and had made her supreme in Italy. No wonder that these Romans were a proud people! They had seen Rome grow from a village 2 to be the owner of a great state. They saw their city still growing larger and richer. In every war of their history they had won, sooner or later. They felt themselves brave and honest. They looked back with respect upon their ancestors and looked forward with hope. They did much to encourage this pride among the people. When a famous man died, he had a public funeral. His body was placed upon the rostrum in the Forum where all the people could see, and a relative made an oration, 'telling of his deeds. A mask oman Q £ wax wag cag ^. ^ Q j ^ jy^ j^ f ace an( j ^ Pride was set up in his house to remind his children of their great and good father. Some families had many such masks of their great ancestors, and they were proud of them. At the funeral of any of their house, men wore these masks and walked in the procession as if to say, " Behold how many good Romans there have been : let us be worthy of them." For much the same purpose a victorious general was allowed a "triumph." He and his army gathered outside the city wall on the field of Mars, the training ground of *See also page 76. ROME GROWS STRONG 87 Rome. From there started a procession headed by the senate and officers of the city. Trumpeters followed, blowing warlike notes and calling the attention of the world. Then came the spoils that had been taken from the enemy — armor on wagons, perhaps a statue or a crown or a throne, a chariot in which a king or general of the foe had ridden. There were tableaux on floats representing the nation that had been defeated or a river that had been crossed or a mountain that had been won. Then came cattle for the sacrifice, horns gilded and wreathed with garlands. After them in chains sadly walked captives taken in battle. Behind them four horses drew the chariot in which stood the victorious general, dressed in a purple robe embroidered with golden palm leaves. He carried in his right hand a branch of laurel, symbol of victory, and in his left an ivory scepter with an eagle at its end, symbol of power. A slave held a golden crown above his head, yet whispered in his ear that after all he must not forget that he was only a man. Behind the victor followed the army that had helped him to gain his victory, and the soldiers sang and shouted. The city streets through which the procession wound were decked with garlands, and every flat roof and door- way and open space was crowded with people, shouting and throwing flowers. The procession climbed the Capitol Hill, where the temple of Jupiter stood. The victor laid his laurel branch in the lap of the god and sacrificed the cattle in thanksgiving. People went home thinking of Rome's army and the courage of her men, many a boy hoping that some day he might ride in that glorious chariot and hear the applause of the people. Every Roman mother believed it her duty to tell her sons stories of the old Romans who had made Rome. 88 THE ANCIENT WORLD She told of brave Horatius and his two friends, who alone kept back a mighty Etruscan army, while the Romans hewed down the bridge over which the A Few of enem y had thought to march into Rome. And of Rome when it fell crashing, Horatius, needing no longer to fight, leaped into the river, and in spite of weariness and wounds, in spite of the enemy on the bank, swam in safety to Rome. "Let nothing make you afraid in the cause of Rome," mothers would say to their sons. "Let nothing shake your determination, just as nothing could daunt the noble youth, Caius Mucius. He had tried to kill the king of Etruria, for Etruria was at war with Rome and would have put a king over her once more. When Mucius was caught, carrying the very dagger with which he had meant to kill the king, he would tell no Roman secrets. The king thought to frighten him and had fires built all about him, threatening to push them closer if the young man did not tell his secret. 'Behold me/ cried Mucius, ' that you may see of how little account the body is to those who have great glory in view.' Then he thrust his right hand into the fire and held it there until it was burned off. 'There are three hundred young men like me waiting to kill you if I fail,' he said. Even that cruel king admired such courage and such devotion to country, and he set the young man free." Such stories, heard at his mother's knee and shown by statue or carving in the public places, bred bravery and patriotism in the Roman boy. Daily, also, he went with his father to the field of Mars beside the river to see the young men run, leap, box, and wrestle, throw the spear, and ride spirited horses. Soon he, too, entered into these sports and was trained for vigorous, fearless man- hood. ROME GROWS STRONG 89 1. What differences are there between the shores of Greece and those of Italy? 2. What do people mean when they say that Italy turns her back on the East? 3. Quickly sketch the chief mountain ranges of Greece and those of Italy. What differences do you see? 4. Model Rome and the surrounding country in sand. 5. Compare the pictures of Greek costume (pages 35, 41, 46, 47) with the Roman (pages 80, 81, 83, 85). 6. The Roman house pictured on page 78 was much like the Greek house described on pages 40 and 42. To what kind of climate does this sort of house seem well fitted? In such a climate should you rather live in it than in our type of house? 7. What qualities of character did the Romans admire most strongly? How can you tell? 8. What hero stories do Americans tell their children to show them the goodness and worthiness of their country? 9. Write a dialogue that two young Romans walking in the Forum might have had concerning the greatness of Rome, their love for her, their religion. CHAPTER V ROME CONQUERS THE WORLD How Rome Conquered Carthage Another great city was jealously watching Rome's growth. This was Carthage, an old colony of Phoenicia on the shore of Africa. She was not a mere city; she had her line of colonies running like a chain around the western end of the Mediterranean. The coasts of Africa and of Spain were hers, the shores of Sardinia and of Sicily, and many small islands besides. While Rome had been making herself mistress of Italy, Carthage had been making herself mistress of the sea. For besides her lands, she had great fleets of ships, thousands of slaves to row them, and plenty of money to hire sailors and soldiers. She boasted that a Roman could not wash his hands in the sea without asking leave of her. Her ships were known in every Mediterranean port, and they carried a thousand precious things for sale. She wanted to keep the monopoly of this trade, but more and more Roman traders were invading her business territory. The new Roman borders, moreover, were now not far from the Carthaginian colonies of Sicily. So Carthage Rome and De S an to look with great suspicion upon Rome. Carthage At the same time the Romans were looking Become enviously upon Carthage. The rich Romans Enemies wan ted new lands for farming, the manufac- turers wanted new customers for their goods, the traders wanted more room for commerce, the state thought that 9a ROME CONQUERS THE WORLD 91 Carthage in Sicily was too close a neighbor to her southern shore. So the two states sat facing each other across the water, with Sicily like a stepping stone between them. Only two years after Rome had made herself mistress of Italy, the trouble with Carthage i 6 i" 241 began over a quarrel which started in Sicily. There followed a twenty-three years ' war. Rome began it on land. There she could defeat Carthaginian armies and take Carthaginian land. But of what use was that, A Trireme The sculptor of the relief has shortened the ship and left out most of the rowers and all the fighting men. Yet we can see the bronze beak for ramming, the pilot's oars in place of the rudder, and the three banks of oars, though they are too crowded when the Carthaginian fleet worried the coast, burned the sea towns, captured grain ships and boat-loads of soldiers ? "We must have a fleet," said Rome, "and the ships must be like the big new galleys of Carthage, not like the little old-fashioned boats that we have had." The gods seemed to help them, for a big Carthaginian warship was 9 2 THE ANCIENT WORLD wrecked upon the Italian coast. This the Romans copied. It had, besides a big sail, 300 long oars arranged in five banks, one above another. A sharp iron beak, with a great tooth at each side, thrust itself out at the bow, and when the 300 rowers pulled their best, the heavy ship bit into the enemy's ship and tore it open as a vulture tears its prey. High on the mast was a crow's nest and in the bow a walled forecastle, where men could fight. In sixty days Rome built 120 ships of this sort. With her new fleet she met the enemy and won a great victory. Four times during the war her fleets were de- B JJ stroyed in storm or battle and four times rebuilt. One of her armies was wiped out in fight and another drowned in a storm. A sixth of all the fighting men of Rome were killed, and yet fresh troops were always ready at need. Such dogged courage could but win. The Car- thaginians asked for peace and gave up Sicily to their con- querors. The Romans had stepped outside of Italy. But proud Carthage was not content. For twenty- three years she kept the peace, yet she was using the time to prepare punishment for Rome. A Carthaginian patriot, Hamilcar, a statesman and a warrior, built up a nation in Spain among its half -civilized people. There he gathered and trained an army, opened silver mines that should be able to pay that army, planted towns that might furnish it supplies, built a port that should protect a fleet; and all the time his eyes were on Rome. He died before the two countries came to the grip again. Yet he had trained up a son greater than himself, and as much an enemy of Rome. That son, Hannibal, had grown up in the soldiers' camp ; and there was not a muscle in his body but was firm and untiring, not a nerve but was quick and steady, not a thought but was patriotic. He loved Carthage, and ROME CONQUERS THE WORLD 93 he hated Rome. This man, when he was thirty years old, took up the army that his father had made and the war that his father had planned, ^"^f Part of his soldiers he left to protect Spain, 20I * BC part he sent to guard Carthage and the coast of Africa, but the great mass he led straight into Italy. The stippled territory belonged to Rome ; the hatched area to Carthage It was a march of 500 miles from Spain. There were rivers to cross, hostile tribes to win a way through, and a rugged wall of snow-topped mountains to pass. For more than two weeks the armies climbed the steep mountain trail. Sometimes the men and baggage-mules slipped from the narrow, snow-covered paths and plunged over the precipice. The mountain tribes hid behind rocks and worried the army and killed the stragglers. The men suffered from cold and from hunger, for food was difficult to find here on barren mountains. Hannibal started from Spain with an army of 50,000 fresh soldiers ; he trailed down from the fierce Alps into 94 THE ANCIENT WORLD Italy with 26,000 men, hungry, tired, and discouraged. The mountains had done their best to protect Italy. With that small army, however, he met the Romans and defeated them. For seventeen years he led his troops about in Italy, feeding them on Italian crops, living in Italian towns, every moment on guard, proving himself one of the greatest generals of the world. But it was one man against a nation. Hannibal could win battles, but he could not win friends. He had hoped that those Latins and Italians whom Rome had con- quered, 1 and whom she held so much against their will, would welcome him and would turn against their old enemy. But most of them stood fast for Rome against the foreigner. During that long war 300,000 men of Italy fell in battle. In the single fight of Cannae 70,000 were left dead on the field. More than half of the senators of Rome died in that battle, and one seventh of all the men of Italy who were of age to fight. But immediately the Roman ranks were filled again. There was no sacrifice that the people would not make. For many years every man in Italy of fighting age was in the army. Farms lay abandoned, or a few fields were worked by old men and boys and by women and girls. Rome's public money was soon spent. When she needed a new navy, wealthy Romans gave money from their own purses to build it. Contractors, who had been doing Rome's work of various kinds for many years, refused now to take pay but gave their services to their country. So with patient courage and self-sacrifice Italy fed men and money into this hungry war. She even sent an extra army into Sicily to hold it, and another into Spain to take it away from Carthage. * ^ee also page 77. ROME CONQUERS THE WORLD 95 Hannibal had no such patriotism to help him. Car- thage across the sea was untouched and safe. To be sure, she was proud of her brilliant general, who was winning battles off there in Italy, and yet she was jealous, too. She was stingy, moreover, and unwilling to spare him more men and money. "Let him shift for himself," she seemed to say. Rome and Carthage At the end of the Second Punic War The stippled territory belonged to Rome ; the hatched area to Carthage But an army cannot live in an enemy's country without help from home. So gradually the Romans closed about Hannibal and shut him up in the southern end of Italy. At last they sent an army into Africa and threatened Carthage herself. Then the proud city sent for its great general to come home. Hannibal and his army left Italy, landed in Africa, met the Romans, and were defeated. Carthage again asked for peace. At the end of the first Carthaginian, or Punic, war Rome had got Sicily, and a year or two later she had seized Sardinia and Corsica. Now she took also Hamil- 96 THE ANCIENT WORLD car's Spain, or rather the nearer shores of it, for the in- land part was still savage and independent. Carthage gave up her ships and her war elephants. She promised to pay a large sum of money to Rome and to make no war without Rome's consent. But Carthage seemed to thrive on defeat. Fifty years after Hannibal's war she was as prosperous as ever. Rome felt it an insult for her beaten enemy to be larger and richer than herself, with more ships and a fuller harbor and a busier market. In jealousy and hatred men began to say, " Carthage must be de- stroyed." Soon Rome found an excuse for war. The Carthagin- ians were desperate with fear and patriotism, and they held out for three years against the hated i S De- Romans. But at last their strong walls fell, stroyed, their rich city was burned, their people were 149-146 captured and sold as slaves. A Roman general ran a plow over the ground where Carthage had stood, as if to say: a We have swept our enemy from the face of the earth. Men's feet shall never again tread her streets. Her rnafket-place" has become a grain-field. Cursed be he who shall try to rebuild her!" By this cruel war Rome gained whatever land was left Rome t° Carthage on the shores of Africa. A new Mistress empire — Italy, Sicily, Spain, Africa, and the of the West islands of the sea — had grown up in the West, and Rome was mistress of it. Rome's Conquest of the East In Chapter III we left the East united for a few years under the arms of a great general, Alexander. But it was like caging lions and horses together ; they could not ROME CONQUERS THE WORLD 97 learn one another's ways and live in peace. Alexander, like a master trainer, could hold them in check, but he died before he had taught them to live in unity, and before he had taught his generals how to rule the great empire he had made. Even as the beloved conqueror's body lay on the bier waiting to be buried, his generals fell to quarreling over who should be ruler in his place. After a few years it all ended in the splitting of the empire into three great kingdoms — Macedon, Syria, and Egypt. On the fringes of these great countries little states were always cropping up, swelling into importance under one king and sinking into littleness again under the next. Greece herself was, as usual, divided and in turmoil. Some cities quietly accepted the rule of Mace- don, others struggled bravely against it. All these changes in the East had happened behind Rome's back, while she had been conquering Italy. She had hardly known of the events ]? ome and had been little interested. Indeed, the Eastward West and the East seemed like two different worlds. Yet some of the Western peoples had friends or enemies in the East. A Greek prince had fought against Rome on behalf .of the Italian Greeks ; and during Han- nibal's war the king of Macedon had helped the Car- thaginians. Moreover, pirates from the coast north of Greece had often troubled Rome. So after her wars in Italy were over, and after she had won the first glorious Punic war, Rome, thus pricked in the back, at last faced about and cast her eyes on the East, full of its jealousies and wars. The first step she took was to punish the pirates and take a few of their cities for her own. Her next step landed her in Macedon. There were three wars here many years gS THE ANCIENT WORLD apart, as there had been with Carthage, and they ended as the Punic wars had ended, in victory for g 1 ^ -107 Rome. Corinth, the "eye of Greece," as she was called, was destroyed as Carthage was destroyed, and Roman governors ruled over the land of Alexander, and over the cities of Pericles and of Leonidas. But the defeated Greeks called upon a great king of Syria, himself a Macedonian, to help them. The Romans beat him at old Thermopylae, chased him Mistress across the sea, and defeated him again in Asia, of the Rome's third step had taken her far into the East, 66-63 old world, more than a thousand miles from B.C. , home. One after another, in the years to come, the countries of western Asia fell into Roman hands. Pompey, the Roman general who did most in these wars, boasted that he had conquered twenty-two kings and twelve million people. By the year 60 b.c. Rome had won most of Alexander's old empire. It was the great general, Pompey, too, who, just before his conquest of the East, made Rome mistress of the sea by putting an end to the pirates. Rome had already punished those of the Adriatic, 1 but those of the East still flourished. For years the Mediterranean had been infested with them. In the eastern seas alone there had been a thousand pirate ships. These men had been daring beyond belief. One pirate chief had sailed into the harbor of the great city of Syracuse in Sicily, had captured it, made it his headquarters, and sent raiders hither and thither through the rich island under the very nose of the Roman governor. Once the pirate fleet had met the Roman ships in the harbor of Ostia, only 1 See page 97. ROME CONQUERS THE WORLD 99 twelve miles from Rome, and had defeated them. Certain islands and coast cities had paid a yearly tribute of gold to the pirates and so had bought their protection against themselves. There had been pirate towns on the sea- coasts of the East where the men had lived between raids and where they had kept their families and their precious stores. A merchant, when he sent out a rich cargo by ship, had not known whether it would reach its own port or some pirate hold. Finally Rome sent Pompey to clean out these nests of pirates. He did it thoroughly. Inside of three months 1300 pirate ships were destroyed, 10,000 pirates Rome killed, and 20,000 captured. Their strong- Mistress holds were burned, their prisoners set free, of the Sea, their stores taken and distributed among 7 BC * the Roman soldiers or turned over to the Roman treasury. After that, merchant ships could go safely to and fro carrying things of all sorts from end to end of the world. Caesar's War in Gaul, 58-50 B.C. Meantime the empire was still further growing in the West. The story of this conquest is very different from that of the conquest of the East. The western war was with barbarians, brave and hardy. ^ ome Rome got from it, not treasures of gold and f the West jewelry, but great stretches of wild forest. Here the Romans became, not learners, as they were in the East, but teachers. Julius Caesar's conquest of Gaul shows better than any other war the condition of the peoples of western Europe. It shows, too, what the Roman army at its best could do. For eight years Caesar marched hither and thither through Gaul. He played a great game, moving his army about IOO THE ANCIENT WORLD so quickly that he was always appearing unexpectedly at just the wrong minute for his enemy. He was always surprising them — fording a swift river that was up to the shoulders ; pretending to retreat and then suddenly facing about ; marching fifty miles in one day and night ; digging out a road through six feet of snow ; rebuilding a bridge on ruined piles that the enemy had left. The Dying Gaul The Gauls were a good match for the Romans. They had towns protected with well-built walls of stones and timber. They were brilliant horsemen. They had swords as long as spears (so a certain Roman said) and spearheads as long as swords. They were strong of body and fierce of look. Their helmets were decorated with threatening horns or frightful animal heads. They ran into battle with fearful shouts. Caesar himself, who wrote his own story of his Gallic war, gives many examples of their bravery. He says of the Gauls in a certain battle, "But the enemy, even in the last hope of safety, showed such great courage that when the foremost of them had fallen, the next stood ROME CONQUERS THE WORLD ioi upon them prostrate and fought from, their bodies.; when these were overthrown, and their corpses heaped ap to- gether, those who survived cast their weapons against our men as from a mound." Yet in spite of their courage and their numbers, Caesar completely conquered the whole nation of the Gauls and made the country a Roman province/ Why was it possible for him to do it? Partly because the Gauls had no idea of standing together. A half-civilized people never seems to know the meaning of unity. So here in Gaul tribe was jealous of tribe, leaders were jealous of one another, men were suspicious of their chiefs. When one tribe was making a brave fight, the others, instead of rushing to their aid and wiping the Romans out by their united strength, stood by and watched. Another aid to the Romans was the fact that during their centuries of warfare they had invented many strange and clever engines. The Gauls, shutting ^ on J an themselves now and then inside one of their ofWar fenced towns and stationing their brave guards on the wall, thought themselves safe. But Csesar im- mediately began to build a dozen things. There was no gunpowder then, but the Greeks or Romans had invented a fair substitute. Perhaps you have put a stick between the strands of a double string and twisted it around and around. If you then held the string tightly stretched and let the stick go, the string untwisted with a great whirr, the stick flew around, and the stroke from it was very unpleasant. The Romans used this idea. But instead of a string they used many strands of rope, and their stick was very thick and heavy. They mounted the rope in a strong frame and invented ways of twisting it tight, of holding it firmly, and of letting it go suddenly. In front of the whirring stick IG2 THE ANCIENT WORLD they put stones or balls of lead or stout arrows. One of these catapults could shoot an arrow a thousand feet and drive it into a board for two inches. Another Roman machine was a battering ram for beating down stone walls. It was a heavy timber swung A Movable Tower A modern drawing. Tracks were built on which to move the tower. Notice the rollers under it. A bridge has been let down across the enemy's ditch. You cannot see the wall of the besieged place. The men are running toward it in loops of rope and mounted on wheels. Men ran with it against the walls, beating again and again at the same spot. Still more wonderful was the movable tower. It was eighty or ninety feet high.. The soldiers built it at some distance from the town, where they were safe. Then they got inside at the bottom of it and pushed it forward on its rollers close to the enemy's wall. When ROME CONQUERS THE WORLD 103 it was near enough, they ran up the inside stairways to the top and began shooting arrows and throwing stones down upon the guard on the city wall. Besides, they dropped a swinging bridge from the tower top upon the wall and rushed over it and into the town. At other times they dug mines. They put down a shaft in some safe place in their own camp. From the bottom of this they tunneled along under the ground and under the wall. Then they dug a shaft upward to end in the town. Some dark night, when the Gauls were unsuspecting, a troop of besiegers, with swords ready, crawled through the tunnel, dug away the last layers of earth, and came out into the city. Generally only a few men entered in this way, stole to the gate, killed the guards, opened the doors, and signaled to the waiting army outside to enter. Or sometimes the Romans built a great mound of earth against the outside of the wall. From this they could shoot 'down into the town and later charge along it and leap into the city. There were scaling ladders, too, which the soldiers set against the wall and by which they tried to climb up and over. To be sure, while the Romans outside were using these engines and doing this building and digging, the Gauls were throwing lighted torches or burning arrows at their engines, and rocks and melted lead and hot water at the soldiers. So the Romans had planned ways of protect- ing themselves. They made sheds of stout beams and put them on rollers. Men stood in them and pushed them about to guard themselves as they worked the bat- tering ram or dug mines or carried earth for the mound. Besides, the soldiers were trained to make a movable shed out of their own oblong wooden shields. To do this they marched shoulder to shoulder and in perfect time. fi04] ROME CONQUERS THE WORLD 105 Each man held his long shield over his head with its edge tight against his neighbor's shield. Sometimes several ranks, one behind another, formed this tortoise, as they called it. It must have been a strange sight, this tight roof of bright shields with marching legs below it. Better, however, than any siege engines were the soldiers themselves. Citizens of wealth no longer wished to undergo the discomforts of war as they had done in the time of the struggle against Carthage 1 ; consequently the fighting fell to poorer men who had no taste for luxury. They could not afford to give their services free of pay as in the old days. Now, moreover, armies could not return home for the autumn £ he harvest and the spring planting, as had been Army done in the days of the forefathers. They were needed all the year and every year in far distant lands. Many of the poorer class, therefore, made a business of war and hired themselves out year after year. Rome's citizen army had given place to a professional one. In Caesar's army there were a few slingers from Crete, a great island near Greece. They shot stones or lead balls from a sling, about as boys do in our day. There was also a little band of archers from the Balearic Islands near Italy. There was a small troop of cavalry, made up of Spaniards and Germans and the conquered Gauls. But these were not the important members of the army. The larger part of it was the Roman legionaries, citizens from Rome and the rest of Italy. They were farmers and shepherds, carpenters, blacksmiths, and shopkeepers who had decided that they would like to get a soldier's pay and a soldier's experience. Some of them were new recruits, others had been in the army for ten or fifteen years and were wise in the game of war. 1 See also page 84. io6 THE ANCIENT WORLD There were five or six thousand soldiers in each legion, and Caesar had six or eight legions in his whole army, besides the slingers and archers and horsemen — in all about fifty thousand men. This army on the march made a line perhaps three miles long ; for besides the soldiers A Roman War Scene In the background is a walled town which the army is to besiege. The sol- diers are disembarking from boats and carrying the baggage ashore. Some already landed are setting out for battle. Four of them are Germans. In the center is the emperor with his staff. Soldiers are holding the officers' horses. Notice helmets on seven heads were pack mules carrying the baggage — tents and tent stakes, picks, shovels, hammers, carpenters' tools, black- smiths' tools, and provisions. It must have been an interesting-looking procession. The slingers wore no armor, but only the Greek costume of short tunic and flying short cape of bright color. The legionary wore, over his shoulders and around his body, armor of shining bronze or of stiff leather. Below this ROME CONQUERS THE WORLD 107 dropped the skirt of a colored tunic, but legs and arms were bare. If the day was cool, he had a bright cape thrown about his shoulders. He wore on his head or carried slung before him a bright bronze helmet, and some of the officers had waving plumes of horsehair atop. Over his shoulders every man carried a forked stick — his mule, he called it — with a blanket, a cup, a pan, and a week's supply of food strapped to it. Perhaps the burden weighed forty or fifty pounds. A large rectan- gular shield hung at his back with its dull cloth cover to protect the bronze figures and painted colors that made it gay. His spears, perhaps, with their heavy bronze points, were in a baggage wagon behind him, but his broad short sword, with two sharp edges, hung at his right side, where his fighting hand could quickly grasp it. All along the line above the heads of the men swayed their precious standards. Before each legion went a silver eagle with its proud S.P.Q.R., standing for Senatus Populusque Romanus, — " Senate and Roman People." Fastened to the pole were often silver medals, that the legion had won for bravery in some battle. And before each cohort, or smaller division of the legion, went its own standard, perhaps a wreath or a wolf or a hand. The Roman soldier felt all the love for his silver standard that our soldiers feel for the flag. It went into battle before him, and it was bitter dishonor for it to be captured. It was every man's proud hope to see the eagle of his own legion and the standard of his own cohort mount the wall first or push farthest into the enemy's ranks. From sunrise till noon the army marched, covering perhaps twelve or fifteen miles. Then they halted and made camp . This was no small task, •£ Roma ? for a Roman camp was a fortified town, built in a few hours. The tents stood in rows along straight [io«] ROME CONQUERS THE WORLD 109 lanes. The general's pavilion, with the altar before it, stood in the heart of the camp where the two main streets crossed each other. Beside it on one hand was a forum or meeting place, on the other hand a space for cooking and eating. About the whole camp went a wall of earth six or seven feet high with a ditch before it and gates at the four places where the streets cut through. Every man had his own share of the work. Certain officers went ahead of the marching army and chose some gentle hillside and laid off the lines of the camp. When the army arrived, some men unpacked the tents and began pitching them. Others with picks and shovels began the ditch, piling up the dirt to make the wall. When it was finished that strong camp was well guarded. Soldiers constantly patrolled the wall, guards were at the gates, sentinels stood before the tents of the officers, a trumpeter was always ready at the general's door to give signals. The secret watchword for the night was given without even a whisper, for it went about from hand to hand written on a wax tablet. With all these precautions it was almost impossible to surprise a Roman camp. The soldiers rested there in comfort and safety. After victory or defeat they came back to it as to a home. For even during a battle a few cohorts were always left to guard it. Men who could build such a camp could do more than fight. It was marvelous how many things Caesar's sol- diers could do. They could lay up stone walls, build bridges, make boats, construct catapults and moving towers, — and that in an enemy's country and often in the wilderness where they had to begin with the living tree. Besides being skillful with tools, they were well trained to Use sword and spear, to climb walls, to follow commands quickly and quietly and with strict obedience. Moreover, they were always in prime physical condi- HO THE ANCIENT WORLD tion. Caesar was most careful about collecting provi- sions, and very rarely did it happen that they ran short. The half day in camp was a blessing. It gave the men time to eat comfortably, to make repairs in clothes and tools, to dress wounds. In consequence, the soldiers were well and strong, and when it was necessary could endure hardship — could march all night in the snow, swim rivers, eat short rations. It was armies like this that had made Rome the mistress of the world. Conquest Changes the Romans This Rome of Caesar's time, the world-ruler, was much changed from the Rome of earlier times. Romans were more cultivated than they had been in the old Romans days. When the doors of Greece were opened Heiienized ^° them, the wealthy ones flocked there to visit this land of learning and of art, and the poor who had to stay at home listened hungrily to the tales that the travelers brought back, and eagerly adopted the new fashions that came from Greece. Those who could afford it bought Greek cloth, Greek furniture, Greek statues, Greek vases, Greek jewelry that merchants im- ported. Greek artists and builders and silversmiths and potters were welcomed into Rome. Greek teachers of poetry and music and oratory had crowded classes. Roman poets imitated Greek poems and plays. Roman gentlemen bought learned Greek slaves to teach their children and to be their own secretaries. With her sword Rome had unlocked the museum, the studio, the library, the university of the world, and now she was making use of what she found there. With the conquest of Asia the fine old Roman ways ol living began to disappear. The conquerors were not willing to stand by and gaze at the wealth of those ROME CONQUERS THE WORLD in lands they owned. Pompey, at the end of his war in Asia, 1 distributed twenty million dollars among his soldiers, and, besides that, brought home ^^ast ten million dollars and gave it to Rome. In his triumphal procession there were two-horse car- riages laden with gold or with ornaments, also the couch of one king and the throne and scepter of another, and the image of Pompey ten feet high made of solid gold. There were, too, vessels of gold and precious stones, three golden statues, thirty-three crowns adorned with pearls, a pearl-decked altar, and an image of Pompey himself made all in pearls. And these were only a few of the wonders of that triumphal procession. It was a rich land from which one general could col- lect so much spoil. Romans were glad to go as soldiers or officers or merchants to such a country, hop- ing to return laden with wealth. Thus Rome Ro ° mans got a taste for luxury. Her women became fond of jewels, her men loved expensive banquets in ten or twelve courses with strange foods from distant parts of the world. Her houses were hung with expensive Eastern tapestry and rugs. The rooms were made sweet with burning perfumes from the East. Dozens of slaves filled the houses of the wealthy and followed their masters on the street. Men became millionaires and had city homes, gardens outside the walls, and country houses in the mountains or on the seashore. These country villas often " covered the space of a moderate-sized town with their garden grounds and aque- ducts, fresh- and salt-water ponds for the preservation and breeding of river and marine fishes, nurseries of snails and slugs, game preserves for keeping hares, rabbits, stags, roes, and wild boars, and aviaries in which 1 See also page 98. 112 THE ANCIENT WORLD even cranes and peacocks were kept." Some people, when they saw this new extravagance, sighed for the good old days when Romans had dressed simply, eaten little, worked hard. But most people followed gaily after the new fash- ions, if they could afford it, and for the rest of her long life Rome grew richer and more and more extravagant. Generally only men from great and wealthy families were elected to office. It was these ex-officers who sat in the senate. 1 Gradually this aristocratic senate had gained more power, and the officers had lost it, until it was the senate that ruled Rome. The officers were only her servants. Everything was done "by the authority of the senate" — war declared, peace made, money spent, laws passed, generals sent out A Triumphal Arch Built in honor of a Roman general who conquered Jerusalem. It still stands in Rome, though broken and much repaired. The inscription says, "The senate and Roman people to the divine Titus, son of the divine Vespasian [both emperors] and to Vespasian Augustus " or recalled. ' ' Senator ' ' was the proudest title in Rome. While the senate was grow- ing strong, a bitter struggle was going on between the rich and the poor and between the Roman citizens and the Italians outside of Rome. The Italians had no of Rome 1 snare m the government, and the poor were miserably downtrodden. They lived packed close in tiny rooms in big tenement houses on narrow, sunless streets. They owned nothing. They had no way to earn a living, for some were too ignorant to know a trade 1 See page 84. ROME CONQUERS THE WORLD 113 Even those who were masons or blacksmiths or car- penters could get little work, for Italy was overrun with slaves. There were gangs of them in towns, on farms, on sheep ranches, in mines. They were often chained so that they could not escape, and they were branded, so that if they did escape men could know them as slaves. The ones who did rough work were dressed in rags or in skins and were fed upon the cheapest food, never tasting meat. They were herded in tents and in barracks no better than cattle sheds. For any kind of labor it was cheaper to own and feed such creatures than to hire self- respecting freemen. The result was that men who would have liked to be plowmen or shepherds were without work. So they flocked to Rome, thinking to get help there; but the same hard conditions existed in the city. There were slaves trained for every trade, and if men did not own them, they could hire them at starvation wages. Poor freemen in the city, as well as in the country, found little work and grew even poorer. Some of them were, of course, lazy beggars and rascals. Some of them were noisy and troublesome, making wild threats against the rich and starting bloody street brawls. Others were discouraged, sullen, dejected. A few were earnest and thoughtful. Most of the nobles and rich men, looking upon this wretched mass of the poor, only scorned them as beasts. But a few pitied their sufferings, hated the injustice of their case, and longed for some way of righting their wrongs. One of these noble friends of the poor said: "The wild beasts of Italy have their caves to retire to, but the brave men who spill their blood in her cause have nothing left but air and light. Without houses, without any settled habitation, they wander from place to place Ii 4 THE ANCIENT WORLD with their wives and children. . . . The private soldiers fight and die to advance the wealth and luxury of the great, and they are called masters of the world while they have not a foot of ground in their possession. " The provinces outside of Italy, too, were unhappy and badly ruled. These were the nations that Rome had con- Bad Gov- q uere d — Sicily, Africa, Spain, Gaul, Macedon, eminent Asia, and all the rest. They had no right to in the vote, no voice in choosing officers and making rovmces i aws Only the few men of the one city of Rome elected the officers that governed the world. A governor was sent to each of these provinces, with a few young men to assist him and an army to give him strength. He ruled his province for one year, and during that time no one, not even the officers and senate of Rome itself, might check or punish him. He had unlimited power. He might imprison men or have them executed. He made his own laws and governed his province according to them. At the end of the year a new governor came and perhaps overthrew last year's laws and made new ones. Under this plan, if a bad man had charge of a province, he could do unlimited harm to a country. A certain governor of Sicily arrested rich men on false charges and took their property for himself. He tried cases in court without judges. He laid- heavy taxes on the province, so that people were reduced to poverty. He boasted at the end of his year that he had made three immense for- tunes out of his helpless people. Cicero, a Roman orator who lived during Caesar's time, said, "All the provinces are mourning, all the free peoples are complaining, all kingdoms remonstrate with us for our covetousness and our wrong-doing ; on this side of the ocean there is no spot so remote that in these latter times ROME CONQUERS THE WORLD 115 the lust and wickedness of our countrymen have not penetrated to it." During a hundred years a few great men tried to solve these problems of Rome. Of them all, Caesar, the con- queror of Gaul, the builder of the new army, Cgesar was the greatest. He marched down out of Begins a Gaul with his devoted and well-trained soldiers, New Gov - overthrew the government, defeated the armies ernment sent against him, and made himself ruler of the Roman world. He was general of the army, high priest of the religion, head of the government. Immediately he began to remedy the abuses from which the Roman world was suffering. He cut up the public lands and gave them out to his old soldiers and other needy families. He began to give rights of citizen- ship to men throughout the provinces. He cut down the terrible taxes that they had been forced to pay, and made the people of Rome pay their share as they had not done before. He was given the title of " Father of his Coun- try" ; and after his death the senate declared that he had been received by the gods as one of themselves. A temple was built to the " Divine Julius," and a priest was appointed to care for his altar. The change which Caesar had made in the government was permanent. The Roman republic of the old days was gone forever. For five hundred years after his time the world was ruled by emperors who built on the founda- tions he had laid. 1. Make a clay model of a triumphal arch, of Caesar's camp, of a walled town. Build mounds and movable towers and battering rams around the town. 2. Find pictures of the Alps. 3. Make a tall, slender column in clay. On it scratch pictures of Roman war scenes. The drawing on page 106 is from such a column now standing in Rome. It was built by the emperor Trajan in honor of his victories. fn6] CHAPTER VI THE ROMAN EMPIRE How Rome Ruled the World In the government that the Roman emperors created one man was ruler. He was thought divine, the suc- cessor to the " Divine Julius." He lived in a great palace that covered acres of ground. He £m ^ dressed in a purple robe, wore a crown, and carried a scepter. His will was all-powerful. But he could not do all the work necessary in ruling the world. These absolute emperors organized a body of helpers. They appointed tax collectors, treasurers, governors of provinces, judges, generals. The officers of the second rank reported to those of the first rank, and officers of .the third rank to those of the second. Through the chief officials the emperor heard of the doings of all the under- lings and visited praise or blame upon them. It was a successful way for one man to control the doing of busi- ness too large for one alone to carry on. The empire was much better ruled than in the old republican days when governors and tax collectors had been responsible to nobody. That empire was practically the world. It stretched northward to the safe boundary of the wide Size of ^ e Rhine 'and Danube rivers, and even the far Empire, northern island of Britain belonged to it. 8 5 A -D- Eastward Rome had all Asia Minor and a narrow strip of seacoast besides. At the south she had Egypt and 117 Ii8 THE ANCIENT WORLD a fringe along all Africa, stretching back to the desert. She owned, moreover, all the many islands of the sea. The most northern point of Roman Britain was more than two thousand miles north of the most southern point of Roman Egypt, and from the farthest western point in Spain to the farthest eastern point of Asia Minor was about three thousand miles. Even the swift ships of our time need about five days to travel the length of the Mediterranean, and in ancient times sailing vessels in the best of weather took about eighteen days. There were a hundred races or more in that empire. To-day there are packed into that old territory twenty countries or districts : England, Spain, Portugal, France, Belgium, Switzerland, Austria, Italy, Albania, Monte- negro, Servia, Rumania, Bulgaria, Greece, Turkey, Egypt, Tripoli, Algeria, Morocco, Tunis, besides little slices of four or five others. Yet in spite of the great size and the variety of races, Rome governed the empire well. The civilized peoples of the East kept their old habits, prospered, and were more or less content. The new peoples of the West were* taught civilized ways and rapidly changed their manners. In 58 B.C. Caesar had found Gaul a country of wild forests. There had been no vineyards ; few grain-fields ; The Work ^ ew bridges, but only fords across the rivers; of Civiliza- few walled towns, but, rather, straggling vil- tionin lages ; human beings sacrificed to the gods. Caesar seems to have had the same feeling of curiosity and condescending admiration for the people that we had for Indians. Four hundred years later, however, the descendants of these half -civilized Gauls were Roman gentlemen. They had houses of thirty rooms with carved furniture and marble statues and libraries of Greek and Latin books. THE ROMAN EMPIRE 119 In their courtyards cool fountains played, the water brought from mountain springs through great aqueducts of stone. There were gardens where the daintiest fruits and vegetables grew. Hundreds of slaves tilled the fields, pressed the grapes into wine, groomed the fine The Cold Plunge in a Roman Bath-house A modern reconstruction from ancient ruins horses, trained the hunting dogs, helped their masters to dress and undress, shaved their faces, and perfumed their hair. There were walled cities like those of Greece and Italy, with stone theaters where the Gauls went to see Roman and Greek plays. In the cities were huge bath-houses where a gentleman could spend his day, now in the warm bath, now in the cold, sometimes . taking a sweat in the hot room and again swimming in the tank or playing ball or tennis in the open court, or perhaps lounging on the benches and reading his Greek verses to listening friends. 120 THE ANCIENT WORLD All these fine gentlemen spoke Latin like their friends in Rome, and even the uneducated people tried to speak it, though they spoiled the pronunciation and mixed Latin and Gallic words. What had happened in Gaul had happened in Spain, also ; she had become as Roman as Rome herself. Even to-day we call the French, the Spanish and the Portuguese, as well as the Italians, Romance peoples, because they have always kept the mark of their early Roman education. But even as far north as Britain, the Romans left their signs. Many an English farmer in our time, in digging or plowing a field, has come upon strange gold In Britain . , . ^ £ j- , u coins bearing the face and name of an old Roman emperor. Or he has found a little vase of clay or bronze, tight sealed, and upon opening it has seen a handful of dust, the ashes of some Roman soldier, per- haps, who lived and died and was burned on the funeral pyre fifteen hundred years ago. Or he has wondered at the low, grassy ridge that runs so straight across his field, not knowing that it is the earth wall of an old Roman camp. Caesar, who twice led his army into Britain during his Gallic war, says that in his time no one but merchants visited that distant island. "Most of the inland inhabit- ants," he says, "do not sow corn, but five on milk and flesh and are clad in skins. All the Britons, indeed, dye themselves with wood which makes a bluish color, and thereby they have a more terrible appearance in fight." This sounds like a description of tattooed savages. But in 85 a.d. the Romans conquered Britain after a war bloodier and much longer than the Gallic war, and Tacitus, a Roman historian, tells how Agricola, the Roman general who finished the conquest, set about Romanizing the country when the war was ended. THE ROMAN EMPIRE 121 He encouraged the natives "to build temples, courts of justice, and commodious dwelling houses. ... To es- tablish a plan of education, and give the sons of the leading chiefs a tincture of letters, was part of his policy. . . . The consequence was, that they who had always disdained the Roman language began to culti- vate its beauties. The Roman apparel was seen without prejudice, and the toga became a fashionable part of dress." Fifty years after Agricola's time the emperor Hadrian visited Britain. He found fifty towns built like Roman towns, with walls around them and comfortable houses inside them like Roman houses. He could go easily from town to town with his guards, for good roads crossed the country to and fro. He found the towns busy with manufacture. Perhaps there was a pottery or a glass shop or a mine of lead or iron. In some cities he visited bath-houses like those great buildings in Rome and Gaul with hot and cold rooms and swimming pools filled by mineral springs. He visited country houses almost as fine as those in the hills near Rome. In the .dining rooms he saw floors of mosaic with pictures of the Roman gods, with benches like those at Rome. There he presided at banquets where food was brought on in silver dishes sent from Rome, where guests sang Roman verses and talked in the Roman language. He saw neat farms along the road with growing wheat and barley and grazing cattle. He found his four Roman legions camped among peaceful people. Some of the soldiers had married British women and were working little fields outside of the camp or keeping shops in the village that had grown up around it. Between Britain and Caledonia (that is, between Eng- 122 THE ANCIENT WORLD land and Scotland) he found a line of camps that Agricola had built, with a road running from one to another. Here the emperor made a wall eighty miles long, with watch-towers looking toward the north, with camps of Roman soldiers to keep out the barbarians of Caledonia from Roman Britain. And so Roman speech, Roman books, Roman laws, Roman dress, Roman ways of building, spread over most of the world. " Wherever I go," says a Roman citizen about 400 a.d., " I find my fatherland. I come as a Ro- Wax Tablet Inkhorn Scroll or Book man among Romans." And that Roman citizen was a Spaniard. To-day travelers can see the ruins of a Roman wall on the edge of Scotland, of a Roman bath in Eng- land, of a Roman theater in France, of Roman camps on the German Rhine, of a Roman bridge across the Danube in Rumania, of a Roman forum in Athens, of a Roman temple in Algiers. How did the Romans do this Romanizing? One of the first things they always did after they had conquered a country was to build roads. They laid them out straight, through marshes, over hills, across rivers. So well were they built that to-day the people of England, France, Germany, Roman Roads THE ROMAN EMPIRE 123 Spain, and Italy are still driving over them. In a few places you can walk on the very paving stones that Roman hands laid down almost two thousand years ago. First the builders packed the ground hard, then put Part of a Roman Map of the World The emperor at Rome sits in the middle of the world, and all roads lead to him. Notice the harbor of Ostia, near Rome, with a lighthouse. The map shows long, narrow Italy, with the seas at the sides. The top of the map is northeast, the bottom is southwest down a thick layer of cobblestones, on top of that broken stones and lime, and above that a bedding of fine cement. Then on the important roads they put, on top of all that, a pavement of stone blocks fitted close. The road top curved from the center to side gutters or toward the 124 THE ANCIENT WORLD middle to a center drain. It must have cost many hun- dreds of dollars to build every mile of road, and must have needed great numbers of men working for many weeks, hauling cobblestone, crushing rock, making cement, squaring blocks. When these roads were once made, they were kept in good condition. The emperors appointed officers to be in charge of them, to inspect them often, to hire con- tractors to make repairs, to collect taxes for the work from the landowners along the way. So important were the roads that the great officers and nobles and even the emperors of Rome were proud to give them their names. Thus we have in Italy the Appian Way, the iEmilian Way, the Julian Way, the Flavian Way, the Claudian Way, the Flaminian Way, named for the great men who first built them or later repaired them. Nor were these roads few and far apart. From the thirty-seven gates in the Roman city wall, roads branched off in all directions. They were almost as many as the railroads of to-day, crossing and meeting in the same way, covering the whole empire as with a spider's web. The center of that web was Rome, so that the saying grew up, "All roads lead to Rome." In one of the forums of the city, the emperor Augustus set up a golden milestone with the names of the greatest cities of the whole empire carved upon it, with their distances from Rome. A man could start from the Roman wall in the north of modern England and drive in a wheeled carriage through the cities of York and London to Sandwich on the southeastern coast. Then he could cross by boat the narrow English channel to what is now Boulogne in France. Here he would find a road again leading south- ward through Lyons and across the steep Alps. From here it went on through long Italy, through Milan and THE ROMAN EMPIRE 125 the heart of Rome, past the golden milestone to Brindisi down in the southeastern corner. Here the traveler would have to take ship again and cross the Adriatic to modern Durazzo. From there a great road would lead him eastward to Constantinople. He would cross the narrow Bosporus by boat, would land and continue southward across rich Asia Minor, passing through many old cities, following the coast through ancient Phoenicia, and at last, after many weeks of travel, would arrive in Jerusalem, having journeyed on straight, clean, level roads for four thousand miles. If he wished, he could continue on down the coast, across the Isthmus of Suez, across fertile Egypt, and along the whole coast of Africa to modern Tangier on the Strait of Gibraltar. There he would cross by ship to Spain and pass along the wonderful coast road back to Lyons, across France, across the channel, and back through England to his town in the North, having made a circle around the Roman world. 1 At every mile of the way he would pass milestones of marble with the names of the nearest cities carved upon them and their distance from Rome. He would travel about forty miles a day, though people sometimes made a hundred, and one of the generals in hurrying to his sick brother in Germany went two hundred miles in twenty- four hours. We cannot do much better in our auto- mobiles to-day. At the end of every day's journey of forty or fifty miles the traveler would find inns where he could get bed and meals and hire horses, if he needed to do so. And often, as he sat in the inn, he would see a messenger dash up on a horse, leap off, fling his saddlebags upon a fresh horse that had been brought out from the stable, and 1 See map on page 116. [126] THE ROMAN EMPIRE 127 dash on again. Or perhaps he would see the long line of a legion marching past to a war, with heavy baggage wagons lumbering behind. And always he would see servants carrying their masters' letters, and merchants passing with rich goods on pack mules or in wagons. For along those great roads flowed war and peace and the whole life of the world. Commerce was another thing that held the empire together and taught East and West and North and South the ways of one another. Many men are content with life so long as they are making money, and merchants and manufacturers and ship- owners surely had a good chance to make money under the Roman empire. Ever since Pompey had put an end to the pirates, 1 the sea had been safe for commerce. Every merchant thanked Rome for peace and prosperity. Another thing was done to stimulate commerce. In that day all cities had market-places where buying and selling was carried on. 2 In every one of these the Roman officers posted up rules as to when the market should be opened and what kind of money should be used. And in the market stood a great block of stone with basins hollowed out holding the right amount for the different measures like our bushels and pecks and quarts. Any man who thought he was being cheated by the merchant from whom he was buying could take his goods here and test the amount. This enforced honest selling and encouraged people all over the empire to use the same measures. As a result there was much world-wide trading in the empire. Just as the food oh our 'own breakfast tables to-day comes from all corners of our country (oranges from California, breakfast foods from Niagara Falls, the 1 See page 99. 2 See pages 43 and 80. 128 THE ANCIENT WORLD wheat in our muffins from Minneapolis, maple sirup from Vermont, bacon from Chicago), so a Roman house was furnished from all corners of the empire. There were rugs and hangings from Asia Minor. Gold and silver came from Spain, as in the earlier time of the Greeks ; tin and lead and iron from Britain ; vases and statues and marble from Greece. From Alexandria in Egypt came all the fine luxuries that far-off India sent to the West — ivory, tortoise shell, rare cloth of cotton and silk (for the earlier Romans had only linen and wool), pearls, diamonds, spices, perfumes. The food on the table was from as many places. The wheat from which the flour was made was from fertile Egypt or Sicily or the Black Sea region, the wine from the Greek Islands and from Asia Minor, oysters from the Gallic coast. Whether these goods that traders handled were sold in Gaul, Syria, or Egypt, they were paid for in Roman silver, and everywhere Roman money was good — among the half-civilized Germans who had no money of their own, and among refined Greeks. Now, when different peoples are using the same money, the same roads, the same ships, the same weights and measures ; are buying and selling among themselves ; are visiting one another's cities ; and are feeling protected and safe, they are learn- ing from one another, are becoming broader-minded, are growing more alike, and are rather sure to be contented and peaceful and grateful to the government that causes it all. So it was for most of the time in the Roman empire. A New Religion in the Ancient World While the empire had been growing, another great thing had happened : Christianity had begun. Its origin was very humble, with one poor man and a few of his poor friends over in a little corner; of Asia that was owned THE ROMAN EMPIRE 129 by the Romans. As you know, that country was Pales- tine, and that man was Jesus. When he was born, the great Augustus was emperor of Rome, and Rome governed the world. That world had many re- */|^ g ligions. The Jews worshiped Jehovah as they tianity had done in the days of David. The Greeks worshiped Zeus and Apollo and Athene and the rest as they had done in the time of Pericles. The Romans worshiped Jove and Mars and the others as they had done since early times. Egypt had gods of her own — gods whose statues had heads of birds or beasts. The German tribes adored Woden and Thor and their com- panions. Some of these gods were good and gentle, others were fierce and jealous and given to fits of anger. Christ taught an idea new to most peoples — that there is but one God for all the world and that He is the God of love, the Father of His people. Christ's followers, look- ing at all the heathen gods, thought them foolish and wicked, and pitied the people who worshiped them. Be- sides this, Christianity promised more after death than did any other religion. According to the Greek and Roman worship the land of the dead was only a beauti- ful meadow where phantom people lived phantom lives and longed for news of their old beloved world. Among the Germans it was only warriors that died in battle who gained happiness after death. They would lead a life of constant feasting and fighting in the presence of the gods. Christianity pictured a gentler, fairer heaven for the righteous after death. Here is a description of the walled city where they were to live : " And the twelve gates were twelve pearls : every several gate was of one pearl : and the street of the city was pure gold, as it were transparent glass. . . . And the city had no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine 130 THE ANCIENT WORLD in it : for the glory of God did lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof. And the nations of them which are saved shall walk in the light of it : and the kings of the earth do bring glory and honor into it." Instead of the warlike heaven of the Germans, Christianity promised peace and love and gladness. "And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes," says the Bible. "And there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain : for the former things are passed away." Christians were excited by their new religion, by its beauty and wonder, and they were eager to teach it to other people. So the most earnest of them went about from town to town of Palestine preaching to their fellow Jews and saying, "Repent ye and be converted." They had some success and gained new converts. Soon they began to travel farther, to the cities of Asia Minor and to the islands* of the iEgean. Here they preached not only to Jews, but to the Greeks and Romans who lived there. At last Paul, the greatest preacher of them all, crossed over to Greece. He preached in Mace- don, Alexander's old country. He preached in Athens, under the very shadow of Athene's temple. In ission- Corinth he lived and taught for a year and a half. Meantime other Christians were visiting other cities. And as "all roads led to Rome," the very center of the world, Christians soon found their way there. In many places people listened to the new teach- ing, left their old gods, and became Christians. Because they were few in the midst of other religions, and because they were much in earnest about their new doctrine, these early Christians felt themselves held fast together by a strong tie of brotherhood. They had fre- quent meetings in their houses for preaching and prayer. THE ROMAN EMPIRE 131 Moreover, since they were brothers, they felt that they must share their goods and clothes and wealth with one another. " Neither was there any among them that lacked, for as many as were possessors of lands and houses sold them, and brought the prices of the things that were sold, and laid them down at the apostles' feet : and distribution was made to every man according as he had need." So says the book of Acts, in the Christian Bible. Officers were appointed to take care of this money and to attend to the distributing of it to orphans and widows and to serve at the tables when the brethren ate together. Other members were chosen to teach or to preach. They wrote letters of encouragement and advice to the churches that were being formed here and there. They went about from town to town visiting their brethren. In the market-places or on the temple steps they preached to any who would listen. Sometimes the audience was interested, sometimes it was angered and was ready to fight for its old gods with these men who spoke against them. Stephen was stoned to death by an angry mob, and Paul was more than once arrested and put into prison. But the Christians were ready to suffer for their re- ligion, and they kept on worshiping and preaching. Soon they were so numerous that they built large stone churches for their meetings, and each church had priests to preach and read the prayers. The bishops who had charge of church affairs wore beautiful Growth of the New white robes and embroidered stoles and needed R e ii g i n secretaries and servants to help them attend to their business. Christianity had begun among the humble folk, — fishermen, carpenters, tentmakers, — but within two hundred years many of the great people of the world adopted the new religion, — learned scholars, Roman nobles, officers, and relatives of the emperor. They were 132 THE ANCIENT WORLD scattered all over the empire, from Spain to Asia Minor, from rich Africa to wild Germany. A great Christian writer two hundred years after Christ says : " We are but of yesterday, and yet we already fill your cities, islands, camps, your palace, senate, and forum." Yet to be a Christian was contrary to law. Moreover, Roman officers and Roman soldiers were required to sacrifice to Jupiter and the twelve gods and to nstian wors hip the emperor. Some Christians were willing to go through these sacrifices and prayers with their hands and their mouths, while they felt that they kept their hearts clean for God. But most of them refused to sacrifice or to pray to any god but their own. Generally Roman officers overlooked this disobedience. For after all, in other ways Christians were good citizens. They kept the laws and paid their taxes. Moreover, the Romans were not very much in earnest about their re- ligion. Most of them thought that people should be allowed to choose their favorite gods from all those in the world, and for many years before Christ, Romans had imported new gods from Egypt or Persia. So in spite of the laws against them, the Christians grew in number and strength and wealth. Yet now and then an emperor came to the throne who thought it best to punish the followers of the new religion, for refusing to serve in the Roman army or for saying that they were not subjects of the emperor but of a greater king. Eusebius, a Christian writer about three hundred years after Christ, gives this story of Apphianus, one of the early martyrs in Africa : An order had been given "that all persons everywhere should publicly offer sacrifice, and that the rulers of the cities should see to this with all care and diligence. The heralds were proclaiming . . . that men, women, and THE ROMAN EMPIRE 133 children should come to the temples of the idols at the command of the governor. Moreover the miUtary trib- unes were calling upon each one by name, from a list, and the heathen were rushing in an immense crowd from every quarter. This youth, [Apphianus,] fearlessly and without imparting his purpose to any, stealing away from us who dwelt in the same house, and unobserved by the military band around the governor, approached Urbanus [the governor], who happened then to be mak- ing libations. Fearlessly seizing his right hand, Apphianus suddenly interrupted him in the act of sacrificing. Then he counseled and exhorted him in a solemn and serious tone to abandon his error, saying it was not right we should desert the only one and true god to sacrifice to idols and demons. . . . "He was immediately seized and torn by the soldiers like ravenous beasts, and after suffering most heroically innumerable stripes on his whole body, was cast into prison until further orders. There, being stretched by the tormentors with both feet, a night and a day, on the rack, he was the next day brought to the judge. When force was applied to make him sacrifice, he showed an uncon- querable courage in bearing pain and horrid tortures. [His sides were cut, his face was beaten, his feet were burned.] . . . But as he did not yield even to this, . . . he was again cast into prison. At last he was summoned the third day before the judge again, and still declaring his fixed purpose in the profession of Christ, already half dead, he was thrown into the sea and drowned." If men were willing to suffer like this for the Christian religion, is it any wonder that people admired them and said: "There must be something good in this religion that men love better than life. We must find out about it." Weak people, of course, were frightened away from 134 THE ANCIENT WORLD An Emperor Becomes a Christian the church, but many of the braver sort were won by such courageous, joyful, loving martyrdom. One of the Chris- tian writers, crying out to the Roman persecutors, says : " Go on, rack, torture, grind us to powder ; our numbers increase in proportion as ye mow us down. The blood of Christians is their harvest seed." That seed, the blood of the mar- tyrs, was sown all over the empire, in Gaul, in Africa, in Italy, in Palestine, in Greece. And there did, indeed, spring up from it great harvests for Christianity, so that there were millions of Christians in the Roman world. At last even an emperor became one of them. That emperor was Constantine the Great. Eusebius tells this marvelous story of a vision that Constantine had during a war : "He said that about midday when the sun was beginning to decline, he saw with his own eyes the trophy of a cross of light in the heavens above the sun, and bearing the inscription, ' Conquer by this.' At this sight he him- self was struck with amazement, and his whole army also which happened to be following him on some expedition and witnessed the miracle. He said, moreover, that he doubted within himself what the meaning of this apparition could be. And while he continued to ponder and reason on its mean- ing, night imperceptibly drew on; and in his sleep the Christ of God appeared to him with the same sign which he had seen in the heavens, and commanded him to procure a A Statue of the Em- peror Constantine THE ROMAN EMPIRE 135 standard made- in the likeness of that sign and to use it as a safe-guard in all engagements with his enemies. At dawn of day he arose and communicated his secret to his friends, and then calling together the workers in gold and precious stones, he sat in the midst of them and described to them the figure of the sign he had seen, bidding them represent it in gold and precious stones." Whether this miracle happened or not, Constantine did carry the standard of the Christian cross in his battles, and he and his soldiers did have the sign of the cross marked on their helmets and breastplates. After several years he was baptized into the Christian church, and even before that, as soon as he was emperor, he gave Chris- tians the right to worship according to their religion. Moreover, he restored to them lands and money which had been taken from them, and himself built churches in honor of God. When the emperor was a Christian, when the laws no longer made it a crime to be a Christian, thousands of people began to flock into the church. Stories say that in one year, at Rome alone, twelve thousand men, besides women and chil- dren, were baptized. Christianity had become the re- ligion of the empire. Results of Roman Rule Rome had ruled the world for four hundred years or more. For four hundred years the peoples of the world had, generally speaking, used the same money, traveled the same roads, spoken the same Ian- Central- guage, obeyed the same law. They had all ^LnenT" faced toward one city, had looked up to one man. Alexander had dreamed of a world empire ; Rome had realized that dream. This long unity made a per- manent mark upon the earth. Men have never since 136 THE ANCIENT WORLD lost the idea of a unified world. You will find people in the Middle Ages trying to revive just such an empire as Rome had created. In much later times Napoleon made the same attempt. Rome not only made a great empire ; she changed the peoples of it, made them all more or less alike. The Generous United States has been called a melting pot, Attitude where all the races of the world are thrown toward together, melted over a fire of education and oreigners f ree( j m, an( j re cast into Americans. But long before our time Rome was also a melting pot of nations. The little city-states of Greece had always scorned for- eigners, had never given them the right to hold office or to vote, had even shut them out of the religious festivals, and had made separate laws for them. In the Roman empire, on the other hand, all freemen were equal : Gauls and Germans belonged to the senate, Spaniards and Arabs sat on the imperial throne. Without knowing it, perhaps, every country of western Europe has followed this Roman example, has generally made friends with the conquered or the conquerors, accepted them as citi- zens, and intermarried with them. The result is that not a nation of Europe is of unmixed blood, as the Greeks boasted themselves to be. The modern man, with this mixed blood in his veins, boasts, not of his exclusiveness, but of his liberality and broad-mindedness toward nations and races. There were two things about Roman government which had a deep influence upon Europe. One was the idea of an absolute ruler. Kings of later times never ^£ e allowed their people to forget the old Roman Ruler ru ^ e ? "The pleasure of the prince has the force of law." Only in modern times have we been able to put that idea aside and to set law above the ruler. THE ROMAN EMPIRE 137 The other idea of government that the Middle Ages took over from the Romans was that of organizing a body of king's helpers, rank below rank, and all responsible to the king. 1 Every state of Eu- H , g s rope and America and every great business firm now does its work in this way. The plan was made for us by the Romans, and from them we have inherited it. The people of Rome were very unlike their teachers, the Greeks. They were not artistic, imaginative, emo- tional. Rather they had the minds of lawyers. It was a Roman habit to obey law. The Roman oman way of doing anything was the legal way. Let one example illustrate. For two hundred years, you remember, the plebeians fought for equal rights with the patricians. 2 But how did they fight? Not with the sword, but with laws. Slowly, step by step, like a horse pulling a heavy load uphill, they advanced, never break- ing an old law, but doggedly persuading the patricians to pass new ones granting this little right, that little privilege, until at last they had them all. That was the Roman way. Such a law-loving people would make a great mass of laws and would be proud of them. The orator. Cicero said that the laws of all other nations, especially of the Greeks, seemed to him ridiculous when compared with the Roman law. Doubtless many a Roman at one time or another might have said something like this: "We have many laws here in Rome. There is hardly any action of a man toward his neighbor that is not covered by some law. And yet tl\ey are all so just and so natural that they never surprise us. We look upon them as upon the wise words of our father. They guide us in our daily lives. It is very different in Greece : men hardly 1 See page 117. 2 See page 84. 138 THE ANCIENT WORLD know what their laws are, and so they have to walk without a guide. I have heard Greeks say : - What need of laws? We Greeks can argue things through without them.' I once saw a case being tried in a Greek court, and I was reminded of a group of boys quarreling over a ball game : no one of them knows the rules, or they all have different rules, or half of them think the rules are bad and therefore will not obey them. And the family of the man on trial were in court, weeping, and begging the judges for mercy in spite of the laws. A JJoman would never do so childish a thing. He would have too much respect for the law." The Romans studied their laws as no people before them had ever done. Great lawyers gave lectures upon them and wrote books about them. At last the emperor Justinian had capable men collect all written laws, all lawyers' opinions that had been written, all the decisions of judges in the courts, all the unwritten customs that people usually followed in making contracts and in 529-534 doing business. All these laws and practices they compared, sorted, put in order, restated clearly, and wrote in books. Besides that, they wrote explanations of the reasons and meaning of law. All this made Roman law very fixed and clear, and although the empire fell, yet these books have remained down to the present day. Through the Middle Ages in the univer- sities young men studied them, and in church and state people lived according to Roman law. To-day the law of Italy, Spain, France, Germany, is Roman, brought down through the Middle Ages from far-off Rome. If an old Roman lawyer should return to earth and walk into an Italian court, he would feel much at home and might almost sit as judge. Of course Rome left us her roads, her ruined buildings, THE ROMAN EMPIRE 139 and some of her great books ; but more important than these are the less material things that she gave the world — the idea of an absolute ruler, organized and centralized government, generous adoption of foreigners, her law, and the habit of obeying law. 1. The Greeks loved beauty ; the Romans loved law. Greece was divided ; Italy was united. Make more sentences of this sort, con- trasting the Greeks and Romans. 2. Greeks wore shawl-like cloaks ; so did the Romans. Greeks had low, flat-roofed houses ; so did the Romans. Make other sentences stating the likenesses of Greeks and Romans. 3. Draw silhouettes of scenes on a Roman road as the Greek vase-painter would have made them. (See cut on page 33.) 4. Look up the following words in a large dictionary and see what language they come from and what they meant in that language; annual, army, century, governor, judge, language, legal, legislature, military, senate. PART II. THE NEWER NATIONS CHAPTER VII THE BARBARIAN CONQUERORS The great Roman empire, the civilizer of the West, was not to stand forever. Many things were helping to bring about its end, but perhaps the greatest Rome and wrec k ers f a u were the barbarians of the the Bar- barians North. From a day in early times when the Gauls had swept into Italy and had burned Rome, she had never been quite free from the fear of barbarians. She had met them over and over again, sometimes inside her own territory, sometimes outside of it. For hundreds of years she had been successful against them. The Gauls, as you know, she had con- quered 1 and had made a part of her great family, teach- ing them her ways, using them as soldiers, making them citizens. Yet there always remained, beyond her farthest marches, a great un-Roman wilderness, peopled with un-Romanized tribes. It was to keep out these peoples that she built frontier forts and boundary walls and had her warlike legions. But the barbarians filtered through even these strong defenses. Though Rome kept out their hostile armies, yet all the time small numbers were coming in friendly ways into the empire. They enlisted in the army and were to be found in the emperor's bodyguard x See page 101. 140 THE BARBARIAN CONQUERORS 141 and in the frontier forts. Hardly a battle was fought that had not barbarian troops on the Roman side. Some of these men worked up to the high position of generals, and a few even became consuls. The barbarian captives after a battle were sold as slaves in the empire, to work Roman farms and to act as household servants. Several times, too, emperors opened the door of the empire to this or that tribe and allowed them to settle inside the Roman boundaries, thinking it wise to make friends among the barbarians and to use them as frontier guards against the others of their race. At one time 40,000 Goths were allowed to settle on the Roman side of the Rhine. Gaul was peppered over with little bar- barian colonies, owning land and under promise to fight for Rome when she called. In all these ways the empire was soaking up barbarians as a sponge soaks up water. The Germans There were many of these barbarian tribes — Franks, Vandals, Goths, Burgundians, Saxons, Lombards — but they were all related and had similar customs, laws, languages. People often speak of all of them as the " Germans." They are the races from whom the modern Germans and Dutch and English and Scandinavians are descended. Tacitus describes them as they were about a hundred years after Christ, in districts where they were untouched by civilization. They seem in many ways like one of our Indian tribes. " Generally," Tacitus says, " their only clothing is a cloak fastened with a clasp, or if they haven't that, with i a thorn ; this being their only garment they pass whole days about the hearth or near a fire. . . . There are those, also, who wear the skins of wild beasts. . . . They select certain animals, and stripping their hides, 142 THE NEWER NATIONS sew on them patches of spotted skin taken from those strange beasts that the distant ocean and the unknown sea bring forth." It seemed strange to the Romans to find people not . having walled cities. Tacitus speaks of it with surprise. "It is well known that none of the German tribes live in cities nor even permit their houses to be closely joined to each other. They live separated and in various places, as a spring or a meadow or a grove strikes their fancy. They lay out their villages, not as with us in connected or closely joined houses, but each one surrounds his dwelling with an open space.' ' Their houses were crude log huts. The land did not belong to indi- vidual men, as with us, but the village owned it and di- vided it among people as it was needed. 1 ' They cultivate fresh fields, ' ' Tacitus says, " every year, and there is still land to spare. They do not plant orchards nor lay off meadow lands nor irrigate gardens." They only scratched the ground, evidently, and threw upon it a little wheat and were content with whatever crop came; for they did not like farming. "Nor could you persuade them to till the soil and await the yearly pro- duce so easily as you could induce them to stir up an enemy and earn glorious wounds. Nay, they even think it tame and stupid to acquire by their sweat what they can purchase by their blood." A Frankish Barbarian Early Times THE BARBARIAN CONQUERORS 143 They seem to have been lazy people, for Tacitus says : " In the intervals of peace they spend little time in hunting but much in idleness, given over to sleep and eating; all the bravest and most warlike doing nothing, while the hearth and home and the care of the fields is given over to the women, the old men, and the various infirm members of the family." Very few of those ancient German warriors wore ar- mor and helmets. They car- ried shields and javelins and could ^ e ™^ throw their spears to a great distance. There- fore, it was without swords and without armor and with ill-trained horses that they met the Roman legion. Yet they fought with mar- velous courage. "It is the greatest disgrace," says Tacitus, "to have left one's A German Warrior shield on the field, and it is unlawful for a man so dis- graced to be present at the sacred rites or to enter the assembly ; so that many after escaping from battle have ended their shame with the halter." They went into battle shouting, with their shields before their mouths, so that they swelled the noise and made what Tacitus calls "a wild and confused roar." There was almost constant warfare, Germans against 144 THE NEWER NATIONS Romans, or Germans against Germans : for every chief had a band of young warriors. " There is great rivalry among these companions/' says Tacitus, "as to who shall rank first with the chief, and among the chiefs as to who shall have the most and the bravest followers. . . . When they go into battle it is a disgrace for the chief to be out- done in deeds of valor, and for the following not to match the courage of their chief; furthermore, for any one of the followers to have survived his chief and to come unharmed out of a battle is lifelong infamy and reproach." " Certain figures and images taken from their sacred groves they carry into battle, but their greatest incitement to courage is that a division of horse or foot is not made up by chance, but is formed of f amilies and clans ; and their dear ones are close at hand so that the wailings of the women and the crying of the children can be heard during the battle. These are for each warrior the most sacred witnesses of his bravery." These half -wild warriors had other virtues than courage. They loved their families and respected their women. They loved liberty and held public meetings v^tu* 11 wnere au< freemen helped to decide tribal business. Their kings and generals they chose by vote, and these kings did not have unlimited power; in all important matters the people were consulted. Such were the Germans who were now facing the empire, a very different sort of people from the Ro- mans, with much to learn from them, and something to teach. The Conquests of the Goths Before 400 a.d. something happened to set all these tribes in motion. The stir began on their far eastern border in Asia among the German Goths. A Roman . THE BARBARIAN CONQUERORS 145 writer and soldier of that time says: "A report spread far and wide through the nations of the Goths The Huns that a race of men, hitherto unknown, had Set the suddenly descended like a whirlwind from the Germans lofty mountains . . . and were ravaging and m ohon destroying everything that came in their way." He describes the ugly, scarred faces of these Huns and their strong, short-legged bodies. "They live," he says, "on roots or the half -raw flesh of animals. . . . They never shelter themselves under roofed houses, . . . but they wander about, roaming over the mountains and the woods. . . . There is not a person in the whole nation who cannot remain on his horse day and night. . . . None of them plow, or even touch a plow handle, for they have no settled abode, but are homeless and lawless, per- petually wandering with their wagons, which they make their homes. . . . This race went on slaughtering all the nations in their neighborhood." The Goths, brave and warlike though they were, fled before this yet fiercer people and came to the Danube River, to the northwest of Constantinople, which since the time of Constantine had been the papital of the Roman empire. They looked into the protected land of the empire and thought that surely there was safety. One group of them sent messengers to the emperor at Constantinople and "humbly entreated," says the old historian, "to be received by him as his subjects. They promised to five quietly and to furnish troops." The emperor consented, and the Goths "crossed the stream day and night, without ceasing." But the Romans and the Goths could not five peaceably together for very long. The Romans treated their new subjects cruelly and dishonestly, and soon the Goths rose. In the great battle of Adrianople 146 THE NEWER NATIONS they found that they could defeat the Roman armies. Alaric is ^ ^ ew y ears a ^er that they revolted from the Chosen empire and decided to have a king of their own. King of the They chose a brave young warrior, Alaric, and raised him on their shields in German fashion. They had made a good choice. He was a man of intelligence and power and of ambitious dreams. He saw the whole empire open before him, rich in spoil and adventure. He gave the word, and a great host of his countrymen began to move, perhaps 300,000 people. A long line of clumsy wagons with thick, wooden wheels started out from Constantinople. In these rode the women and children and the feeble old men. In these were packed, also, a few necessary things — tools, pots and kettles, extra arrows, swords, and battle axes. The full fighting force of the nation rode on horseback. Such a great number of people needed huge quantities of food. They got it from the helds, the full granaries, the herds, that they passed. Or, better yet, they took flour ready ground and bread ready baked, wine ready pressed and meat ready killed, from the houses and the shops of the villages. When they tired of journeying, they quartered themselves in a town, sleeping in the citizens' beds; helping themselves to food, rich clothes, treasures, whatever they would. Meantime, the citizens fled, except those whom the Goths captured as slaves to serve them here in their borrowed houses. When the tribes started on again after a few days, the wagons were fuller than before. There were little bags of money, perhaps, tools, weapons, provisions, a silver vase that might upon need be melted into coin. A Gothic woman here and there was adorned with a Roman necklace or was wrapped in a soft Roman shawl. To the wagon ends were chained a few slaves, men and women from the THE BARBARIAN CONQUERORS 147 plundered village. Little of value remained in the town. Indeed, perhaps it was left blazing behind the troops. In such manner the Goths marched westward and southward from Constantinople. There was no army to meet them at the famous old pass of Ther- 395AD mopylaB, 1 and they went on into Greece. They Goths camped in Athens, they burned the rebuilt Plunder Corinth 2 and Argos and Sparta, that old lion, reece feeble now. Through Greece they went, always burning towns, tearing down ancient temples, stripping harvest fields. Their wagons grew heavier and richer as Greece grew poorer; for they filled them continually with the treasures of plundered cities. After several years they entered Italy and went through the land, living, as before, by plunder. Three times they besieged Rome itself. Once the starving and frightened Romans bought peace with "the payment of 5000 pounds of gold, of 30,000 pounds of silver, of 4000 robes of silk, of 3000 pieces of fine scarlet cloth, and of 3000 pounds' weight of pepper.' ' Though she was not now the capital, yet Rome had money and treasures, it appears. Finally, the Gothic army entered her gates, however, and plundered the city. A foreign army in the streets of Rome ! Such a thing had not happened in 800 years, not since the Gauls had done the like. Alaric, however, had no mind to remain in Rome. He had his eyes fixed on a richer place, grain-growing Africa. So he led his tribes south to take ship, but before they left the shores of Italy, he died. The new king, Adolf, had a different dream from Ala- GothsTake ric's. He had once hated the very name of ^ Spain Rome, he said, and had hoped to erase it from the world and to write "Gothia" over the old Roman 1 See pages 57 and 98, 2 See page 98, 148 THE NEWER NATIONS empire. But as he had watched the Goths on their journeys through civilized lands, he had seen that they were lawless, uncontrolled. He had learned to respect the quiet and the culture that he had beheld in Italy. Instead of becoming Rome's destroyer, he had decided to become her helper. When he was king, therefore, he allowed the Roman emperor to keep his office and asked him to accept the Gothic army as Roman troops and their king as a Roman friend and confederate. You may be sure that his request was granted by the frightened and powerless Romans. So the Goths, as defenders of the empire, marched northward out of Italy and crossed the Alps into lower Gaul and northern Spain. These, remember, were civilized lands, as Roman as Italy. In this rich and peaceful country the Goths settled. They were not welcome, of course. They were rude barbarians, without learning and without good manners. Gallic gentlemen scorned them. Besides, Gallic farms and Gallic purses had to support them. The Goths even pushed themselves into gentlemen's houses, ate ravenously at their tables beside the masters, and slept in the guest rooms. Yet courage and strength were on the side of the Goths, and they stayed and grew strong. After a few years one of their kings had a realm stretching over most of what is now France and Spain. The Franks Now, these Goths were not the only German people set in motion by the Huns. At the time when Alaric was overrunning Greece and Italy, other German tribes were invading nearly all of western Europe. One of the most important of these peoples, one which put the deepest mark on Europe, one which founded two of THE BARBARIAN CONQUERORS 149 her greatest nations — France and Germany — was the Franks. About the time of Alaric they were on the northern shore of what is now Germany, at the mouth of the Rhine River. But they were growing stronger, and they soon The Germanic Kingdoms SCALEOF MILES 100 200 300 400 600 Longitude West Q ° Longitude E'ast from Greenwich Showing the remnant of the Roman empire and the lands held by the various barbarian tribes toward the end of the fifth century began to spread westward and southward into Gaul. They were blessed with great success in battle and with a strong and wily king, Clovis. They conquered certain German tribes to the west of them. To the east, in northern Gaul, they conquered a remnant of the .Roman empire. ISO THE NEWER NATIONS Clovis A statue above his grave. As in all tombs of the Middle Ages, the figure is lying down, with head on pillow and cushion at feet But Clovis was not satis- fied with this. He decided that he would have all of fertile Gaul. So he took an army southward against the kingdom that his Ger- man kindred, the Goths, had founded, beat them in bat- tle, and drove them down into Spain. In a few years he had conquered a great country — practically all of modern France and Belgium and Holland and perhaps half of modern Germany. The Franks of his time were still heathen, worship- ing Thor and Woden; but Christianity was in the very The air of this old Ro- Franks manized country. Become The conquerors Christian of Qaul were get _ tied among Christian people and Christian churches, and Clovis soon married a Christian princess. It was not long, therefore, until the Franks, also, adopted the new faith. The way in which it happened accord- ing to the old story is in- teresting. Clovis was at war with THE BARBARIAN CONQUERORS 1 5 1 certain neighbors, and the battle was going against him. No human help seemed able to save him. Then he thought of the God to whom his Christian wife prayed, and he cried out : " O Jesus Christ, . . . I humbly beseech thy succor ! I have called on my gods, and they are far from my help. If Thou wilt deliver me from mine enemies, I will believe in Thee and be baptized in Thy name." Immediately the enemy began to lose, and the battle ended in a glorious victory for Clovis. Soon afterward he was baptized as he had promised, along with three thousand of his warriors. It was not many years before all the people had followed their king's example. A hundred years later the Franks had even forgotten the names of their earlier gods. Charlemagne's Empire So this Christian people, the Franks, settled in the broad lands that Clovis had conquered. Kings were crowned and died, descendants of Clovis, most of them poor, weak creatures. But they had ^ xs . of officers ("mayors of the palace," they were magne called), strong and wise men, who did their work for them. So the Franks prospered and grew stronger, until there came to be their king one of the greatest men of the world, Charlemagne, or Charles the Great. He was a brave warrior and a wise general, a descendant of one of the " mayors of the palace." By his wars he doubled the size of his kingdom. He pushed his eastern border to the Danube, conquering fierce heathen tribes that dwelt in that region. At the north he carried on a terrible war for thirty years with the Saxons, brave German kindred 772-803 of the Franks themselves. Only after cruel AD - slaughter did Saxony lie quiet under Charlemagne's 152 THE NEWER NATIONS hand. He won the northern part of Italy, also, where a German tribe called Lombards had been settled for 200 years. Charlemagne defeated them, placed their iron his own head, declared their Pope Crowning Charlemagne A little decoration on a manuscript seven hundred years old crown on and was king. All these conquests gave the Franks an empire larger than any Ernke 1 other that had Formed existed for four hundred years, since the Roman empire had begun to fall to pieces. They made Charlemagne the great- est ruler in Europe. People thought of his kingdom as a second Roman empire and of him as a new emperor. It seemed proper for the greatest king in Europe to bear the highest title possible to a ruler. So when Charle- magne visited Rome, the head of the Christian church, the pope, "set a crown upon his head, while all the Roman populace cried aloud, ' Long life and victory to the mighty Charles, the great emperor of the Romans, crowned of God.' After [that] . . ." the chronicler goes on, "he was called emperor and Augustus." He was famous through all the world of that time. Ambassadors came to his court from far-off Arabia and strange Africa. They brought him gifts, too, curious things from their lands — perfumes, spices, monkeys, and even an elephant, the only one that western Europe had seen since Hannibal's time. 1 i See pages 92-95. THE BARBARIAN CONQUERORS 153 Charlemagne's wars were important, not because they made Frankland larger, but for other reasons. For one thing, Charlemagne Christianized all German How lands as he conquered them. He built churches charle- in them and sent out priests to preach and to magne baptize. When he was trying to make Chris- e tians of the newly conquered Saxons he made some laws that seem cruel and unchristian to us, but they show, at least, how much in earnest he was, and how stubborn the Saxons were. One law read somewhat like this : "If any Saxon shall try to hide himself unbaptized and shall scorn to come to baptism and shall wish to remain pagan, let him be punished by death.' ' Charlemagne made laws, also, to protect and support the churches that he built and the missionaries that he sent out. "We command that all shall give a tenth of their property and their labor to the churches and the priests. ... On the Lord's day all shall go to church to hear the word of God. ... If any one shall enter a church by violence and carry off anything in it by force or theft or shall burn the church itself, let him be punished by death." Under these hard laws and the gentler teaching of the missionaries, Saxony was soon converted and thoroughly Germanized. Charlemagne carefully planned how his great empire should be ruled. He kept a strong army, and it was the duty of every freeman who owned any property to do his share in fighting or in helping to furnish arms and food for a substitute. The neighbors to the east were still dangerous, barbarous tribes. Here Charlemagne built forts and put strong men in command of the land and the people. These counts were responsible for protecting the land from the barbarians and for collecting troops and bringing them to the king upon need. 154 THE NEWER NATIONS He wrote to them at assembly time much as follows : "We have decided to hold our general assembly this year at the place called Stassfurt. Come with your men to this place prepared to go in any direction whither our summons shall direct. Each horseman shall have a breastplate, shield, lance, sword, dagger, bow and quiver with arrows. In your carts shall be axes, planes, augers, boards, spades, iron shovels, and other tools which are necessary in an army. In the carts shall be, also, supplies of food for three months and arms and clothing for half a year. And we command that you proceed peaceably through our realm. You shall take nothing except fodder, food, and water." These assemblies were held twice a year, first in one city of the great empire, then in another. They were not The only for the purpose of collecting an army. Frankish Any freeman had the right to go. There were Assem- r i cn nobles and poor farmers there, learned bishops and ignorant workmen. Officers of the king, who had been going about inspecting the country and seeing that the counts did their duty, here reported to Charlemagne. If any count had acted ill, Charle- magne punished him as he thought fit. Moreover, any man, high or low, who thought he had been unjustly treated by his count made complaint here in the assem- bly and got redress. Here Charlemagne announced, too, any new laws that he had planned. One of the best things that this great ruler did for his people was to educate them. In his early years only _ . priests and a few other men in Germany could read and speak Latin, and even fewer could write. Books were rare, and there were no schools. Most people were ignorant of history and geography and everything that books can teach us. Charlemagne him- THE BARBARIAN CONQUERORS 155 self could not read until he was a grown man, and he never learned to write, though he kept tablets under his pillow at night and often drew them out and practiced his letters. But Charlemagne loved learning and hated igno- rance. He complained that even from monas- teries, where most educa- tion was, he often received letters which were full of mistakes and uncouth ex- pressions. Now, he thought that " those who desire to please God by living rightly should not neglect to please him also by speaking correctly/' So he set about instructing his people. He brought church singers from Italy, the home of culture. He sent for Italian artists to decorate his churches and palaces. He even brought up statues and carved columns from Italian cities to beautify his new buildings. He had copies of great Charlemagne The picture was made much later than his time. He carries the globe, as the Roman emperors had done to show that they ruled the World. He wears the Roman eagle on his shoulder. (Many modern nations have adopted the same emblem.) The fleur-de-lis reminds us that modern France as well as Germany was a part of his kingdom 156 THE NEWER NATIONS books made, and so collected a library — a rare thing in Frankland. He invited scholars from other lands to come and live at his palace and to teach there. Not only boys studied at that palace school, but nobles of the court, and the most eager student of all was the king himself. But one school was not enough. Charlemagne wrote frequently to the monasteries, saying, "Let schools be established in which boys may learn to read." He went about among these schools and examined the pupils. At one time he praised some boys who studied well, say- ing : "My children, you have found much favor with me. . . . Study to be perfect, and I will give you bishoprics and splendid monasteries, and you shall always be honor- able in my eyes." For hundreds of years people looked back to Charle- magne with affection and told marvelous tales of his courage and his wisdom. Indeed, he was a man to love and admire. His friend, Einhard, says : " His The Man ^ 0( jy was i arge anc j strong, his stature tall. . . . magne His eyes were very large and piercing. His nose was rather larger than is usual, he had beautiful white hair, and his expression was brisk and cheerful, so that whether sitting or standing, his appear- ance was dignified and impressive." He must have made a noble picture as he sat on his throne, with his high boots, his long Frankish tunic and blue cloak of silk, embroidered with gold and clasped with gold buckles, with a jeweled crown on his head and at his side a sword with a jeweled hilt. Those were indeed worthy ornaments for the wise Charlemagne, with his quick eyes flashing over the crowd of courtiers and his keen mind listening, learning, planning sound laws or great battles or new schools, — the greatest king in Chris- tendom. THE BARBARIAN CONQUERORS 157 The Vikings During the last years of Charlemagne enemies appeared on his coasts that promised trouble for his descend- ants. These were the Northmen, from the countries which we now call Norway, Sweden, and Denmark. They, like the Franks and Goths and Saxons, were Ger- man. 1 They had not moved with the other Germans, however. When Alaric and the Goths were besieging Rome, 2 these Northmen had probably been in their far northern homes for hundreds of years. There they had developed a brave, hardy kind of life. They loved danger, as the Greeks had loved beauty. They were at home on their ships, as the Huns were on their horses. They could swim like fish and fight like tigers. They had boats much like those of the early Greeks — long and narrow, with forty or fifty oars, a single mast, and a square sail. The sail was for fair weather, the oars for storm j the sail for leisure, and the oars for speed. A boat was warship, pirate ship, trading vessel all in one. The men were at the same time pirates, peace- able merchants, and useful explorers. In the boat were provisions for a few days : at the men's sides hung swords that could get them more at the first landing. Around the ship's sides glittered forty or fifty shields, hanging ready for use. Behind each rowed its warrior owner. As a voyage ended, and the ship neared land, out leaped the agile oarsmen, dragged the shallow boat upon shore, snatched down shield and battle-ax, and stood ready for fight. An old Norse story tells of one Viking hero who "from his youth up loathed the fire boiler and sitting indoors, the warm bower, and the bolster full of down." The hard 1 See page 141. * See page 147. 153 THE NEWER NATIONS northern winter held these men in their homes. Scores of big-voiced warriors sat in the wide feast halls and shouted applause, as the bards sang of old battle glory. But when spring came, and the salt breeze blew inland, the wild blood began to dance in their veins, and the smoke of the hearth fire was hateful in their nostrils. Then they longed to go a- Viking, as we long in the spring to go tramping and camping, gypsy-fashion. Going Viking Ship A modern drawing from an old ship found buried in a marsh. Notice the oars instead of rudder, and the shields along the gunwale a- Viking meant making a pirate voyage, landing here and there to swing swords, to gather treasure, and to leave smoking houses behind. It meant fighting joyously wherever man or ship barred the way. There were scores of petty kings in these Scandina- vian countries. Every man of any wealth and strength haughtily thought himself the descendant of the god Woden and the equal of any man. About 800 a.d. three strong kings — one in Norway, one in Sweden, and one in Denmark — each in his own country, conquered all the lesser kings, and made themselves supreme. THE BARBARIAN CONQUERORS * 159 Their haughty foes scorned to remain and be the under- lings of any man, so they sought their Mother Sea and went wherever she led. They traveled on the , long rivers of Russia down to the Black Sea. T * a ^[ The emperor at Constantinople x had Northmen soldiers for his guard. Coins of far-off Arabia have been found buried in the soil of Norway, brought, perhaps, those thousands of miles by some Viking adventurer. On the floor of a temple in Athens is scratched a drawing of the hammer of Thor, the Norse god of war, and on the coast not far from Piraeus is an old Greek statue of a lion carved over with Norse letters that tell the story of a Viking raid. The Northmen fell like locusts upon all the shores round about their homes, and whatever land they touched suffered bloodshed and burning and thieving. They set- tled by the thousands in England and Scotland and Ireland. They discovered Iceland and Greenland and peopled them. In the year 1000 they even touched the shores of North America. They followed the coast of Europe around to Spain and sacked R ^f Seville, far inland on a river. They rowed up the streams of Frankland and plundered cities, burned bridges, and laid the country waste. Charlemagne had held them in check while he lived. An old Frankish historian says : "He had ships built on all the rivers of Gaul and Germany which flow into the northern ocean, and ... he erected solid structures at the entrances of all the harbors and navigable mouths of rivers and thus blocked the route of the enemy." But when Charlemagne's strong hand was gone, no armies or boats or fortified bridges could check the North- men. The same historian says of a later year : "A fleet of two hundred ships, coming from the country of the 1 See page 145. i6o • THE NEWER NATIONS Northmen, landed in Frisia [now Holland] and ravaged all the islands adjacent to this shore.' ' This army went inland and won three battles against the Frisians. The Danish conquerors imposed a tribute of a hundred pounds of silver upon the people. Indeed, there was not a seacoast of Europe that these pirates did notr ravage. They were so dreaded that a special prayer was sung in the churches, "From the fury of the Northmen, O Lord, deliver us!" Centuries earlier the German tribes had moved into the Roman empire and had begun tearing it to pieces until it was quite gone from western Europe. The Goths had torn off Spain ; x the Lombards had taken northern Italy ; the Franks had taken Gaul and Germany 2 and by new conquests had built them into a great empire. And now came these other German barbarians, the Vikings, and helped to tear that Frankish empire to pieces. 1. Compare our Indians with the early Germans. 2. Write a letter such as a Roman trader might have written when traveling among the Germans. (For more information than the text gives, the teacher may select parts of Tacitus, Germania, Everyman edition, — e.g. Bks. hi, iv, vi, viii, xv.) 3. What things did Charlemagne do that prove him a great man? 4. Tell the story of a Viking raid as some skald, or singer, might have told it. 5. Model a Viking ship in clay or make it in wood. 1 See page 148. 2 See page 150, CHAPTER VIII HOW GERMANY AND FRANCE BEGAN Charlemagne's Empire Divided The later rulers of Frankland, the sons and grandsons of Charlemagne, were not such men as their great ancestor had been. They did not reverence the wide empire that he had built up. They saw in it only their separate shares of land and wealth and power. Instead of working to keep it together, they fought to cut it up into small kingdoms for themselves. A father often divided it among his sons, and the sons fought over the parts. The Norse- men were battering at the empire on every coast. Kins- folk of the Huns x moved west- „ .. , t . T , . He sits on a carved chair. In his Ward, and this fierce enemy hand is the round world marked t i tt, -ii t ,r " Asia, Europe, Africa " to show that attacked Frankland on the he is ruler of the whole earth southeast* And still other barbarous races were pushing on her eastern border. Under all these enemies and under the weakness of the rulers, the empire fell to pieces. Thirty years after Charlemagne's death there was a king of East Frankland, or Germany, a king of West 1 See page 145. 161 Holy Roman Emperor l62 THE NEWER NATIONS Frankland, or France, and an emperor who held Italy and a strip between the west and east countries. His fine title of emperor amounted to nothing. There East and rea iiy was no empire. Two new countries were Frankland growing up, — France and Germany. They had always been rather different from each other. East Frankland was almost purely Frankish, that is, German. But West Frankland was old Roman Gaul. 1 Showing the three sections into which the empire of Charlemagne was di- vided. Later East and West Frankland were extended so that their bounda- ries touched, as shown by the broken line The Gallic people there had taught their soft Latin and their gentle customs to their Frankish conquerors. Now that the empire was broken up and each country had its own king, they went on growing, each in its own way. But in both East and West descendants of Charlemagne iSee page 118. HOW GERMANY AND FRANCE BEGAN 163 still wore the crown, and good-for-nothing rulers they usually were. Germany So in East Frankland the people had little protection from the Vikings and from the Huns and other savage peoples that were settling on the eastern border. The Every man had to take care of himself by hook Beginning or crook. Good fighters were better off than of Ger ~ other men in those days of constant warfare, many because they could better protect themselves. So they rose to power. Weaker men, or men of peace, asked for the strong warrior's help in time of war and exchanged for that help money, grain, wine, a piece of land, or even their own labor in the stronger man's fields or service in his army when he needed soldiers. Such a man built a strong castle with a great surround- ing wall to keep out his enemies. It was really a fort. Other men built their huts near to it and in war time took refuge in it with their families and helped to beat off the enemy. By such means the lords in all the countries of western Europe grew richer in lands and in men. Some of them came to own not one castle, but many, and lands as wide as one of our New England states, with forests and farming land and wide rivers and busy towns. Under a great duke were perhaps twenty or thirty other lords only a little less rich and powerful. Charlemagne had not been willing to allow such great princes to exist in his kingdom. He had believed that so many powerful men were bad for the country. They were likely to be haughty and selfish and jealous of one another. They would perhaps manage their lands in such a way as to gain more wealth and power for them- selves, regardless of the good of their people. They 1 64 THE NEWER NATIONS would fight, one against another, in selfish quarrels, and the fields would be devastated and the people slaughtered. They would disobey the command of the king, if it pleased them, and would make laws of their own in their own lands. They might even throw off all rule of the king, tear off their lands from their country, and set up new, smaller kingdoms of their own. Perhaps Charlemagne's descendants saw these dangers as clearly as he had done, but they had not the wisdom and the strength to prevent the growth of these great dukes. So before a hundred years had gone, East Frank- land was divided into five or six great duchies, — among them Saxony, which Charlemagne had conquered with so many hard years of fighting l ; Franconia, the oldest of Frankish lands ; Bavaria, whose troublesome master called himself "duke by the grace of God/' and not by the consent of the king ; Lorraine, on the border between the east and west country. The kings of Germany had other troubles besides those with their ambitious dukes. You must remember that German Charlemagne was crowned at Rome " where Kings as the Csesars and the emperors were always used Roman to sit," and he was called "the great emperor mperors Q £ ^ e R omans ^ cr0 wned of God." 2 It was a magnificent title, and his descendants and the other kings of Germany after them were eager to wear it. That crown could be given only at Rome and only by the pope's hands. The pope had been at first only bishop of Rome, in charge of the religious affairs of its few score churches. Now, however, he was much more than that. Wise, strong men had been Roman bishops; and priests and rulers had formed the habit of asking their advice in 1 See page 151. 2 See page 152. HOW GERMANY AND FRANCE BEGAN 165 many matters. The church had come, also, to own land in Italy, as great dukes or kings owned land, and the Roman bishop ruled these lands as p^Jl? dukes ruled theirs, or gave them to nobles to hold as kings gave land to their nobles. So the pope came to have, not only heavenly power, but earthly power also. He called himself " Christ's vicar, " that is, one to whom Christ had given the power to do part of His work for Him . Some people thought that this meant only looking after the souls of men, appoint- ing priests and officers of the church, planning and attending to church affairs. Other people thought that it meant much more than that. It seemed to them that religion and the church and the pope ought to control all the actions of all men. They thought that God had given the pope power to appoint and to command princes and kings and the emperor, that the pope was the rightful umpire of all troubles and the decider of all questions. A great bishop of that time once said: "The church triumphant stands next to God, and the power of this church next to divine power, then comes the power of the The Pope on His Throne A great English earl on a pilgrimage kneels before him. Notice the pope's triple crown, a symbol which he still wears. At the pope's right stands a cardinal, known by his hat. Behind the earl is a bishop, known by his staff 1 66 THE NEWER NATIONS clergy and the priesthood, whereas [earthly] power comes last and is placed subject to that of the clergy and the priesthood/' And one of the popes, in speaking before a meeting of cardinals and bishops, said: "Holy Fathers and Lords! let the whole world now know and under- stand that as you can bind and loose in heaven, you can also upon earth give and take away from each according to his merits, empires, kingdoms, principalities, duchies, marquisates, counties, and all possessions. ... If you judge the angels, who are the masters of the proudest princes, what may you not do with the princes, their slaves!" Indeed, to get this pope's forgiveness a very proud emperor once climbed barefoot up the hill to the pope's castle and threw himself weeping on the floor at the pope's feet. And every newly chosen emperor journeyed hundreds of miles to Rome, knelt before the pope, kissed his feet, and received from him as a gift the sword, the lance, the golden apple, the scepter, and the emperor's crown. Yet the emperors claimed to be the equals of the popes in earthly matters. They thought of themselves as the Emperors* descendants of the Roman emperors of old Struggle time, who had possessed the whole civilized with the world, and who had been worshiped as gods, opes Therefore, they believed that no other prince could hold land except as a gift from them. They thought, moreover, that special power to rule had been given them by God. Many other people believed the same things. An old writer calls a certain emperor "the greatest of earthly princes, the wonder of the world, and the regulator of its proceedings." This left no room for an equal of the emperor. Trouble would necessarily come out of such a situation. Sometimes the pope for one reason or another was HOW GERMANY AND FRANCE BEGAN 167 not willing to crown a German king emperor. Generally the people of Italy sided with the pope ; then there was war. Oftentimes some of the German nobles took the pope's part and rebelled against the king. And because The Greatness op the Emperor He is in his palace. The word behind him names him "Wisdom" the pope was the head of the Christian church, there were religious troubles. Sometimes he would not allow any priest to perform services for the king. Sometimes he would order all the churches of Germany to be closed and so would leave the country feeling cut off from God. 1 68 THE NEWER NATIONS His hope was that the people in their distress would force the king to obey the pope in order that the churches might again be opened. The story of Frederick II shows how emperors had to struggle against their own Germans, against the Italian people, and against the pope. It shows, too, how re erw Germany suffered and Italy suffered, because 1250 a.d. the German king wished to be, also, emperor His Fight of the "Holy Roman Empire." Frederick's to Become f a th er h a( J Deen one f ftie m0 st powerful of the emperors, but he had died when his son was a child. The German dukes were unwilling to elect a mere boy for their king ; and the pope did not think it wise to make him emperor, for the child was king of Sicily, and the pope was afraid that Germany and Sicily would combine against him. So two of the great dukes, Philip and Otto, put them- selves forward as candidates. Each of them called a meeting of the electors to choose a new king. But Philip's friends went to one meeting, and Otto's friends to another. Philip's friends elected Philip, and Otto's friends elected Otto. Then they tried to decide the matter by war. Sometimes Otto won the battles, and sometimes Philip. At one time the pope favored one man and at another time the other, and nobles often changed sides. So Germany was a distressful place, full of war and treachery. At last Philip died, and Otto was emperor, and safe, he thought. But before long the pope became displeased with him and looked about for a new man. Meantime the little Frederick had been growing into a clever, learned, mild-mannered prince down in Sicily. Perhaps the pope now thought that Frederick was sure to be his friend, and when the princes of Germany re- HOW GERMANY AND FRANCE BEGAN 169 menibered the greatness of his father and his grandfather, they were easily persuaded that he was the right one for their king. So in spite of the fact that Otto was still wearing the crown, they listened to the pope and chose Frederick for German king and future Roman emperor. But Otto would not tamely step aside. He gathered together his few remaining friends in Germany and got money and men from some foreign dukes and from the king of England. The war, however, went against him, his friends deserted him, and Frederick was left in power. It was this Frederick whom the men of his own time called " the wonder of the world." He could speak half the languages of Europe — Italian, French, German, Greek, Latin, besides Arabic. He was poet, the Man ' singer, warrior, physician, lawyer. He had read, so it seemed to people of his time, all the books of the world and possessed all the knowledge of men. His court in Sicily was as brilliant as that of an Eastern prince, with black slaves blowing on silver trumpets, with a " throne of gold decked with pearls and precious stones," and a menagerie of strange beasts. He had an elephant, lions, panthers, camels, and tame leopards that were trained to hunt on horseback. He was a great and rich merchant, too. Matthew Paris, the English writer who lived at this time, says, "In [one] year twelve camels were sent to [Frederick] from the East, laden with gold and silver ; for he was a partner in mercantile traffic and a great friend of all the Sultans of the East, so that traders traveled both by land and sea, even to the Indies [that is, to India], on his account." It seemed as though this gifted man, this learned scholar, this elegant knight, this powerful king, might 170 THE NEWER NATIONS make the dream of his ancestors come true; as though at last one man might, indeed, bind all of Europe into one huge empire. And yet this great man's life was a failure. For thirty-four years he ruled as emperor, and nearly all that time was one continual struggle against enemies. A Caravan in the East It was not long before Frederick, emperor of the world, did things displeasing to the pope, also ruler of the world. At last the pope rose in wrath before a meet- Fredenck ing of cardinals and bishops; and after re- municated minding them of Frederick's wrong-doing, he solemnly pronounced sentence against him in words much like these : " We therefore declare this prince to be bound because of his sins, and cast off by the Lord and deprived of all honor and dignity. All who have taken the oath of faithfulness to him, we free from such oath. We forbid any one hereafter to obey him or to look upon him as emperor or king." Then the pope and all the churchmen there present took candles and lighted them and afterward extinguished them as a sign that the light of religion was removed from Frederick and that he must thereafter dwell alone in darkness of soul. This action of the pope was called "excommunication." It was a sad thing for ordinary people, when the two HOW GERMANY AND FRANCE BEGAN 171 rulers of the world were enemies. Many a one wept in that assembly where the pope spoke. One man cried, " Remember that the pillars which uphold the world are two: the one the pope, the other the emperor." What would happen if one of them should fall? How could men know to which to cling ? Some went to one side, and some to the other. On the pope's side were the Lombard l cities of northern Italy. These cities were ,rich and proud and strong. They traced their history back to old Roman Cities times. They hated tyrants and kings and ofItaly big states. Each town liked to choose its own ruler, make its own laws, coin its own money, carry on its own wars in its own way. Every one looked with dislike and fear upon a strong emperor, a man who claimed Italian cities as mere little corners of a great empire for which he made the laws, coined the money, declared the wars, collected the taxes, appointed the 1 officers. So they banded together, with the pope to encourage and help them, raised their armies, and made ready for war. A terrible war it was! There were cruel sieges of those fine old towns. Around one brave city Frederick's captain cut down orchards and burned fields and houses so that people had to live in caves, and many died of starva- tion. An Italian writer says that for all the years of that long war men could neither plow nor sow nor reap nor till vineyards nor gather the vintage nor dwell in villages. But close to the city walls men tilled the fields under guard of their own soldiers, who protected them at their work all day ; for so it must needs be by reason of the ruffians and bandits and robbers. And evils were multiplied upon the earth, and the wild beasts increased l See page 152. 172 THE NEWER NATIONS beyond all measure. The wolves gathered together in mighty multitudes round the city moats, howling dis- mally, and they crept into the cities by night and de- voured men and women and children who had come in from the villages and were sleeping under the porticoes or in wagons. There were many years of this Lom- bard war. A whole book could not tell all the brave and cruel things that were done on both sides and all the suffering and burning and destroying that came in its train. As the years went on, the pope and the emperor grew more and more bitter against each other. They flooded Europe with letters accusing each other of a Fails hundred wrong deeds. People began to whis- per evil things of the emperor. Many thought him a wicked man and fell away from him. Twice there were plots to poison him. The princes of Germany, urged on by the pope, even chose a new king. All this unkindness and misfortune soured Frederick's good nature, and he became harsh and bitter and scornful. - When he heard that the pope had excommunicated him for the fourth time, "he burst into a violent rage," says Matthew Paris, "and darting a scornful look on those who sat around him, he thundered forth . . . 'Where are my cases which contain my portable treasures ? ' And on their being brought and unlocked before him by his order, he said, 'See if my crowns are lost, now.' Then finding one, he placed it on his head, and being thus crowned he stood up, and with threatening eyes and a dreadful voice ... he said aloud, ' I have not yet lost my crown, nor will I be deprived of it . . . without a bloody struggle.'" Before that bloody strug- gle was ended, he died there in Italy with defeat about him. HOW GERMANY AND FRANCE BEGAN 173 For two hundred years the popes had striven against the emperors. They had encouraged the Lombard cities to rebel. They had tried to make the other kings of Europe enemies of the empire. B y^^ p They had stirred up the German people to rebellion. This failure of Frederick's was the end : the popes were victorious. The empire was in ruins. Italy was lost to it. Sicily the pope himself gave to a French- man. Germany was a camp of quarreling great dukes with no one strong enough to lead them. It would have needed all Frederick's time to hold these princes under and to bind them into a nation. But he had spent very little time in Germany. He had been in. Italy, in Sicily, in Jerusalem, and had left the rule of the Germans to his son or to some other assistant. And the nobles had kept up their old proud, quarrelsome habits. Indeed, Frederick himself had helped to increase their pride and their strength. He had bribed them in order to get their aid against Italy and the pope. He had allowed each duke to make his own laws, hold his own courts, coin his own money, make his own wars, almost as though he had been an independent king. After Fred- erick's time there grew up a ruler of Saxony, a ruler of Bavaria, a ruler of Prussia, Grand Duke this and Grand Duke that. Germany was again in pieces, and Italy, also, was breaking up into little city-states, — beautiful, brilliant, rich, proud, jealous. It was six hundred years, moreover, before either Germany or Italy became a united nation. France Let us go back to West Frankland at the time just following Charlemagne's death. You remem- ber that this great man's descendants had no large idea of the duty of an emperor or of the mean- 174 THE NEWER NATIONS ing and value of a wide empire. 1 Therefore, they cut the empire up into three states. The rulers of West Frankland, like those of East Frankland, were weak men, unable to control their strong nobles, unable to keep out the Vikings who were attacking the coast. 2 And so in West Frankland, just as in East Frank- The Nobles land, great lords built castles and filled them with bold fighting men, sworn to serve them. 3 It mattered little to such men what weakling descendant of Charlemagne in some distant corner of the country wore a shadowy crown and called himself king. Yet a king there must be, for some reason. So the great nobles of West Frankland came together, deposed the useless descendant of Charlemagne, and chose one of themselves to wear the crown. That name of king, however, meant very little. There was many a duke and count who had more land, more wealth, more castles, more soldiers, than the king. These great lords made their own laws, fought their own wars, collected their own moneys, each in his own ter- ritory. They themselves felt like kings and were unwill- ing to bow to another. The king of the Franks was also duke of a territory which his family had owned for many generations, the dukedom of France. Here the king (who was also duke) was reverenced and obeyed. But if he moved out of his own dukedom into the land of his neighbors, he had to do it at the head of an army. Rarely did a nobleman loyally open his gates and hospitably entertain his ruler. The royal army had to force open the gates and carry the king in. Nor did the neighboring counts and dukes often supply money for his expenses. He must get that from his own dukedom. Seepage 161. 2 See page 160. 8 See page 163. HOW GERMANY AND FRANCE BEGAN 175 But the nobles had chosen a clever family to wear the crown — the Capetians, people call them. Father and son through three hundred years, £ he . this family toiled to unite France and to make -pamiiy the French king a power. Their first move was to get more lands for themselves. For if a king of the Franks, besides being duke of France, became also a count of Vermandois and duke of Normandy, he got with that land faithful subjects who would be likely to obey his laws, serve him in battle, and supply him with money. The kings gained these lands in different ways. Sometimes they married their sons to the daughters of great counts and so brought the property into the family. Once a king even bought a dukedom. They oc- casionally fought for one and conquered it. Sometimes a duke died without any chil- dren to inherit his possessions. Then the king rightfully took them. In all these ways the Cape- tians kept gathering in territory until they owned more than half of France. As the king's lands grew, his power grew. As his power grew, his laws spread over the country, and loyalty increased. The great nobles had to respect the king and obey him. Men began to turn their faces away from this and that castle and to look toward the king's city of Paris as the capital of the land. In A King of the Franks on His Carved Chair 176 THE NEWER NATIONS fact, the nation of France was made at last — pieced to- gether out of old warring dukedoms and counties. One of the kings who did much for this growing France was Louis IX. His grandfather, Philip, had built up a large kingdom. It was Louis' work to make Louis ix, fogfc ki n gd om f ee i like a nation, to strengthen AD it with peace and prosperity, to teach its people to live according to law. This last thing was perhaps the hardest and the most nec- essary. In Paris, for example, things had come to a bad pass. " Because of the great injustice that was done and the great robberies . . . ," writes Joinville, an officer and friend of King Louis, "poor people did not dare to live in the king's land, but went and lived in other lordships. . . . The king, who was very diligent to inquire how the people were governed and protected, soon learned the truth of this matter. . . . And he abolished all the evil customs that were hurtful to the people, and he [found] men who would execute good and strict justice and not spare the rich any more than the poor," and he made them officers in the city. After that "no thief nor murderer dared to remain in Paris, seeing that if he did he was soon hanged or killed. Neither [great name] nor gold nor silver could save him. So the king's land began to improve, and people came there to live for the good justice that was done there. Ofttimes it happened that the king would go, after mass, and seat himself in the wood of Vincennes and lean against an oak and make us sit round him. And all those who had any cause in hand came and spoke to him without hindrance of usher or cf any other person. Then would the king ask out of his own mouth, 'Is there any who has a cause in hand?' And those who had a cause in hand stood up. Then would he say, 'Keep silence, HOW GERMANY AND FRANCE BEGAN 177 all, and you shall be heard in turn, one after the other.'" But the king could not hear all cases, even in one city. He had lawyers and councilors about him. Some of these he sent to "hear pleadings at the gate [of .Paris] which is now called 'The Gate of officers^ 8 Requests/" Joinville says. "And when he came back from church, he would send for us and sit at the foot of his bed, and make us all sit round him, and ask if there were any whose cases [we could not settle. And if we named any,] he would send for them and would settle the matters himself." Into the other parts of France, also, he sent judges to hear cases and other officers to carry out the laws. And he made strict rules somewhat after this style to govern these officers. "We, Louis, by the grace of God, King of France, ordain that our bailiffs, viscounts, provosts, mayors, and all others, whatsoever office they may hold, shall make oath that, so long as they hold the said office, they shall do justice to all, as well to the poor as to the rich and to strangers as to those who are native-born ; and that they shall observe such uses and customs as are good and have been approved. And if they do aught contrary to their oaths and are convicted thereof, we order that they be punished in their goods or in their persons." In such ways did the king try to make honest officers and to give all the people of France fair treatment and the protection of law. Moreover he was a great peacemaker in that age when men liked to fight. He thought it a sad spec- tacle to see " two kingdoms gnaw each other L 0U i S > at the prompting of the devil," and "pillage standing and slay each other." He tried to settle by inthe peaceful agreement the quarrels between his hot-blooded nobles. And he was often called upon to act i 7 8 THE NEWER NATIONS as peacemaker between rulers ; for he was respected and loved throughout Europe. He received foreign kings in his palace at Paris, and he sat in the most honorable seat among them. His advice was sought by the pope, the emperor of Germany, and the king of England. Matthew Paris, the English writer, calls King Louis "the king of all earthly kings on account of [his holiness] as also on account of his power and his emi- nence in chivalry. " This compliment, paid by a for- eigner, shows what the French kings had accomplished in two hundred years. The king of France was no longer a mere crowned duke among many dukes as powerful as himself. Now when he moved through the country, farming people left their fields and lined the roads to gaze at him and to huzzah. Cities opened their gates and decked themselves in his honor. When he needed an army, the nobles loyally came riding to him at the head of their knights. When he sat down to table, great counts and dukes carved the meat and served the plate, and knights in tunic* of silken cloth stood on guard. Once when he held court, so many men came flocking to serve him that "many said," so Joinville writes, "they had never, at any feast, seen together so many surcoats and other garments of cloth of gold and of silk ; and it was said that no less than three thousand knights were there present." King Louis was mild and gentle of soul, fair and delicate of body, and very lovable. His kindness and courtesy won him friends wherever he went. Moreover he was St. Louis HOW GERMANY AND FRANCE BEGAN 179 very honorable in keeping his promises. He was enter- taining, too, and liked pleasant talk with his friends. He said it was better than any book. He was very religious, going to mass every day, giving alms daily to the poor and washing their feet, building churches and monasteries, asking God's help and counsel upon all occasions. Just before his death Louis called to him his son and advised him how to live. What he said then shows the kind of man he was ; for he himself had lived . ~ ; . 1270 A.D. according to the same rules he laid down for King his son. "Fair son/' he said, "keep thyself Louis' from doing aught that is displeasing to ^? vl ^ e t0 God. ... If God send thee adversity, receive it in patience, ... if He send thee prosperity, then thank Him humbly. . . . Let thy heart be full of pity toward those who are poor, miserable, and afflicted; comfort and help them to the utmost of thy power. Maintain the good customs of thy land and abolish the bad. . . . Do not burden [thy people] with taxes save when thou art in great need. . . . See that thou hast in thy company men . . . who are right worthy and loyal, and fly the company of the wicked. . . . Beware of undertaking war against any Christian prince without great deliberation. ... If wars and quarrels arise among thy subjects, see that thou end them as soon as thou art able. . . . God give thee grace to do His will always, so that He be honored in thee and that thou and I may both, after this mortal life is ended, be with Him together and praise Him everlastingly. Amen." For all his virtues the church declared the king a saint after his death, and many people in their prayers still ask St. Louis to intercede for them. While Germany was growing more broken and dis- 180 THE NEWER NATIONS united, France, under this good king, was well started on the path toward national unity and kingly strength. She continued in that way for hundreds of years, becom- ing a powerful, wealthy, cultured nation. 1. Which is better, a large country under one government or several small countries? 2. What advice do you think some wise old man might have given Frederick II that would have kept Germany united? 3. Make a play in which people come before King Louis with complaints, and he makes wise decisions. 4. Would the study of Roman law be favorable or unfavorable to strong mon- archies ? (See pages 135-139.) 5. Find out when the present kingdom of Italy began ; the present German empire. CHAPTER IX HOW ENGLAND BEGAN In ancient times, you remember, Britain had belonged to the Roman empire. 1 Roman governors had ruled it and Romanized it ; Roman legions had held it. But as the empire had grown weak, she had needed all her legions nearer the center. When Alaric had stormed Rome, 2 the British legions had been called to fightf on the continent, and Roman Britain had been left undefended. Immediately the barbarians to the north, the Picts whom Rome had not been able to conquer, had begun to make raids into Britain. The Angles and Saxons Take Britain At that time, long before the days of Charlemagne, when Adolf and the Goths were settling in Spain and Gaul, 3 and the Franks were spreading west and south, 4 other German tribes, called Jutes and Angles and Saxons, lived across the narrow sea to the east of Britain. They were warriors and pirates. A Roman poet sang about them: "Foes are they fierce beyond other foes and cunning as they are fierce. The sea is their school of war, and the storm their friend. They are sea wolves that prey on the pillage of the world." They loved danger and the fight. In an, old Anglo- Saxon poem the hero, Beowulf, says, "Ever would I be in advance in the host, alone at the front, and so shall I, 1 See page 120. * See page 148. 2 See page 147. * See pages 149-150. 181 182 THE NEWER NATIONS while life last, make fight, so long as the sword endureth, that oft early and late hath served me." In long ships of many oars and with a single sail, these lovers of war, of the sea, of plunder, sailed out, as the Vikings did in later days, 1 after riches and adventure. To these warrior peoples, according to an old tradition, the British king The Angles turned and Saxons against Come into ^here is England A Saxon Warrior for help his foes. an old book called the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. It is a sort of diary of the early English people. Here are some jottings from it : a.d. 449. Hengist and Horsa, An ornamented wooden shield with invited by the king of the an iron boss. An iron helmet with a Britons to his assistance, short nose guard. A tunic with long ... . sleeves. Some kind of armor over landed in Britain. The king this, perhaps of leather. Leg wrap- v , j , ■» n tj a pings instead of hose directed them to fight against the Picts, and they did so and obtained the victory wheresoever they came. They then sent to the Angles at home and desired them to The send more assistance. They described the Angio- worthlessness of the Britons and the richness Saxon f the land. Then came the men from three Victories p 0wers f Germany — the old Saxons, Angles, and Jutes. [They had decided to have this land for their own, you see.] a.d. 455. This year Hengist and Horsa fought with 1 See page 158. HOW ENGLAND BEGAN 183 the king of the Britons. Horsa was slain, but Hengist and his son Esc took the kingdom. a.d. 473. This year Hengist and Esc fought with the British and took immense booty. And the British fled from the Angles like fire. [The news of these successes went back to the Angles and Saxons at home and tempted others across the narrow sea.] a.d. 477. This year came Ella to Britain with his three sons in three ships. There they slew many of the Britons and some in flight they drove into a wood. a.d. 495. This year came two leaders into Britain, Cerdic and Cynric his son,. with five ships. They fought with the British the same day. a.d. 501. This year Porta and his two sons came into Britain with two ships. So it goes. It is evident that hardly a year passed that a few ships, full of fighting Germans, did not land here and there on the British coast. Probably they were beaten sometimes, but their proud descendants when they wrote the Chronicle did not tell of their defeats. And certainly they won more often than they lost. It is a strange, long, slow story, this German conquest of Britain. Probably the Britons did not realize that they were actually losing their country. In some little corner of the coast a few shiploads of the dreaded pirates landed, dragged their low ships upon the sand, pulled out their long, two-handed swords, and advanced upon the surprised farmers and villagers. The Britons, with wives and children to save, fled inland to friends and kinsfolk. The Germans took possession of the deserted houses and fields and sent back home for their families. All along the southern and eastern shores of Britain little settlements of this sort were being made year after year. 1 84 THE NEWER NATIONS Yet, doubtless, the Britons felt fairly safe in their wide land. But these Germans were eager, ambitious folk and were not content with little spots of ground. As more of them kept coming, they spread inland and con- tinued to push the Britons slowly backward. There are many such entries as this in the Chronicle : " a.d. 571. This year Cuthulf fought with the Britons at Bedford and took four towns. . . . a.d. 577. This year Cuthwin and Ceawlin fought with the Saxon Horsemen Britons and slew three Evidently the horses are shod k j ngg _ # an ^ took from them three cities. ... a.d. 591. This year there was a great slaughter of Britons. " So the Germans slowly enslaved the earlier people or drove them back and after about 400 years had all of modern England for their own. The Britons were mostly cooped up in Wales and Cornwall, where their descendants still live to-day. They had been rather thoroughly swept off their own land. British customs and Roman culture were gone from it. It was German now. Its new inhabitants had settled down for all time to make this new country of theirs " England." This Anglo-Saxon land was not a peaceful place. It was a great battlefield for warlike chiefs. A leader who had brought over a few shiploads of warriors and had won a piece of coast felt himself the independent lord of it. His son after him enlarged the territory and called HOW ENGLAND BEGAN 185 himself king. Sometimes there were ten or twelve sep- arate kingdoms in that small country. Then, again, one man, mighty in battle, would conquer ^"S two or three of his neighbors and unite them 8 ^ ^ into a larger kingdom. Each part wpuld keep its own ruler as under-king, but would pay tribute and obedience to the conqueror as overlord or head king. Slowly three great states formed themselves out of all these struggling groups, and at last Egbert, the king of one of them and a pupil of Charlemagne 's, 1 made himself overlord of them all. These early Anglo-Saxons had one custom that is of very great importance to us. All the freemen of every village or township met, whenever it was necessary, to talk over village business. They ^ngio- were simple farmers, come between plowings Moots and harvestings. They met in the open air on a knoll or under a great tree sacred to the god Woden. A priest opened the meeting, and the head man took charge. These farmers brought up questions that needed settling. A newcomer was admitted into the village, officers were chosen, a farmer who had cut hay on some other man's field was punished, land was divided ' out among the villagers. Every man at that meeting had a right to say what he thought and to vote as he would upon these matters. But this assembly, or town-moot, as it was called, handled only the small business of the village. Once a month there was a hundred-moot. The hundred was a collection of several villages that were neighbors. To this assembly all the villages sent their head men and four representatives each. There came, besides, the chiefs of the hundred and their warriors, This moot, l See page 156. 1 86 THE NEWER NATIONS also, met out of doors, on a hilltop or under the trees. The men discussed questions that had to do, not with the village, but with all of the hundred. As the hundred bound together several villages, so the folk or tribe bound together several hundreds. And The House of Parliament in England To-day as the hundred-moot discussed questions too large for the town-moot, so the folk-moot discussed matters that were' of importance to all the hundreds. Here came to- gether all the chiefs and warriors and also the head men and four representatives from the simple farmers of the village. This meeting, too, was out of doors, and was opened by the priest. Here great crimes were, punished, war was declared or peace made, leaders chosen. This was an important meeting, and only the most important people did the talking. The common men listened and shouted when they were asked to vote and clashed their swords or spears against their shields. For this, like Charlemagne's assembly, 1 was a meeting of the army as 1 See page 154. HOW ENGLAND BEGAN 187 well as of lawmakers, and often, the members marched from discussion into fight. When several tribes had been made into a kingdom, the king was accustomed to call together the chief men from all the folk-moots to give him advice. This was called the witenagemot, or meeting of the wise men. England has been called "the mother of parliaments" : these old Anglo-Saxon moots of rude farmers and fierce warriors were her first children. To-day the Parliament of England and the Congress of the United States, which meet in great buildings of stone to discuss the needs of the country and to make laws for its governing, are the descendants of that little outdoor assembly with shouted vote and clashing weapons. The Reign of King Alfred Egbert had conquered the English people in war, but he had not been able to unite them in feeling. They did not forget old memories. The men of each earlier kingdom clung together and A 7 i 901 longed for old times and their. old kings. Eg- bert's grandson, Alfred, inherited the rule over these dissatisfied people. After a reign of thirty' years he left the country united and* the English proud of their land. One thing which helped to accomplish this great change was the lovable nature of Alfred himself. Asser, his friend and one of his bishops, 1 wrote of him, T^J "He was wonderfully kind toward all men and very merry." He was gentle and humble, not haughty, 1 Long before Alfred's time Christian missionaries had come into England. Slowly, family by family, kingdom by kingdom, they had converted the country and had built churches and monasteries. Alfred was born a Christian and ruled a Christian land. (See pages 297-298.) 1 88 THE NEWER NATIONS as some kings are. He was very religious, rising in the night to go alone to his chapel for prayer. He loved the poor. " On their behalf, among all his du- ties," writes Bishop Asser, "he was wonderfully thought- ful day and night. . . . And in judgment he sought earnestly the good of his people both high and low." In- deed, his heart was full of love for all men, and they loved him in return. Many old English sayings call him "Eng- land's darling," "England's shepherd," "Good King Alfred." After his time "king" meant a different thing to Englishmen from what it had meant in the old days of ambition and unending war. It meant a strong, wise, loving man, who labored for the good of his whole people. Besides loving the memory of the man himself, for hundreds of years Englishmen looked to the "laws of King Alfred" as the safeguard of their liberty. Alfreds Before his time few laws had been written Laws down, but men had remembered what their fathers had done and called that the law. Alfred had these old traditions written, chose what he thought the best from the recorded laws of the earlier kings, and added a few new rules of his own making. In the preface to this body of law the modest king says: "I, then, Alfred, king, gathered these [laws] together and com- manded many of those to be written which our forefathers held, those which seemed to me good ; and many of those which seemed to me not good I rejected them, by the counsel of my 'witan.' ... I durst not venture to set down in writing many of my own ; for I could not know what would please those who should come after us." Yet some of these laws, because of their kindness, sound as though he must have made them. "Judge thou very evenly ; judge thou not one doom to the rich, another to the poor; nor one to thy friend, another to HOW ENGLAND BEGAN 189 thy foe, judge thou. . . . Vex thou not comers from afar and strangers. . . . Injure ye not the widows and step- children nor hurt them anywhere : for if ye do otherwise, they will cry unto me, and I will hear them, and I will then slay you with my sword ; and I will so do that your wives shall be widows and your children shall be step- children." Even in the laws of this gentle king, however, we find some things to remind us that, after all, he lived a thousand years ago and that men have grown a little wiser and kinder since then. For example, some men were slaves in that day, and even King Alfred did not think it wrong. In one of his laws he speaks of a father's selling his daughter as a slave, but only to say, "He ought not sell her away among a strange folk." And when we see even this kind man freely dealing out the death penalty and cruel punishments, we realize that he lived in a time of fierce warfare and bloodshed. "He who smiteth his father or his mother," he writes, "he shall perish by death ... if any one thrust out another's eye, let him give his own for it ; tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe." Like Charlemagne, Alfred was a lover of knowledge. His mind was open to learn from any one having infor- mation. He listened greedily to the stories of sailors and travelers, that he might know something of foreign lands. He kept a note-book in his bosom and jotted down inter- esting things that he heard or saw or thought. He was, besides, an inventor, and he could draw designs and instruct goldsmiths how to work. He knew how to train dogs and falcons for the hunt. He loved the poems of his country, and many of them he learned by heart, and sang them to the lyre. ipo THE NEWER NATIONS With much labor, after he was a grown man, he learned to read and write both the Anglo-Saxon language, which the common people spoke, and Latin, the L arnin language of books and learned men. He was a great lover of reading. "Day and night," says Asser, " whenever he had any leisure, he commanded men to read books before him, nor would he ever suffer himself to be without one of them." Many of these books that he loved were in Latin; for although the Romans had long been gone from Britain, 1 and the Roman empire had disappeared, yet people had so formed the habit of using Latin, the tongue of the world's rulers, that it continued to be the language of writers and of all learned men. But most of Alfred's people were uneducated, did not know Latin, and could not read those good books that he loved. So he translated several of them into the common speech. In one of them he says, "Long and much I [wished] to teach my people then these mixed say- ings of sweet speech." In another he mourns because Englishmen have become so ignorant, and he hopes by translating good books to instruct his countrymen. He established schools, too, where he hoped that "all the free-born youth of the land might persevere in learning." And Asser says that it came to be true that many an old man of that day "would command his son to read Saxon books to him day and night whenever he had any leisure. And, sighing greatly from the bottom of his heart, he mourned because in his youth he had not devoted him- self to such studies." Another thing that helped to weld all the men of England into an English people was their war with the Danes, Vikings of the same sort as were attacking Seepage 181. HOW ENGLAND BEGAN 191 Charlemagne's empire. 1 These men were also much like the Angles and Saxons of earlier times and swarmed across the narrow sea as they had ^ he . done. They landed from the same sort of invasion boats and with the same kind of fierceness drove the inhabitants before them. In the same way they settled upon the land and began to spread out and push the English back. By Alfred's time these Danish raids were an old story. They had been going on for many years, and there had been continuous warfare. Towns lay burned and empty, farms lay neglected and grown to weeds, monasteries stood ruined and deserted. Alfred saw the need of peace. The nation must rest. Farms must be tended, and granaries filled. Children must be educated. Roads must be built. An army must be planned so that every man should do his share of his country's fighting and should yet have time to do his own work. So the king made peace with the Danes and allowed them to settle in a great stretch of eastern England. He permitted their own king to rule them, and yet Alfred was their overlord. He helped to make their laws, he sent Christian priests among them, and in every way he treated them like his own English- men. It was not many years, therefore, until the Danes were as English as their neighbors. They spoke the same language, worshiped the same God, obeyed the same laws, loved the same country. They intermarried with Angles and Saxons, and many an Englishman to-day has the blood of Danish Vikings in his veins. Bishop Asser gives us an idea of what Alfred accom- plished in his long reign. He writes: "And what shall I say of his many wars against the pagans [that is, 1 See page 157. 192 THE NEWER NATIONS the Danes] and of his battles and of the never-ending care of ruling his kingdom? What shall I say of the ^^ cities and towns which he restored and of the Alfred others which he built where before there had Accom- never been any? Or of the work in gold and pls e silver, incomparably made under his direction? Or of the halls and royal chambers wonderfully made of stone and wood by his command ? . . . As a master pilot strives to bring his ship, filled with many riches, to the safe haven of his native land, ... so the king permitted himself neither to faint nor to waver, though he was set amid the rough waves and various storms of this present life." The Norman Conquest For eighty years after Alfred's death the kingdom that he had made strong continued united. But then a weak king lost it to a new swarm of Danes. In 1066 yet another conqueror entered England. This was William the Norman, a descendant of one of those Viking Northmen who had long before plundered Frank- land. This ancestor, Rolf the Ganger (that is, "the goer"), had spent all his fearless life in fierce raids on the coasts of England and Frankland. He had burned and plun- dered, and by his courage had won the headship of Normandy ms band. The Frenchmen, in spite of their a Great bravery, feared him and at last bought peace Viking f or themselves by giving him a wide district emen Qn ^ e g e ^ ne Here h e anc [ hi s warriors settled down. They were baptized as Christians. They changed their names t6 French names. They- married French wives. Their children spoke the French tongue, wore French clothes, followed French customs; and the HOW ENGLAND BEGAN 193 descendants of Rolf, the Viking, were polished French knights and rich dukes of Normandy, " Northmen's land." The great-grandson of Rolf's grandson William of was a powerful man, Duke William. An old Normandy writer says of him, "So very stern was he Conquers and hot that no man durst do anything ngan against his will." This stern warrior got Normandy and her knights thoroughly under his control. He and his ancestors had Norman Snip From an old piece of embroidery called the Bayeux tapestry. Perhaps King William's queen and her ladies made it. It is 200 feet long and has 48 scenes. The next five pictures, also, are from this tapestry had many dealings with the kings of England. They had exchanged visits. English princes had even been educated at the Norman court. And the English king of Duke William's time was the son of a Norman princess. When William was a young man, this English king died, with no son to be king after him. Then William, his friend and distant cousin, decided that he would wear the English crown. But Englishmen had the fine old German custom of IQ4 THE NEWER NATIONS choosing their own king. 1 They would have none of William. They elected a man of their own blood, Saxon Harold, big and blonde, and handsome and brave. But in spite of Harold's courage and strength, and in spite of the fact that Englishmen " sacrificed their bodies and poured out their spirits for their country," yet Duke William and his horsemen and archers won against King Harold and his footmen and bowmen. Harold was killed in the first great fight, the battle of Hastings, and Saxon Foot-soldiers and Norman Horsemen Notice the Saxon battle-axes. The armor is made of metal scales sewed on leather hundreds of dead Englishmen and Normans lay on the field. The English hope was gone. A few weeks after the battle, the same council that had elected Harold king elected William with great shouting, and the same bishop that had crowned Harold now blessed William and put the crown upon his head. Then began for England a stern rule of twenty-one years. Many men who had not fought in that first battle were unwilling to submit, and the king had to lead his army about through England, putting down revolts. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle says, "He let his x See page 144. HOW ENGLAND BEGAN 195 men always plunder all the country that they went over." Some rebels and traitors, as the king called them because they would not obey him, were ^ e i it -ii Norman thrown into prison, and some "were pumshed Rule with blindness, some were driven from the land." And wherever he had to put down revolts, he built strong castles and manned them with Norman knights to hold the land. D>KE*>1NTERF6C TV5-EST Death of King Harold He was shot in the eye and is pulling out the arrow. The lettering is in Latin, and says, "King Harold was killed " " Assuredly in his time had men much distress," the old Chronicle says, "and very many sorrows. Castles he let men build and miserably oppress the poor. The king himself was so very rigid ; and extorted from his subjects many marks of gold and many hundred pounds of silver. . . . He was fallen into covetousness, and greediness he loved withal. He made many deer parks [where he and his friends might hunt], and he established laws therewith; so that whosoever [else] slew a hart or a hind, should be deprived of his eyesight. . . . His rich 196 THE NEWER NATIONS men bemoaned it, and the poor men shuddered at it. But he was so stern that he recked not the hatred of them all; for they must follow withal the king's will, if they would live or have land or possessions, or even his peace." To the Norman knights who had come over with him he gave rich lands. Gradually most of the old Saxon nobles lost their possessions, for one reason or another, and saw them in the hands of the strangers. Norman Horsemen There were different styles of helmets at the same time. Two of these are hoods attached to the body armor. Two are of iron plate with nose guards. Notice the oblong shields Yet King William did good things for England. " Amongst other things/' says the old Chronicle, "is not to be forgotten that good peace that he made in this land, so that a man of any account might go over his kingdom unhurt with his bosom full of gold. No man durst slay an- For he made strict laws against theft and murder and all crimes, appointing officers to carry out those laws, and he himself traveled through the country now and then, to see that there was peace and obedience. King William's Laws other." HOW ENGLAND BEGAN 197 Alfred and Alfred's grandfather 1 had done much in their time to make a united England. William took more steps now in the same direction and made that unity more sure and lasting. He did not allow in the land any great earls and dukes who should grow into petty kings and tear the country apart, as had happened in Frankland after Charlemagne. 2 He had noblemen, to be sure, to whom he gave land but never to one man so much in one place that he owned a great tract as big as a state. And every noble, and every man who lived on a nobleman's land, had to go before the king when he sat on his throne, kneel, and put his two hands between the king's two hands and swear to obey the king above all other men. On that condition people received their land, and for disobedience they lost it. By such means the king prevented the great nobles from having under their hands armies of men sworn to obey them. Instead every man all over England turned towards the king for law and commands. William was not satisfied with any guesswork about who his subjects were and what land they possessed and what they owed him in the way of taxes, or about the wealth of his country and the ^ he occupations of his people and the customs Book under which they lived. The Chronicle says : "The king had a large meeting and very deep consul- tation with his council about the land, how it was occupied and by what sort of men. Then sent he his men over all England into each shire, commissioning them to find out ■ How many hundreds of hides 3 [of land] were in the shire, what land the king himself had and what stock upon the land, or what dues he ought to have by the year from the shire.' Also he commissioned them to record [this] in l See page 187. 2 See page 163. 8 Hi4e = about 120 acre?. 198 THE NEWER NATIONS writing. ... So very narrowly, indeed, did he com- mission them to trace it out that there was not one single hide nor a yard ' of land, . . . not even an ox nor a cow nor a swine was there left that was not set down in his writ. King William's Ship Like a Viking ship, with carved prow. The pilot holds both steering oar and sail. The gilded trumpeter in the stern shows that it is the duke's ship And all the recorded particulars were afterwards brought to him/' This record is called the Doomsday Book, and lawyers still read in it to find who ought to own certain pieces of land in England, and they respect this careful work of William the Conqueror. William and the Normans did another service to Eng- 1 Yard = one quarter of a hide. HOW ENGLAND BEGAN 199 land. They brought it into touch with the rest of Europe. Englishmen on their island had remained rather ignorant of the rest of the world. Of course, kings ^7^^ had now and then married foreign princesses, Normans wealthy men had made visits to Rome, and Did for foreign monks and merchants and travelers ngand had settled in England. Yet the country was off in a corner by itself. William of Malmesbury, a writer who was not born, to be sure, until after the Norman conquest, and so never saw England under Saxon kings, gives a strange picture of the country before the Conqueror's time. If what he says is true, it. seems as though Alfred, after all, had accomplished little toward elevating his people ; or rather, as though there had been so very much to do that he had been able only to make a beginning. This is what William of Malmesbury says: "The priests, content with a very slight degree of learning, could scarcely stammer out the words of the sacraments, and a person who understood grammar was an object of wonder and astonishment. . . . The English at that time wore short garments reaching to the mid-knee.; they had their hair cropped, their beards shaven [except on their upper lips,] their arms laden with golden bracelets, their skins [tattooed]. They were accustomed to eat and to drink till they were sick." Moreover, they lived in small wooden houses. There were few buildings of beauty and dignity in the whole country. But the Normans, William goes on, were " proudly ap- pareled and delicate in their food. ... They are a race used to war, and can hardly live without it; fierce in rushing against the enemy, and where strength fails, ready to use stratagem. . . . They five in large houses [and are economical]. " They revived " religion which had every- where grown lifeless in England. You might see churches 200 THE NEWER NATIONS rise in every village and monasteries in the towns and cities, built after a style unknown before. . . . Each wealthy man accounted that day lost to him which he had neglected to signalize by some magnificent action." ET- hICEPISCOPVSCIBVCT POTV: A Norman Banquet There are no forks, spoons, or plates. The inscription says, "And here the bishop blesses food and drink." He is the third from the right, making the sign with his three fingers Perhaps William of Malmesbury was trying to flatter the Normans somewhat. But at any rate, they waked up the minds of Englishmen ; taught them the courteous manners of the French; introduced them to the songs, the history, and the language of a more polished people ; taught them to build beautifully in stone ; in many ways added beauty to their lives ; and gave them the habit of crossing and recrossing the narrow sea which separated them from their neighbors. For William still remained the duke of Normandy, as well as the king of England. The Good Laws of Henry II, n 54-1 189 William's great grandson, Henry II, was a strong king and a wise lawyer. He made changes in the courts HOW ENGLAND BEGAN 201 which brought about in England a justice which other countries had not yet dreamed of. Before his time priests and all men who by writing their names could prove that they had been educated in the church schools were tried, not in the king's courts, but in the courts of the church. Henry, thinking these church courts too lenient, and believing it unjust for some men to escape due punishment, ruled that churchmen who were guilty of common crime should be punished in his courts like common men. He had a quarrel with the pope about this, and had to give up a part of his plan. However, he made another plan whereby twelve men in each hundred, 1 and four in each township, should investigate crimes and bring suspected persons before the judges. King Henry introduced a new kind of trial, also. According to old custom God was asked to give some sign as to whether or not an accused man was guilty. Perhaps the arms and legs of the accused person were tied, and he was thrown into a pond or a stream of water. If he really was guilty, he would float, people believed, but if he was innocent, he would sink. This was because water, " above which the voice of the Lord had thundered," being pure, could not receive into itself anything impure. In another kind of trial the accused man, after he had taken holy water and had been blessed by the priest and had fasted for three days, grasped a red-hot iron in his hands, took three steps, and cast it from him. After three days his hand was examined, and if there was no wound, he was declared not guilty. Even the wise King Henry kept this kind of trial for certain crimes, such as murder and robbery. But for smaller crimes he made a more just and merciful plan. Twelve men were chosen to investigate the matter, They Seepage 185. 202 THE NEWER NATIONS talked with the man himself, inquired from his neighbors concerning him, examined any objects that would help them to learn the truth. Then they decided among themselves as to whether or not he was guilty. This is so great an improvement over the old manner of trial Pilgrims Leaving a Town Notice the town wall with towers, gate, and portcullis that we have kept it with little change to our own day. We call those twelve men the "jury." King Henry was teaching his people what justice was, and they were learning at the same time what Liberty freedom meant. During a century or so large Towns towns had been growing up at road crossings, at fords in rivers, around castles and monasteries. These towns were small in comparison with ours. HOW ENGLAND BEGAN 203 They were circled about and shut in by moats and walls with gates and portcullises and drawbridges, like those of a castle. Inside this wall the houses were built close, as in the old Greek city. There were no lawns, and neighbors had only a wall between them. The streets were narrow, with often not enough room for two carts to pass. Yet space was always saved in the heart of the city for the market-place, or the churchyard, where all the men of the town could come together for trade or talk or war. The peo- ple of this close-packed little town' were most of them common folk. And wherever it was, the land on which it was built be- longed to some lord — noble or bishop or king. To him the town owed taxes and obedience. Often this lord was hard upon the people. He demanded too much money from them. He quartered his soldiers in their houses. He cruelly punished men for little misdeeds. He threw innocent men into prison, that he might get ransoms for them. Perhaps he made them pay heavy toll for using a bridge or a road. Perhaps he taxed them for setting up stalls in the market-place. Perhaps he compelled the people to go many miles to his castle in Paying Toll on a Bridge The man on the right is collecting toll for the lord who owns the bridge. The country people are bringing their cattle, pigs, and lambs to sell at the town shown in the background. From an old stainea- glass window in a Belgian church 204 THE NEWER NATIONS order to try law cases, thus wasting their time and spoil- ing their business. Under such circumstances the people would talk these matters over, and after much discussion might decide to buy from their lord, if they could, the privilege of being free from these troubles. They would send a few of their number to the lord to say : "Our lord, if you will do so and so for us, we will promise to pay you yearly such and such a sum of money. We will write out this promise of ours on a parchment and will sign it, if you will likewise write out and sign your promise." Often the lord, because he needed money to go to war or to repair his castle or to prepare a tournament, would be glad to sign such a charter. Here are the words of one granted by John, king of England, to a town called Helleston : "Know that we have granted and by this our charter have confirmed that our town of Helleston shall be a free town and that our burgesses of this town shall have a gild-merchant 1 and shall be free from tolls throughout our realm ; whether the tolls be for crossing a bridge or using a road or for having a stall in a market or for loading a ship or for the use of the soil. . . . We grant also to them that their law- cases concerning the matters and tenures of their town shall be heard only within the walls of their own town." When a village was governed by its lord, it had no English- voice in its own ruling. But in these free towns men like Helleston the townsmen met, elected offi- **■*" cers and aldermen, collected money to pay town Lccal Self- expenses, and made market rules and police govern- laws. Men in such a town would learn to ap- ment predate their rights as common people, to rule themselves, to think about the duty of a lord and a king to his people. 1 See page 263. HOW ENGLAND BEGAN 205 By the time King Henry died, therefore, Englishmen had learned much about good government. There still existed the memory of Anglo-Saxon free talk and law- making in town-moot and folk-moot. 1 Men had come to expect crimes to be searched out and punished, and accused persons to be justly tried. The people of many towns had gained freemen's charters and were ruling themselves. And men still remembered the good King Alfred as an ideal ruler with whom to compare others. After Henry II came two kings of a very different sort. One of his sons, Richard I, Lionheart, was a dashing knight and a hero of brave stories, but he was not a good king. He loved war and glory Richard above all things. He had continual struggles Il8o _ IIOO ' in France, where, he was a mighty duke. He went far over seas to Jerusalem to fight. So, in order to support armies and hire ships and build castles, he laid heavy taxes on Englishmen. He unjustly took wool and holy dishes of gold and silver from rich monasteries. He was once captured and put into prison by his enemy, the German emperor, and in order to buy his freedom every man in England was forced to give one quarter of all his movable goods — horses and cattle, plows and wagons and crops ; furniture, clothes, and jewels ; the stocks in mer- chants 7 shops. The people groaned under this heavy taxing. King John and the Great Charter After Richard, came his brother John. He had been a rebel against his father and against his brother. Over and over again men have called him the worst king England ever had. He was a selfish man, cruel and wicked. He had a furious temper. He was extravagant and eager for money. Again and again he Seepages 185-186. 2o6 THE NEWER NATIONS King John's Cruel Acts took immense sums from rich and from poor, from church and from people. Men dared not refuse to pay, for the king had countless ways of wringing the money from them. Roger of Wendover, an old chronicler, tells of a time when "by the king's order, all the Jews throughout England of both sexes were seized, imprisoned, and tortured severely, in order to do the king's will with their money ; some of them after being tor- tured gave up all they had and prom- ised more, that they might thus es- cape." People were thrown into prison for no worse crime than that they were enemies of the king, i A certain church- man who had whispered against him was imprisoned, and a heavy cap of lead put upon his head so that the weight slowly killed him. The wife and son and daughter of a great Irish noble who had rebelled against John were loaded with chains, thrown into prison, and there starved to death. In Notice the long toes of many i eS s terrible ways people were the shoes. They were ■, t* sometimes turned up annoyed and abused. Roger says that a 1irdi a e St rth d chls the while John was once having a quarrel with the church " religious men and other persons . . . when found traveling on the road, were dragged from their horses, robbed, and basely ill- treated by the agents of the king." Again the chronicler says : " There were at this time in the kingdom of Eng- land many nobles, whose wives and daughters the king had insulted . . . others whom he had by unjust exac- tions reduced to the extreme of poverty; some whose King John HOW ENGLAND BEGAN 207 parents and kindred he had exiled, converting their inheri- tances to his own use ; thus the said king's enemies were as numerous as his nobles.' ' And the chronicler might have said, "And y among church- men and common people there was none that loved him." At last these Englishmen, whose ancestors had been long training in the moots of Anglo- Saxon times, un- der the wise rule of Alfred, in the courts and under the just laws of Henry II, and in the self-government of the free towns, determined to endure John's cruelty and injustice no longer. Stephen Langton, a great archbishop, became the leader of the revolt. When many people were one day met in church to hear £ he mass, he called aside a few barons who were Rebel there and said, according to Roger of Wendover : " 'A charter of Henry I, king of England, has just now been found, by which you may if you wish it, recall your long lost rights, and your former conditions.' And plac- ing a paper in the midst of them he ordered it to be read aloud for all to hear." This Henry I was the great-grandfather of John and son of William the Conqueror. He had drawn up a char- ter in which he had promised to rule justly according to The Castle of an English Baron 208 THE NEWER NATIONS the old Saxon laws and not to demand so many and so heavy payments of money as his father had done, but only those dues that every man owed his lord. f Viar+or /vf Henry I Henry had kept his promises, and this charter had been a precious document. But here was his wicked great-grandson, John, ruling as though no such promise had ever been made to the English people. Imagine the joy of these troubled barons when they read in this yellow old parchment the promises that a king had made to their ancestors a hundred years before ! "When this paper had been read and understood by the barons who heard it," Roger says, " they were much pleased with it, and all of them, in the archbishop's presence, swore that when they saw a fit opportunity, they would stand up for their rights, if necessary would die for them." At Easter they gathered, 2000 knights besides common horsemen and foot soldiers, and sent their paper to the The king. But it was no longer merely the old Barons charter of King Henry. With discussion men Defy the had come to see more clearly the rights of the g people and the duties of a king. So it was a new, a larger and more precious charter that they were asking their king to sign. When John heard it, he cried out: "Why don't they ask for my kingdom? I will never grant such liberties as will make me a slave." So the messenger carried the charter and the king's refusal back to the waiting army. Then that grim host began to besiege castles and towns that belonged to the king. London and a few other cities opened their gates and welcomed in this "army of God and the Holy Church," because it was fighting for the people's rights. Barons and common men came flocking to the army from all sides until, the chronicler says, King John was deserted by almost every one and hardly had seven knights out of all HOW ENGLAND BEGAN 209 who had ever served him. Every face that he looked upon looked back with stern hate. He could not get his own people to serve as his soldiers against this army of Englishmen. He could get no money from his rebellious subjects to hire a foreign army. After sixteen years of cheating, of greed and cruelty, he was now trapped by his own sins. No man could more hate to be beaten, and John was all the time in his heart swearing ven- geance. Yet he saw that he must sign. So he sent a message to the barons asking them to appoint a time and place. On the fifteenth of June, 1215, the two parties met at Runnymede. The king's attendants were on one side of the river. On the other side was drawn up "the army of God and the Holy Church," and *^£ y * the chronicler says that it is not necessary to tell who they were, "since the whole nobility of England were now assembled together in numbers not to be com- puted." On a small island in the river King John met twenty-five of the barons and under the eyes of the determined army on the banks signed the Great Charter. Nor did he sign it for himself alone, but, as he writes, "for us and our heirs forever." Probably the old barons were not thinking of future ages but of their own time and their own troubles. Yet Englishmen who have come after them through seven hundred years have more and more re- , e reat vered that old charter. It has been the battle- cry of men fighting for liberty. It has been called the bulwark of English freedom, a part of the " Bible of the English constitution," " a common blessing of the whole people." Englishmen still look back to June fifteenth as the birthday of their liberties. There are sixty-three articles in that old charter. 2IO THE NEWER NATIONS Some of them concern matters that no longer interest us. But some of them are the most precious possessions of to-day: for example, the beginning of the people's right to control the taxing of themselves. The king promises that when he desires to levy a tax for certain purposes, he will call the bishops and barons and all men who hold land from him to a meeting where the matter shall be discussed. He distinctly says that no tax shall be imposed (outside of certain dues that every- body had for centuries considered just) " unless with the consent of the Common Council of our realm.' ' Five hundred years later, when Englishmen in the American colonies said to the English king, "No taxation without representation," they felt that they were but repeating what the nobles had asked and won in the Great Charter. Most important of all the sections of the charter, per- haps, are these two : "No freeman shall be taken, or im- prisoned, or disseized, or outlawed, or exiled, or in any way harmed . . . save by the lawful judgment of his peers or by the law of the land. ... To none will we sell, to none deny or delay, right or justice." As we read the words, we can see the stern faces of the men whose relatives and friends John had outraged, exiled, robbed, thrown into prison to die or to be bought out by then- wealthy families. In later times when men were being oppressed and imprisoned by their kings, they cried out against them as promise-breakers, for they felt that when their ancestors had forced King John to sign this article, they had gained " full protection for property and person to every human being that breathes English air." It was, to be sure, the nobles who chiefly made up the strength of "the army of God and the Holy Church" and who gained most by the charter. Yet there were com- moners, too, in the army — merchants from the free towns, HOW ENGLAND BEGAN 211 probably, and farmers from the more prosperous districts. For a certain section promised justice to the people in the matter of fines for breaking the law — small fines for small faults. And no matter what the fault or what the fine, men were to be left the means by which they earned their bread — his land to the farmer, his merchan- dise to the merchant, his wagon to the poor peasant. Moreover, there was granted safety for merchants, foreigners often, whom John had been used to annoy and rob. "All merchants may safely and securely go out of England and come into England, and also delay and pass through England, as well by land as by water, for the purpose of buying and selling, free from all evil taxes, sub- ject to the ancient and right customs. " Some of the free towns, too, gained privijeges. "And the city of Lon- don/' says the charter, "shall have all its old liber- ties and free customs as well by land as by water. Moreover, we will and grant that all other cities and boroughs, and towns and ports shall have all their liberties and free customs." The promises made in the charter were impor- An English Merchant in Rich Clothes tant, but the fact that there was a charter at all was more important. These men had not bought it with money, as so many towns had done : they had got it at'the point of the sword. They had forced a king to do their bidding, to rec- 212 THE NEWER NATIONS ognize their rights. John had signed against his will. He had left the green meadow of Runnymede, curs- Results of mg an( j tearing his hair and raging like a mad- Charter man. Yet the charter stood, in spite of his fury. The people had made a weapon with which to control their kings. Thus, while Germany was falling to pieces and France was building up the power of the king, England was slowly preparing for the power of the people, was develop- ing a popular government. 1. In what ways were Alfred and Charlemagne alike? In what ways were they different? Which do you admire more ? Keep a note- book for a few days, as King Alfred did. (See page 189.) 2. Make a list of ways in which England suffered from the Norman conquest, and a list of benefits that followed. 3. Why would a town grow up at a cross-road or a river ford ? Write the imaginary history of such a town, telling how it began and how it grew* (For information about the growth of towns, see Allsopp, Introduction to English Industrial History, pp. 59-63, or Guest, Social History of England, pp. 60-63.) 4. Try to find out what helped the growth of your own town (or the one nearest to you). 5. What one of the Anglo-Saxon moots was most like our state legislature? What one was like our Congress? What one was like the Athenian assembly? (See page 51.) 6. Some of our American towns now hold town meetings like the Anglo-Saxon town-moot. Hold such a meeting to discuss some class project, — organizing a loan library, planning a Saturday class picnic. 7. Appoint a judge and a jury of twelve, like King Henry's jury, and let them try a classmate for the imaginary breaking of some law. What is the use- fulness of the jury? 8. Some of the girls would get pleasure and profit from embroidering on linen pictures like those of the Bayeux tapestry. (See pictures on pages 193 to 200.) 20° 10° 0° 10" EUROPE "\\/ '" 1 ABOUT THE CLOSE OP THE y 1 ^-^^ . / TWELFTH CENTURY / ^^^^Jl/ SCALE OF MILES / T ■ "fl^ P V> 060 100 200300400500 / ~y js^J^' 1 VtfLJ *^ 1 1? Boundary of feudal dominions / *CY&p t ^"~} / in France held by the English king. / M^^^Jr / f*r 50° Life / ^\^^ es^ j i _ f j~ J *s i^'L / A /*Sx panMillrf ( Bremen^} T*% C_ / /^~^^-^i=r , ^^x~-v C !A^^^ ii, ' ,J?6 !,^' / / sr-^svc^s/ o y>-^ f~~^z^j / / ^^"-~-— ^ / / "--. 3 {jH s 1 / iuren ilergo 1 ' ^ / t^tf Sq /_Ej^ « ' Angs) / Yr\J R qJ / C^ \ / \ *-cv r r ii/^v^. \ftSJ& 40° M *h ♦PATBIUCNVV . K) 0FST> / V ~^L_\ ^jr — ~~~~J^~L^_ n / / r^fe^S^^ \ under the earth that bringeth folk into the Wood of the Serpent, and when I was a child I. went through it. Dig here and you shall find it, and we may escape without danger.' "Then Renaud came to the place, Battering Ram Notice the difference between this armor and that in the Bayeux tapestry. This is about 400 years later. It is made of iron plates and they digged in the earth and found the way that the old man said, and Renaud, his wife and children, his brethren and the remnant of his folk, put themselves in the way, and Renaud made great plenty of torches to be fired, that they might see the better. ... So long they went that they came to the mouth of the cave and found them in the Wood of the Serpent at day spring . . . [and thereafter came to Renaud' s own town]. And when they of the city knew that their lord was come, they were glad and came out to meet him CASTLE LIFE 227 in fair company and made great feast through all the town." x But besiegers were not always forced to wait for star- vation to conquer the castle. They could make many machines to help them. These were much like the Roman engines, 2 for they had the same sort ieg . e of work to do. In spite of the centuries that had passed, the castle and walled tower of the Middle Ages were much like the walled camp and fortified city of late Roman times. So the knights made battering rams much like the Roman ones and for the same purpose of knock- ing down the stone walls. They made movable towers and catapults for throwing stones. They dug mines as the Romans had done and used scaling ladders. But of course the castle men had ways of protecting themselves. Guards were always in the towers watch- ing and at sign of danger gave signal and H & called the other fighting men; for in time of castieMen siege the warriors slept ready for the fray, Could Pro- with their swords at their sides. There were te * tThem ~ selves secret passages leading out of the castle and little strong gateways in hidden places. Here a little body of men sometimes stole out at night and fell upon the sleeping camp and, after they had quickly done some mischief, slipped back into safety with only a few men lost, perhaps. The castle men, moreover, had engines on their wall and sent stones crashing into tents and rolling towers. They threw fire on the enemy's wooden engines and poured down burning pitch and lime and boiling water upon the men working below with the battering ram or the scaling ladders. 1 To be sure, the castles of Charlemagne's time were not so elaborate, but the later story-teller did not know this. l See pages 101-103. 228 THE NEWER NATIONS The Warlike Spirit of the Age The Middle Ages were a time of fierce war and cruelty. I suppose it is impossible for us in our day to imagine how much fighting there was. Every one thought it the only work fit for a gentleman. The nobles loved it and thirsted for fight as the old Vikings had done. It was, moreover, every great noble's right to go to war whenever he pleased, without asking the consent of his king or his people. The consequence was that war was very common. And where war is the chief business of life we cannot The expect to find men gentle and kind. There Cruelty was in nearly every castle a deep dungeon of the underground, without windows to give light and air, without chairs to sit on or beds to lie on. Here men were sometimes kepfc for months and years, merely because they were the enemies of the castle lord and had been captured. The punishments for crimi- nals were horrible. William the Conqueror prided him- self on his kindness, because he never sentenced a man to death. Yet he ordered men's tongues cut out and their hands cut off and their eyes blinded. Many a knight was vain of his " honor" as he called it. If a man in a crowd accidentally pushed against him, if a knight of less nobility walked before him through a doorway, he would throw his glove into the offender's face, and the other knight for his honor's sake would snatch it up angrily. In a few moments or a few hours, as soon as the plans could be made, these two men, on horseback and in full armor, with spear and sword, would be fighting a duel ; and one of them or both would be left wounded or dead on the field. If for a few months there was no war and no cause for CASTLE LIFE 229 a duel, the hunger for fighting grew into a madness among the knights, and one great lord or another would announce a tournament. Then there was joy in the A Tournament Seats have been built for spectators. Emperor and empress are watching. Horses are wearing armor. Two splintered spears on ground show that this is not the first charge. One assailant has now run the other through, and the heralds are blowing the end of the tournament castles around about and polishing of armor and making of new trappings for the horses and surcoats for the knights. The ladies, too, were all excitement, each one 230 THE NEWER NATIONS hoping that her chosen knight would win, and giving him her glove or an embroidered sleeve or a bit of her girdle to wear in his helmet. On the great day all ourna- ^ e ladies of the district and the greatest of the lords, perhaps, and the young pages would sit on tiers of benches that had been built at the sides of a level meadow. On the plain before them the knights on their war horses would clash together in fight. The battles were supposed to be mock fights, but often the mockery became real earnest, and perhaps a score of knights would be killed, for nothing but a game. A man's life was cheap in those days. Sir Thomas Malory tells of Launcelot, the mirror of perfect knighthood, how, at a tournament, for mere sport and upholding of his fame, he " thrust in with his spear in the thickest of the press, and there he smote down with one spear five knights, and of four of them he brake their backs. . . . Anon therewithal Sir Launcelot gat [another] great spear in his hand, and, or ever that great spear brake, he bare down to the earth sixteen knights, some horse and man, and some the man and not the horse, and there was none [he hit that bare arms again] that day. And then he gat another great spear, and smote down twelve knights, and the most part of them never throve after/' that is, they died. And yet according to the same story this was "the meekest man and the gentlest that ever ate in hall among ladies." Most of these knights were nobles. That is, they and How a their fathers and their grandfathers had been Knight lords of castles and wide lands, with vassals toward anc * servants t° do them honor. All this had Common made them very proud, thinking themselves People much better than men of common blood. It seemed to them that the world had been made for CASTLE LIFE 231 noblemen, and the common people were but to serve them. The lords thought little of trampling down the poor men's crops in their wars or their hunts. They had loaned the land to these farmers, and in return they claimed from them so much money and so much work that the peasants were often poor and miserable — how poor the next chapter will tell. There was another class of people, also, whom the nobles looked down upon : namely, the merchants. For some strange reason a noble thought he had a right to take whatever he could from them. He made them pay for traveling on roads that went through his land, for crossing a bridge over one of his streams, for selling goods in his town near the castle. If he lived on a great river, he made the merchants who passed in boats pay toll. Only a man of some wealth could be a knight. He must have steel armor to cover his body, a helmet to protect his head, a long shield to cover him from neck to ankles, a sword to hang at his side, a battle-ax, and long lances. He E ^ ^ ent s must have a strong horse to carry him and his heavy armor. He was not content with a poor saddle. It must be of thick leather with carved pommel, made, if possible, in the south of France, where they did good A Knight of the Thirteenth Century His outer garment of cloth is called the surcoat. His hood, gauntlets, and mailed shirt are all of one piece, woven of iron links. Spurs are tied about his ankles 232 THE NEWER NATIONS work in leather. His reins must be embroidered and perhaps studded with jewels, and his beloved horse must be gay with coverings of silk and gold embroidery. His sword should be made in Spain of steel so sharp that it could cut a silk scarf thrown into the air and so tough that it could slash a shield of steel. Its handle he liked to have of gold with a few precious stones shining, and his spurs, also, must be of gold. He wanted his armor made by some famous, cunning armorer so that every link would hold against a sword stroke. He must have a surcoat or cloak of embroidered silk to throw over his armor when he was riding at peace. He must have at least one follower, or squire, to ride with him and carry his heavy shield and long lances in moments of peace and to help him put on and take off his clumsy armor. So most knights were men of wealth. Knightly Ideals and Training Knighthood meant more than fighting, however. In Sir Thomas Malory's old English story-book is a descrip- tion of Sir Launcelot, the ideal knight. One of his brother knights is mourning over Launcelot's dead body, saying : " Thou were the courtiest knight that ever bare shield; and thou were the truest friend to thy lover that ever bestrode horse ; and thou were the truest lover of a sinful man that ever loved woman ; and thou were the kindest man that ever strake with sword ; and thou were the goodliest person ever came among press of knights ; and thou was the meekest man and the gentlest that ever ate in hall among ladies ; and thou were the sternest knight to thy mortal foe that ever put spear in the rest." That was the knight's ideal — not only to be brave and strong, but to be well mannered and gentle, to be a true friend and a lover of ladies. CASTLE LIFE 233 Chaucer, the first great English poet, describes a young squire who is preparing for knighthood. What he says shows that a knight was not to be a mere rough fighter. He describes the squire as x "A lover and lusty bachelor, With locks all curled, as they were laid in press. Of twenty years of age he was, I guess. Of his stature he was of even length, And wondrous nimble he was and great of strength. . . . Embroidered was he as it were a mede All full of freshest flowers, white and red. Singing he was or fluting all the day ; He was as fresh as is the month of May. Short was his gown, with sleeves both long and wide. . . . Well could he sit on horse and fairly ride, Was able songs to make and well endite, Joust, too, and dance, and well could draw and write. Courteous he was, lowly and serviceable, And carved before his father at the table." Now, a young man could not learn all of these things in a moment — to carve at the table, to draw and write, to make and sing songs, to dance and to have pretty manners, to ride his horse and carry his Training lance and swing his sword and hold his shield hood cleverly, and to be brave always. He had to go through a long course of training. It began when he was only a little boy. Sometimes he stayed at home for his education ; but usually he went to live for years at the castle of some other famous and wealthy knight. The castle family which he entered might be made up of two or three hundred people. The kitchen might be 1 Chaucer's poem was written about 1386. His strange old spelling and some of his old-fashioned words make the verses difficult to read, so I havq changed them a little. 234 THE NEWER NATIONS A Castle Family a great room a hundred feet long and wide, with three or four huge fireplaces, where whole deer and pigs and sheep could hang and turn over the coals. There were, perhaps, twenty or thirty men and boys to cook and clean, running about from kneading tables to fires with great copper kettles or big loads of wood for the flame. At the barracks out in the court- yard there might be a hundred common soldiers, prac- tising with the crossbow, a powerful weapon so stiff that a man had to pull it back with a crank. In the ladies' bower was the lord's wife with perhaps twenty serving women. Some had mantles thrown over their knees and were embroidering the edges. Others sat before tapestry frames and wove with bright threads. A few were cutting and sewing new robes of silk or fur. In the meadow outside the castle were perhaps thirty knights, followers of the lord, bound to serve him at all times and in return supported at his expense. They were exercising their horses and practising with their spears. The boy's education began in the ladies' bower. He chose one lady and served her lovingly for several years as her page. He helped her in every way that he could — ran upon her errands, carried her messages, held her horse, carried her falcon, wound her yarn, held her embroidery basket. And from her he learned many things. She told him stories of the saints and of great knights. She taught him to bow gracefully and to dance. Perhaps she could read, and spent an hour a day with him over some huge book with big letters and Crossbowman The crossbow -was the most deadly weapon invented before the use of gunpowder The Page CASTLE LIFE 235 bright pictures. Surely she could sing and play the harp and helped him to learn that art. She saw to it that the castle minstrel spent an hour now and then with her page and taught him some of his great knowledge. She made sure that the boy went frequently to church and to confession, and she talked with the castle priest and asked his help and advice in training her little page to be an honorable, Christian knight. So the ladies and the priest tried to teach the boy knowledge and gentle manners before they let him learn from the knights the fierce practices of war. When the page was large enough and strong enough (perhaps when he was twelve or thirteen years old), he became the squire of some knight, as he had before been the page of a lady. The squires led busy lives. Every morning they went to the stables arid helped . to care for the war-horses and hunting horses. And well tended those horses were. Cloth of silk was not too fine to rub down their shining coats, for they were the best beloved of their masters' hearts. The horse and the knight had lived together for many a year in peace and war. They had often been wounded together. Together they had lain down at night on a hard-fought field. Together they may have fled in fear and shame from a lost battle. So it was a young squire's great duty and great pleasure to learn to care for a noble war-horse, looking forward to the time when he should have a shin- ing sorrel of his own, with thick, arching neck and high- lifted hoofs and nervous nostrils and intelligent eyes. The squire served his master in many ways. He made his bed, he stood behind him at table, carved his meat, carried his plate, and filled his cup. He helped him to dress and undress. He polished his helmet and sword and shield until they were like mirrors. He mended the leather 236 THE NEWER NATIONS dress that was worn under the long link armor, and he kept it oiled and soft. He carefully inspected the armor, and if a link was broken or if a sword or lance had slashed it in battle, he took the coat of mail to the armorer's shop in the castle court and had it mended. But, best of all, he followed his lord to war, carried his extra lances in battle, rescued him and took him off the field, if he was wounded. Thus he learned the things that he needed to know. And, besides, his knight taught him how to mount a horse in one spring, without touching the stirrup ; how to receive a stroke with his shield and so guard himself ; how to hold his heavy lance firm ; how to swing the long- sword. He tried to train him, too, in courage and faith- fulness and courtesy. Some day, when the boy was full grown and had done a brave deed, or by strength and gentleness had shown himself worthy of knighthood, his lord would Kni htin knight him. That was the greatest day of his life. Perhaps the knighting would be done in a moment, on the field, after a battle where the squire had done some brave thing. Perhaps it would be done in the castle yard in time of peace. In that case the squire would bathe and put on fresh, new garments, as he was to begin a new, clean life. All night he would spend in the chapel before the altar, where lay his sword and lance and shield ; for every knight must be a lover of Christ and a defender of the church, and his weapons must be consecrated to God's cause. But whether the knighting was done in haste on the battle-field or with all gorgeousness at home, among ad- miring friends, the great moment was when the young squire knelt before his lord, waiting to be made a knight. Malory tells how King Arthur knighted Tor. "Then Tor I 237 J 2 3 8 THE NEWER NATIONS The Knighting A squire has done brave service in a battle, and a friendly knight is giving him knighthood alight off his mare and pulled out his sword, kneeling and requiring the king that he would make him knight and that he might be a knight of the Table Round. 'As for a knight, I will make you, • [said King Arthur] ; and therewith smote him in the neck with the sword, saying, ' Be ye a good knight, and so I pray to God so ye may be, and if ye be of prowess and of worthiness, ye shall be a knight of the Table Round/ " After that stroke on the back of the neck to test his courage, the young man rose, a knight. And his lord gave him a sword and belted it on with his own hands and buckled golden spurs on the new knight's heels and CASTLE LIFE 239 gave him a shield. Often he told him what were the duties of a knight and encouraged him to be worthy of his new name. Lord Tennyson, one of the great English poets of our own time, has King Arthur tell what he made his knights of the Round Table promise before he would accept them : "I made them lay their hands in mine and swear To reverence the King as if he were Their conscience, and their conscience as their King, To break the heathen and uphold the Christ, To ride abroad redressing human wrongs, To speak no slander, no, nor listen to it, To honor his own word as if his God's, To lead sweet lives in purest chastity, To love one maiden only, cleave to her, And worship her by years of noble deeds.' ' Knightly Pleasures The chief joy of these knights was in battle, yet there were gentler sports. About every castle was good hunt- ing ; for farms were fewer then than now, and TT ':■ Hunting there were more forests and open fields. Deer and wild boar and bear were common in them. All these were good eating, and the castle families were fond of wild meats and fonder yet of the excitement of the hunt. Every castle had kennels with dozens of dogs, and in the stables hunting horses, smaller and quicker than the knights' heavy war-horses. Men went hunting, not in armor, as they went to battle, but in gay cloth suits, with fur capes flung over their shoulders, perhaps, and heavy gloves to protect their hands. Instead of swords they carried bows and quivers of arrows or stout hunting spears and always a broad, sharp knife in the belt ; for a boar was a savage 240 THE NEWER NATIONS beast, and sometimes the hunter had to protect himself at short range. Twenty knights, perhaps, would start out from the castle on their prancing horses, with laughter and shouting and blowing of horns. Among them walked the keepers of the hounds, holding back the excited dogs, that were leaping and straining at the end of their leashes. All day the party scoured the woods. The hounds tracked the game, and the hunters followed, coming in with their spears and knives to kill the animal when it was cornered. Hunting was a savage game, less brutal than war, but a good training for warlike quickness and courage. No man was thought a good knight unless he was also a good hunter, and great and wise kings and bishops were proud of skill and courage in the chase. William the Con- queror owned great "deer parks" or stretches of wild forest, where no one was allowed to hunt except at his invitation, 1 and the old Anglo- Saxon Chronicle says, "he loved the tall deer, as he were their father." King Alfred trained his own hounds, Charlemagne was famous with the hunting spear, and Fred- erick II was proud of his hunt- ing leopards. Hawking was a gentler, prettier sport. The ladies, as __ , . well as the knights, Hawking ° ' were lovers of this. A hawking party went to hunt only rabbits and hares and such wild birds as are good to eat, — ducks, geese, partridges, quails, and the t See page 195. A Gentleman Hawking The bird is held by leather thongs CASTLE LIFE 241 like. On the wrist of every hunter perched a hawk or falcon, carefully trained and tended at the falcon house in the castle yard. As the gay party rode along, chatting and laughing, the falcon's head was hooded, so that he could not see to fly away. He was, moreover, held by a little silver chain or leather leash attached to his leg. As the party entered the wood, they grew more quiet, lest they might frighten the game, and they scattered through the forest in twos or threes. If a hunter caught sight of a flying duck, he took off the hood from his hawk's head and loosed the leash from its leg. In a moment the falcon's sharp eyes saw the game. A spring, and he was in the air, flying with his strong wings toward the bird. Once or twice he circled above it, then fell upon it with his savage talons and beak and killed it. The hunter, eagerly watching, at this moment blew, on a little silver whistle, a note that his hawk knew. The falcon, hearing the call, dropped the bird and, flying to his master, settled upon his wrist to be petted and fed some tidbit. Meantime a servant let go a dog, which sought out the dead game and brought it back. At the end of the day dozens of birds would be hanging at saddlebows. The party would return to feast in the castle hall, to sit about the fire and tell tales of their clever falcons, to hear the minstrel sing of the joys of hawking in the greenwood. Folk in castle days were great lovers of poetry. There were few books to read, and few people could read them. Instead, there was the minstrel, for the common folk. He* wandered about from town to town, afoot, with a stick and a bundle over his shoulder and a viol slung at his back. At ^ Mmstre i ? i Son s some busy street corner, where many people passed, he would unsling his viol and begin thrumming the 242 THE NEWER NATIONS strings. At the merry sound doors would open ; feet would begin running ; glad shouts would be raised ; and men, women, and children would crowd about. Then the min- strel, while he played on his viol, would begin singing, perhaps a song like this good old ballad of Scotland : Ye Highlands, and ye Lowlands, Oh, where have you been ? They have slain the Earl of Murray, And they laid him on the green. " Now wae be to thee, Huntly ! And wherefore did ye sae ? I bade you bring him wi' you, But forbade you him to slay." He was a braw gallant, And he rid at the ring ; 1 And the bonny Earl of Murray, Oh, he might have been a king ! He was a braw gallant, And he played at the ba' ; And the bonny Earl of Murray Was the flower amang them a\ He was a braw gallant, And he played at the glove ; And the bonny Earl of Murray, Oh, he was the queen's love. Oh, lang will his lady Look o'er the Castle l3owne, E'er she see the Earl of Murray Come sounding through the town ! *A game in which the knight, riding at a gallop, tried with his spear to pick off rings huner on a standard. CASTLE LIFE 243 Almost every castle had a poet of its own. There he lived and did his work — the making and singing of pretty songs. At weddings and on birthdays and gay holidays he must make special new ^ ts ° as e lays and stand up when the company was gathered at dinner and sing for their delight. On the evenings of common days, too, the big family gathered in the great hall to talk and tell stories, and at last the minstrel must sing. Perhaps the lord would give him a subject — love or a battle or yesterday's hunt — and would demand a new song made up on the moment. The King Dines The minstrel often played as the servants brought in the food There are very few people who can do that thing, but some of these old poets were clever at it. Some of the castle poets had great genius, and they found one lord's castle too small. Most of them loved adventure and found settled life too tame. Then they took to the road. If they were ^ ren ? h , , . 1 i« i t<< Trouba- poor, they went afoot, as the minstrels did. 11 dours one was richer, he rode on a horse, with a mule to carry his harp and viol and his precious book or two and his extra clothing. Perhaps there was a boy to lead the mule and to wait upon the master. 244 THE NEWER NATIONS Such a singer in southern France was called a trouba- dour, and there were scores of them in that rich, song- loving land. The names of four hundred are still re- membered and many of their songs preserved in books. A famous troubadour went only to the great castles, where he would find men and women of education who would appreciate his poetry and who could pay him well; for poets must live. When he approached the castle, there would be a great stir. The guard would quickly let down the drawbridge and pull up the portcullis and would send a message to his lord and lady, "A troubadour has come!" When the family gathered at dinner that night, there would be more bright looks and more gay laughter than usual. Perhaps, if it was spring, and the air was sweet, the lord would order the midday meal in the garden outside the moat on the river bank. That was a busy scene, with dozens of serving boys run- ning about under the high trees, carrying trestles and boards for the tables, great platters of steaming meats, drinking cups of silver and even a few of gold for the ladies. Perhaps two servants together would proudly carry a silver plate with the greatest delicacy of all — a roast peacock, its beautiful feathers all carefully saved and so arranged over the roasted body that the bird seemed alive and spreading its proud tail. But the ladies and gentlemen of that company were more gay than any peacock. The women were in long robes of shining silk that trailed rustling over A G3.V Company ^ e grass. And not a lady was content with one color in her dress. Perhaps a long robe of deep blue fell from her neck to her toes, and it was all embroidered over with little apples of gold. The wide cuffs under her hands dropped so low that they brushed CASTLE LIFE 245 the grass, and they were lined with green, like the lights in the peacock's tail. There hung from her shoulders a mantle of dark wine color, and around all its edge was a wide embroidery of golden .flowers and leaves of green like the long cuffs. She and her ladies had kept their needles busy on it for half a year. And about her body was wound a wonderful girdle, all braided and twisted and embroidered like a Persian rug. The gentlemen were quite as gay, with em- broidered capes and crimson shoes and pointed hoods of bright silk and rich fur at neck and wrists, and every one with a jeweled dagger thrust into his belt, a golden chain about his neck, and shining rings on his fingers. When dinner was ended, perhaps the lord himself took the harp and sang a song of his own making and afterwards sent the harp to another and asked for a lay. dour s " s But soon he called for the visiting troubadour, and there was glad clapping of hands from the company. Perhaps the poet would sing of his lady ; for every troubadour was a lover. Sometimes he was a knight and a lover of war as well as of ladies. This song was made by such a man — lord of a castle, a fierce fighter, a friend of kings : A Lady I love the spring tide of the year When leaves and blossoms do abound, And well it pleases me to hear The birds that make the woods resound With their exulting voices. And very well it pleases me Tents and pavilions pitched to see, And oh, my heart rejoices 246 THE NEWER NATIONS A Royal Harper The artist has kindly given crowns to everybody except the servant. The harper is playing while the meal goes on. Doubtless all the few dishes are of gold or silver. Dogs were commonly allowed in the dining hall To see armed knights in panoply Of war on meadow and on lea. Not so much joy in sleep have I, Eating and drinking please me less Than hearing on all sides the cry 'At them I* and horses riderless Among the woodlands neighing. And well I like to hear the call Of 'Help !' and see the wounded fall, Loudly for mercy praying ; And see the dead both great and small, Pierced by sharp spearheads, one and all. To us this seems a brutal song, but the castle com- pany that listened hundreds of years ago liked it very much, I am sure. Every knight remembered his own battles and felt his heart leap with the savage joy of fight, and he shouted applause. Even the ladies clapped their hands ; for they, too, thought that war was noble. Surely the lord of the How Trouba- dours Were Paid CASTLE LIFE 247 castle was pleased with the song and invited the trouba- dour to be his guest as long as he would — for months or for years. But the poet was doubtless a rover, like all his fellows, and after a summer or two sought another castle and new companions. The Time of Chivalry Nobody can tell when chivalry or knighthood began. Doubtless the people of the very time when it was start- ing did not know what was happening, for things begin quietly and change as they .grow. But we know that there were knights in the year 1096. Yet we cannot tell how long before that knighthood may have existed. It is as hard to tell when knighthood ended as when it began. Indeed, kings of England even to-day dub men knights, but a modern knight is a very different kind of person from a knight of the Middle Ages. Those men of earlier times, who dressed in steel armor, carried lances and swords, loved to fight, lived in stone castles, listened to troubadours — when did they disap- pear? They did not drop out of the world all at once. Slowly all things changed — costumes, laws, ways of thinking. The change which had most to do with the dis- appearance of the old-time knights was in the kind of fighting. About 1340 the people of western Europe began to use gunpowder, which they had learned of in their Eastern travels. Now, gunpowder will send a ball through a man's armor, and a cannon ball will tear through a castle wall. So, gradually, as men invented stronger guns, they put off their useless, clumsy armor and abandoned their useless, gloomy castles. Yet all over western Europe we have many of these castles left — some in ruins and some that have been 248 THE NEWER NATIONS kept in repair. The king of England still lives in castles that were built hundreds of years ago, though they have been enlarged, and modern comforts have been added. In museums we have, too, some of the very armor that those olden knights wore. Stored in books we still have many old troubadour songs and many a knightly story. But the best thing that the people of the Middle Ages have left us is the knightly ideal of what a man ought to be. Few knights lived up to it, of course; and in the hundreds of years since then we have learned that war is hideous and not glorious, that work is noble and not shameful, and that all men have equal rights. These are the things that the knights did not know. And yet when we now want to say that a man is most honorable in the keeping of promises, true to his friend and courteous to his enemy; that a lie never stains his lips ; that his manner is gentle and beautiful, — we call him " knightly." Knight In this knight's time fashions are beginning to change from the old link armor to plate armor. The saddle is planned to brace the knight against a thrust 1. Make a play in which a vassal swears fealty to his lord. 2. Model a castle in clay, each one in the class making one building or a part of the wall. 3. In sand model a country with hills, valleys, and rivers, then choose a place for a castle. 4. Did feudalism last longer in France or Germany? Can you tell why? CHAPTER XI THE WORKERS The knights were few, and the common people whom they scorned were many. Doubtless most of those who read this book are descended, not from some knight of the Middle Ages, but from some farmer or trader or craftsman. These common people were oppressed, and they began the long, hard fight for freedom and comfort that we are still fighting. Facts like these ought to make the common men more interesting to us than the fine castle folk. Farmers Common people in the Middle Ages did not own land, as our farmers do ; they only borrowed it from the great people — knights, lords, bishops. 1 One of those gentlemen might own several thousand acres of land, scattered in pieces through the country. Each piece was called a manor, and it had upon it a castle or a strong house. Perhaps the lord himself lived here, or perhaps only an agent, who took care of the manor for him. But however that was, neither the lord nor the agent really worked the land. There was too much of it for one man to till, so it was divided up in a strange way. Some of it the lord kept for himself and called it his domain, or demesne. On this he had grain fields; an orchard of apple and pear trees, perhaps; and a garden where grew onions, mustard, cabbage, peas, and beans. ) See pages 214-216, 249 250 THE NEWER NATIONS Another part of the land was divided into three fields, each as large as one of our farms, with perhaps two or three hundred acres in it. On one great field was planted wheat, the best crop ; on another, oats ; and the third field was left unplanted and was used as a pasture for cattle or sheep. The next spring wheat was planted on last year's oat field, oats on the old pasture, and last season's wheat field was left unplanted. People rotated the crops in this way because the land wore out if they planted wheat on it year after year. These were the fields that were loaned out to the com- mon people. Perhaps a hundred families shared this land. It was cut up into long, narrow strips, with lines of wild grass between instead of fences. Each man had a strip here and a strip there, perhaps as much as thirty acres, scattered about through the three fields. Of course, he might not work these just as he pleased — plant what he liked and harvest when he would. He had to do what all his fellows did. He had to Wo e rk arm let his strips in the fallow field lie fallow when his neighbors planned. On his strips in the oat field, too, he had to plant oats; and in the wheat field, The Ox-plow wheat; as other men wished. Moreover, he had to plow when his fellows plowed, plant when his fellows planted, and harvest when his fellows harvested. For it needed four oxen to pull a plow, and in clay soil eight; Waste •Wasfti Plan op a Manor Showing the three fields divided into strips. The black strips are those belonging to one villain [251 1 252 THE NEWER NATIONS and no poor man could own as many as that, with plows and carts besides. So one man furnished a plow, three or four others an ox apiece, another perhaps two oxen. One day one man held the plow, and another drove the oxen, while their fellows dug the drain ditches. httdiflMKSiHattM__ Cutting Grain Women are doing the work with hand sickles. When harvest time came, they all went together to the great field, each to his own strip. The wives and children, too, were there, every one with a little sickle in his hand. So the big patchwork field was dotted over with moving figures, bending and swaying, and with crisscross rows of standing grain and fallen grain. At rest time several families came together, I suppose, in Stacking the Sheaves friendly fashion and ate their bread and cheese and shared their cider and ale from the leather jugs. And the children, doubtless, ran to the wild patches between the planted strips and played hide-and-seek among the shrubs, and picked daisies and made chains. THE WORKERS 253 When the grain was all cut, the workers raked it up with hand rakes and bound it into sheaves. Then one lent his cart with its heavy wooden wheels, another lent his two oxen to draw it, the harvesters piled it high with bundles and hauled it to the big barn. There they spread the wheat thinly over the floor and with wooden flails beat out the grain from the heads. Then they raked it into piles and with fans blew away the chaff and straw. After that every man came with the woolen sacks his wife had woven, and claimed his share of the grain, ac- cording to the amount of land he held. Some one has called these manors " little islands of cultivation in a great waste/ ' for western Europe was thinly peopled in those days. AH about the manor lay a sea of untitled land. Perhaps it Isolation was wild forest where the lord might hunt, where Manor the peasants' pigs might feed, where the tenants might get wood for their fires and lumber for their build- ing. Or perhaps it was rocky hillsides or rolling moor- land where sheep might feed. Perhaps it was marsh- land where wild hay might be cut or peat taken out for fuel. Whatever it was, it cut off the manor from the rest of the world. For there were few roads made through it, and many robbers lurking in it. Few men, even if their lords had encouraged them to travel, would have chosen to set off on foot through this dangerous wilderness. Besides, they would not have known how far it was to the nearest manor or in what direction it lay. Few peasants, therefore, ever trod any soil but that of their own manor, ever saw any methods of work except those of their own fellows. Very seldom, indeed, did they even see anybody that they had not known all their lives. If ever a visiting lord or king's agent, with his dozen armed followers, or trader with his pack-horse, did 254 THE NEWER NATIONS ride out of the great forest, it was an exciting day for all the people on the manor, and for months they talked of the visitors' strange ways and strange dress and strange speech. So the people in one " little island of cultivation" were knit very close together. They had to do almost every- thing for themselves. They made their own farm tools. They grew their own wheat, and their own lord's miller ground it into flour. They killed their own pigs and smoked their own bacon and hams. They sheared their Hauling the Cart-load Uphill The horses are harnessed tandem own sheep, spun the wool, wove the yarn, and made their own clothes. Their own lord or his agent held court three times a year in the manor house and heard all com- plaints and punished all crimes. They went to the church in the heart of the manor, and in the graveyard beside it buried their dead. For these farmers were not free men. They belonged to the lord who owned the land. They were Services' 1 not exactly his slaves, for he might not kill them or sell them away from the land, but in all mat- ters they had to obey him. Moreover, they had to work for THE WORKERS 255 him in return for the use of his land and for the protec- tion which he gave them. 1 In the spring they had to go to his field and do his plowing before they did their own. At harvest time they cut his wheat and threshed it. Sometimes they furnished the plows and oxen and carts and sickles ; sometimes the lord had his own tools. Each man did much or little, according to the amount of land he used. In fact, just as a great lord loaned out his land to knights and called them to help do his fighting, so a lesser lord loaned his land to common men and called Harrowing The medieval artist did not know how to represent the harrow lying flat. A man is slinging stones at the birds them to do his farm work of all kinds. Besides that, just as the knights had to give money to their lords at certain times, so these common people had to give presents to their lords. For instance, a certain man used about thirty acres of land and in payment had to do the following things for his lord : eighty-two days' work between Michaelmas [September 29th] and June 24th ; eleven and a half days' work between June 24th and August 1st ; nineteen days' work between August 1st and Michaelmas; six extra days' work with one extra man; one extra day's work with two men for reaping, with food from the lord ; half a carriage [this means, I suppose, that he and another 1 See pages 163 and 215-216. 256 THE NEWER NATIONS peasant together furnished a wagon with oxen to haul it] for carrying the wheat ; half a carriage for the hay ; the plowing and harrowing of an acre; one day's harrow- ing of oat land ; one horse load of wood ; making one- quarter 1 of malt and drying it ; one day's work at wash- ing and shearing sheep ; one day's hoeing ; one day's nutting ; three days' mowing ; one day's work in carry- ing to the stack ; help once a year at the lord's will. A certain other man used only a tiny spot of ground in front of his house, and owed only "one day's work on Monday in every week unless a festival prevents him, one hen at Christmas, and five eggs at Easter." Some men were especially good carpenters or blacksmiths and paid for their land by repairing the wooden carts, harrows, and plow frames, by making horseshoes, or by keeping the plowshares and scythes and hoes in order. Besides all these regular dues, the lords made many special demands. If a man's daughter married, he had to make a present to the lord. If his son wished to go to school, he had to buy the lord's permission. If a pig was killed, the lord had to have his share. A man might not grind his own wheat in his own little hand mill, but had to take it to the lord's mill and pay toll for the work. Indeed a villain, or peasant, could hardly turn over his hand without having to pay. As a result of all these dues the peasants were very- poor, and their lives were hard and unlovely. Their houses were mean little things of wood, with ff to" 1 ™ 8 only one room and a dirt floor - At night the Peasants family climbed a ladder to a loft under the thatched roof and slept in their day clothes on piles of straw. In the room below was very little furni- ture — a table on sawhorses, a chest or two, a few stools, 1 Eight bushels. THE WORKERS 257 a brass pot, some wooden bowls, a loom for weaving. A little fire burned on the floor, with no chimney but only a hole in the roof to carry off the smoke. Even in the long winter nights the family went to bed at dark, for candles were costly. Their food would seem poor to us. There were no sweet cakes or puddings, little fresh fruit, and few green vegetables. Fish and peas, or pork and cabbage, were thrown into a pot and boiled and set on the table in one dish. Every one used his fingers or a piece of bread to handle his food. In 1362 there was a common people's poet in England, — William Langland, himself a poor man. This is the picture he gives of "the poor in the cottage, Charged with a crew of children and with a landlord's rent. What they win by their spinning to make their porridge with, Milk and meal, to satisfy the babes — The babes that continually cry for food — This they must spend on the rent of their houses, Ay, and themselves suffer with hunger, With woe in winter rising a-nights, In the narrow room to rock the cradle, Carding, combing, clouting, washing, rubbing, winding, and peeling of rushes. Pitiful is it to read the cottage women's woe, Ay, and many another that puts a good face on it, Ashamed to beg, ashamed to let neighbors know All that they need, noontide and evening. Many the children and nought but a man's hands To clothe and feed them ; and few pennies come in, And many mouths to eat the pennies up." In some countries the lord had the right to punish his villains almost as he would, — to fine them, to brand 258 THE NEWER NATIONS them with red-hot iron, to cut off their hands, to take their land from them and turn them out of their homes. And some landlords there were who served their people in this way. But if the lord was just and kind, his villains might prosper. They might buy their sons' freedom, send The them to school, and make priests of them, struggle They might pay money to the lord for rent, for Free- instead of taking two days out of the week to do his work while their own fields lay neg- lected. They might even buy his permission to leave their land, to go to a town or to another manor and work there for wages as free men. No lord could claim work or gifts from these men or could punish them in his court. Freedom of this sort was the highest ambition of every villain. But it was a difficult thing to gain. Life was so hard that few men could save enough to buy free- dom. Sometimes they tried to gain it by running away through the forest to some other place. If such a man was not caught within a year and a day the law declared that he should be a free man and that his lord had no right to him. But generally he was found before the year was out. Then he was taken back to his old manor, was whipped and branded, and was worse off than before. Once the common people of England banded together against their lords and tried to gain freedom by force of arms. Froissart tells the story of this " Great "The Revolt." He was a lover of nobles and a Revolt" scorner of the common people, yet even as he tells the tale we can see that this was a brave, desperate attempt to get the people's just rights. It is as inspiring a story as that of the gaining of the Great Charter, but a sadder one, because in spite of its justice and in spite of men's earnestness, it failed. THE WORKERS 259 Froissart says: "It is customary in England, as well as in several other countries, for the nobility to have great privileges over the common people ; that is to say, the lower orders are bound by law to plow the lands of the gentry, to harvest their grain, to carry it home to the barn, to thrash and winnow it. They are also bound to harvest and carry home the hay. All these services the prelates and gentlemen exact of their inferiors; and in the counties of Kent, Essex, Sussex, and Bedford, these services are more oppressive than in other parts of the kingdom. In con- sequence of this the evil-disposed in these districts began to murmur, saying, that in the beginning of the world there were no slaves, and that no one ought to be treated as such, unless he had committed treason against his lord, as Lucifer had done against God; but they had done no such thing, for they were neither angels nor spirits, but men formed after the same likeness as these lords who treated them as beasts. This they would bear no longer ; they were determined to be free, and if they labored or did any work, they would be paid for it. "A crazy priest in the county of Kent, called John Ball, who for his absurd preaching had thrice been con- fined in prison by the archbishop of Canterbury, was greatly instrumental in exciting these rebellious ideas. Every Sunday after mass, as the people were coming out of church, this John Ball was accustomed to assemble a Threshing with Flails 2<5o THE NEWER NATIONS crowd around him in the market-place and preach to them. On such occasions he would say, ' My good friends, matters cannot go on well in England until all things shall be in common ; when there shall be neither vassals nor lords ; when the lords shall be no more masters than ourselves. How ill they behave to us ! For what reason do they thus hold us in bondage? Are we not all de- scended from the same parents, Adam and Eve? And what can they show, or what reason can they give, why they should be more masters than ourselves? They are clothed in velvet and rich stuffs, ornamented with ermine and other furs, while we are forced to wear poor clothing. They have wines, spices, and fine bread, while we have only rye and the refuse of straw ; and when we drink, it must be water. They have handsome seats and manors, while we must brave the wind and rain in our labors in the field ; and it is by our labor they have wherewith to support their pomp. We are called slaves, and if we do not perform our service we are beaten, and we have no sovereign to whom we can complain or who would be willing to hear us. Let us go to the king [Richard II, great-great-great-grandson of King John] and remonstrate with him ; he is young, and from him we may obtain a favorable answer, and if not we must ourselves seek to amend our condition.' "With such language as this did John Ball harangue the people of his village every Sunday after mass. The archbishop, on being informed of it, had him arrested and imprisoned for two or three months by way of pun- ishment; but the moment he was out of prison, he re- turned to his former course. Many in the city of London, envious of the rich and noble, having heard of John Ball's preaching, said among themselves that the country was badly governed, and that the nobility had seized upon THE WORKERS 261 all the gold and silver. These wicked Londoners, there- fore, began to assemble in parties, and to show signs of rebellion ; they also invited all those who held like opin- ions in the adjoining counties to come to London ; telling them that they would find the town open to them and the commonalty of the same way of thinking as themselves, and that they would so press the king, that there should no longer be a slave in England. "By this means the men of Kent, Essex, Sussex, Bed- ford, and the adjoining coun- ties, in number about 60,000, were brought to London under command of Wat Tyler, Jack Straw, and John Ball." That is a wonderful pic- ture, 60,000 poor men in their ragged clothes tramping the roads to London, shouting noble sayings of John Ball : "All men were created equal" ; or, "When Adam delved and Eve span, who was then the gentleman?" Some of these men were farmers, and carried hoe or scythe or plowfoot in their hands. Others were blacksmiths with their hammers, or woodcutters with their axes. A few knights, whose hearts were touched by the people's wrongs, went with them on horseback. These crowds set out for London, with their dream of freedom ahead of them. But because they were ignorant, and because their poverty had made them bitter against wealth, they did some wild things on the way. They opened prisons, tore down the houses of rich men whom they hated, and even killed some who were their enemies. When they came to Lon- don, the young King Richard would not go out to meet John Ball 262 THE NEWER NATIONS them at first. So they went through the city streets, burning the houses of lawyers and tax collectors, and king's officers who they thought had wronged them. Moreover, they killed many men of that sort, and cut off their heads and put them on poles which they set up on London Bridge. But at last the king rode out to meet them in a meadow where they were camped, " saying in a most pleasing manner, ' My good people, I am your king and your lord. What is it you want ? What do you wish to say to me ? ' Those who heard him made answer, 'We wish you to make us free forever. We wish to be no longer called slaves, nor held in bondage.' " At first the king thought to grant their wish but at last he turned against them, " and a proclamation was made through all the streets, that every person who was not an inhabitant of London and who had not resided there a full year should instantly depart, for if any [others] were found in the city on Sunday morning at sunrise, they would be arrested as traitors to the king and have their heads cut off. . . . "This proclamation no one dared infringe, but all in- stantly departed to their houses quite discomfited. John Ball and Jack Straw were found hidden in an old ruin where they had gone, thinking to steal away when things were quiet ; but this they were prevented doing, for their own men betrayed them. With this capture the king and his barons were much pleased, and had their heads cut off, as was that of Tyler, and fixed on London Bridge." After that the king resolved to visit the country in order to punish the principal rebels throughout Eng- land, so upwards of sixteen hundred were beheaded or hanged. The Great Revolt had come to nothing. Yet we can see that the peasants had progressed since THE WORKERS 263 the early days of the manor. Men who can hold secret meetings, organize an army, and plan a war, are not the ignorant, downtrodden, ununited villains of early times, never setting foot outside of their own manors. Many men, by purchase or escape, had gained freedom, and peasants were beginning to think. This great attempt failed, and so did others like it in France and Germany. But every where the slower, quieter ways of gaining freedom went on. Free men working for Wages began more and more to take the place of land-bound villains, and the towns grew populous with free workmen. Townsmen We have seen } how villages grew up near the castles, and how large villages or towns grew up in places favorable to trade. Almost all the people who lived in these towns were tradesmen or apprentices ^^^g^- who hoped to become tradesmen. Living elbow to elbow inside the city wall, all earning their bread by selling goods, these men felt closely knit together. "Let us join into a society to help one another," they said. "We can thus protect ourselves from dishonest trades- men in our own town and from foreign traders who come to our gate." So they organized what they called a " gild merchant," or merchants' society. The law of the gild of Southampton reads: "In the first place, there shall be elected from the gild merchant ... an alderman, a steward, a chaplain, four skevins, and an usher." These men were "to execute the king's com- mands . . . and to keep the peace and protect the fran- chise and to do and keep justice to all persons as well poor as rich, natives or strangers. . . . The common chest shall be in the house of the chief alderman or of 1 See pages 163, 202-204. 264 THE NEWER NATIONS vh * the steward, and the three keys of it shall be lodged with three discreet men . . . who shall loyally take care of the common seal, and the charters and the treasure of the town, and the standards ; . . . and nobody shall sell by any kind of meas- ure or weight that is not sealed [that is, inspected and passed by the officers of the gild]. . . r " " And no one of the city of Southampton shall buy anything to sell again in the same city, unless he is of the gild merchant." Such a gild often grew rich from the dues and gifts of its members and could accomplish much in the fight of the people against the lords. It could buy liberties from the lord of the town and under the charter could establish self-government, with the gild officers acting as the officers of the town and the gildsmen at their meetings making laws for the town and voting money to pave streets and build bridges. Under its rule busi- ness prospered, the town grew larger, and many men became wealthy. The whole plan of working in these towns of the Middle Ages was different from our plan. There were ° ps no great factories where hundreds of men worked at machines. The making and selling were done in a man's own home. Imagine, then, a harness maker's place. On the first floor in the front, coming close to the m So Nj Medieval Shops On the first floor of the houset THE WORKERS 265 street, was a little room where hung bridles and harness for sale. Back of that was a larger room, where work went on. Here two or three boys were cutting the leather or sewing up the harness. Perhaps the master's wife and daughter, too, were at work here. The master went about among his boys, telling how the work was to be done, correcting mistakes, giving out material, doing the hardest tasks himself, and going out to the little shop in front when a customer entered. These boys were his apprentices. Wishing to learn the trade of harness making, they had come here to practice. They had really become members of the master's family and had promised to stay ti ^ en ~ for seven years, to labor at the master's work from morning light to evening dusk, and to obey the master as a father. On his side the master had promised to give his apprentices food and bed, to pay them a small sum per week, to teach them his trade, to watch their morals and their religion, to be a father to them. In the two or three rooms on the second floor of the house these young apprentices lived with the master's family, and per- haps slept in the attic under the steep roof. So a workman's house was his home and factory and store, all in one. A customer, entering the front door of the little shop to buy, might step back into the work- room to see his leather cut ; and might, if he was a friend, be invited to go upstairs to the living room for a mug of ale, after the sale was made. One little family shop like this could not make much harness, and so a large town would have per- haps twenty such places. All these harness Craft p ilds makers came to feel that they could carry on £° ws * their business better if they met and made plans together. The gild merchant did not satisfy them. 266 THE NEWER NATIONS There were men of all trades in it. It was more interested in the governing of the town and in the management of markets than in the special problems of the harness makers. So these workers formed a new gild just for themselves. Soon every craft followed the example. There were gilds for bakers, tailors, goldsmiths, spurriers, arrow ity^j^u^iw^y^ A Goldsmith's Shop Jewelry and silver dishes are on the table and hanging from the rod. Piles of money lie on the table. A gentleman is bargaining with the goldsmith. A servant is carrying the purchases already made. A clerk is writing down the sales in a book makers, and all the rest. Each gild chose officers, built a hall for its meetings, levied dues to pay expenses, perhaps decided upon a uniform for all its members, made rules about hours of work, prices, treatment of apprentices, and many other such matters. Best of all, the gilds used their influence to get honest work in their craft and decent behavior among their members. For example a certain William Peeke, an English tailor, abused his servant — bruised his arm and broke his head. The servant complained to the gild, and the gild made the master pay the servant's doctor's bill and his board for the months while he was recovering, and compelled THE WORKERS 267 him to give the servant a good sum of money besides. Moreover, they fined the master as a member of the gild "for his misbehaving against the craft." The gild of the makers of spurs had a rule against cheating that read thus : "No one shall cause to be sold or exposed for sale, any manner of old spurs for new ones, or shall garnish them or change them for new ones." This same gild had another rule "that no one of the trade of spurriers shall work longer than from the beginning of the day till curfew . . . , by reason that no man can work so neatly by night as by day. . . . And further many of the said trade are wandering about all day, without work- ing at all at their trade, and then when they have become drunk and frantic, they take to their work to the annoy- ance of the sick and all their neighborhood, by reason of the broils that arise between them and the strange folks who are dwelling among them. And then they blow up their fires so vigorously that their forges begin all at once to blaze, to the great peril of themselves and all the neighborhood around. ... By reason thereof, it seems unto them [that is, the officers of the gild], that working by night should be put an end to, in order such false work and such perils to avoid. And therefore the mayor and the aldermen [of the gild] do will, by the assent of the good folks of the said, trade, and for the common profit that from henceforth such time for working and such false work made in the trade shall be forbidden." The men who made that rule were working not only for honesty in their trade but for order and decency in their town. Moreover, the gilds compelled their members to give vacations to their apprentices and to take the same vacations themselves — all Sundays and saints' days and Saturday afternoons, and more than a month at Christmas. 268 THE NEWER NATIONS Nor was one member of the gild allowed to try to get a brother member's business away from him by selling at a lower price or by buying up all the material that was for sale or by inviting his brother's customers to his shop or by taking his workmen from him. Indeed, a certain gild had this law : " And if any one of the said trade shall have work in his house that he cannot complete ; or if, for want of help, such work shall be in danger of being lost, those of the said trade shall aid him, that so the said work be not lost." This, surely, was a proof of brotherhood. So was another law of this same gild. "If by chance any one of the said trade shall fall into poverty, whether through old age or because he cannot labor or work, and have nothing with which to keep himself, he shall have every week from the [gild] box, seven pence for his support, if he be a man of good repute. And after his decease, if he have a wife, a woman of good repute, she shall have weekly for her support seven pence from the said box, so long as she shall behave herself well and keep single." Almost every gild, in fact, cared lovingly for its sick members and respectfully buried the dead. But the chief advantages of belonging to a gild were business ones. Each gild usually made it unlawful for any man not a gild member to make or sell any goods inside the town. A blacksmith from another village, for instance, might not bring his goods into a town and offer them for sale. Neither might a baker, or a tailor, or any other tradesman come in from outside and open a shop. The business of the town was saved for its own people and its own gild members. Therefore it paid a spurrier to join the spurriers' gild, a brewer the brewers' gild. So through all western Europe there grew up free cities, rich and beautiful, with their busy gilds. None of THE WORKERS 269 these was richer, or more beautiful, than was Florence in northern Italy. She was walled, of course, like cities of the time, for she had many jeal- F1 ° rence > ous enemies. Her men were trained to arms; City for she had conquered cities roundabout and needed to hold them to obedience. When the great ■ ■ j frl An Old View of Florence Notice the wall all around it. The large dome is that of the cathedral. The low, eight-sided building at its right is the Baptistry. The bell tower is be- tween them. To the left of the cathedral stands the tower of the town hall bell rang from the tower of the town hall, the people ran to the square ready for war. Florence was full of rich cloth merchants. They brought brilliant dyes and raw silk from the East. They planted mulberry trees and learned to raise silkworms. They were always experimenting with dyes in order to 270 THE NEWER NATIONS find rich, lasting colors. They wove brocaded silks and cloth of gold that were as beautiful and as precious as those which came from far China. They made woolen cloth that was more beautiful than any other city could make. They even took the cloth of Flanders, the great weaving country, colored it with their wonderful dyes, trimmed it, finished it, pressed it, and sent it back twice as valuable as when it came. The Florentine markets were among the busiest of the world. They were open squares like the market-places of Athens and Rome. Every day they were crowded with tables and benches and little stalls under awnings. Here were all common things H A Corner of a Market in Florence We see scales like the fish merchant's to-day. The woman who is standing has a string of dried figs over her arm. The woman at the left is spinning with hand spindle and distaff while she waits for customers from the farms for sale, — flowers, fruit, vegetables, milk, wine, bread, cheese. There were barbers' shops, too, THE WORKERS 271 and doctors' stalls. There was a special market for fish and meats and cattle. Still another was for richer merchants, — goldsmiths, bankers and money lenders, makers of gorgeous silks and embroidered cloths. But not all the goods of Florentines were on sale in these markets. On every street, tucked into the corners of fine palaces and the lower stories of poor houses,' were shops of a hundred sorts, — shops of silk weavers, wool weavers, dyers, armorers, pot makers, blacksmiths, jew- elers, bow-and-arrow makers, tanners, saddle makers, shoemakers, carpenters, bakers, ropemakers, glass blowers. And in these shops and in the markets and the gild- halls were the proudest, the richest, the best dressed, and the most honored gentlemen of the city. For after the gilds had become strong, and the traders had grown rich, and the nobles had been put down, no man in Florence was ashamed to be a craftsman or a merchant. Indeed, many noblemen entered trade and became members of gilds. The people of Florence were educated and brilliant, and they loved learning. " Tailors left their benches, to attend the Greek lecture. Blacksmiths laid aside their hammers for the pen of history, wool carders found time to study law, barbers sought the chair of poetry," and even the donkey boys loved good verses. In fact, the people were lovers of all kinds of beauty, like the Athenians of olden time. They devotedly loved their city, too, as the Athenians had loved theirs, and they made of Florence a newer Athens. She was one of the great money- centers of Europe, and she was also a center ^ m of art and learning. No other city ever had so many great painters and sculptors and builders and writers at one time. About the year 1490 on almost any 272 THE NEWER NATIONS day a visitor to Florence might have counted on her streets five or six artists who were famous the world over. A Street Corner in Florence A saint is preaching. Notice how narrow the street is, and the almost blank walls of the houses coming close to it. An old Italian painting The skilled hands of these artists and the money of these merchants made Florence one of the most beautiful spots in the world. They covered the inside walls of her THE WORKERS 273 churches and her palaces with paintings. They decked her altars and porticoes and fountains with statues. They constructed buildings with dignified fronts as beautiful as a picture. Every street in Florence to-day is material for an artist's pencil. Suppose, for example, that you were standing in the Cathedral Square. Out near the center of it is the Baptistry, the little church where every child born in Florence during the last 800 years has B ® been baptized. One pair of its bronze doors a sculptor spent forty years in making. They are like a page from some great, marvelous picture book. There is a margin of sculptured flowers and fruit and tiny statues of saints, all cast in bronze. Within this margin are ten bronze reliefs of Bible stories. Every little figure is perfectly modeled. Some of them are drawn in the background in relief. Others stand out in front as little statues. Michael Angelo, a Florentine, and one of the world's greatest artists, once stood gazing at these doors in joy, and he said, "They are so beautiful that they might fittingly stand at the gates of Paradise." But the Baptistry, with its wonderful gates, is only one beauty of this square. At the side of it towers a great cathedral with one of the largest domes of the world — the first dome built in western ® e Tower Europe after the days of the Romans, and its maker was a Florentine. Near the corner of this church there rises the bell tower, that has called the Florentines to prayer for six hundred years. It stands high and slender, every inch of it delicately carved, cut through with long, graceful windows, seeming so light that a wind might stir it. Nor is it all of cold, white marble. There are lines of rose color and dark green, and the whole body of white has grown into a rich cream. The Bronze Doors of the Baptistry [274] THE WORKERS 275 A great Englishman who loved it has said that it is " colored like a morning cloud, and chased like a sea shell." The Florentines, themselves, call it "angel-builded." One other building may give a hint of the beauties of Florence. It is on a street where in old days were the gild The halls and the shops of artists. c ^ mch It is a little square church three Gild stories high, with enough beauty Emblems on its four outer walls to feed the hearts of a city. One window alone would make a whole building rich, it is so lovely with columns and interlaced curves and gar- lands all carved in stone. Between the windows are statues of Christian saints, standing in marble niches, looking down upon the passers-by and reminding them to live holy lives and to love goodness and beauty. Above every statue, set into the dark stone wall, is a round tile of terra cotta with soft blues and greens and cream, under a shining glaze. Framing every plaque is a modeled and painted garland of fruit and flowers. In one circle is the Madonna with the Child, and the lilies waving beside her. That is the sign that the gild of apothecaries and physicians carried upon its banners. On another plaque are a white lamb and a flying flag, and iris blossoms. That is the mark of the gild of wool weavers. In another circle an eagle spreads his wings and clutches a bale of cloth in his talons. It is the sign of the cloth The Bell Tower 276 THE NEWER NATIONS merchants. And so over every niche is the coat of arms of one of the great gilds of Florence. For it was they who helped to build this church and who gave these statues in token of their worship of God and their love of Florence. Indeed, just across the narrow lane from The Arms of the Apothecaries and Physicians the church is the gild house of the wool weavers, where they held their meetings and where their officers lived. This little church of Or San Michele, the "gates of Paradise," the bell tower, and the great cathedral, are only four out of hundreds of beautiful things that make old THE WORKERS 277 Florence lovely. There are churches, their walls bright with marvelous pictures of Christ and angels and saints. There are palaces with beautiful fountains and staircases in their courtyards. Around the sides of open squares are porticoes, their columns gracefully shaped, and bright plaques of terra cotta set into their walls. There are statues in churches and piazzas. A lifetime is not too long for becoming acquainted with the beauties of Florence. And this was not the only city of Europe where all the people loved beauty, where men were eager to give money to make their city lovely, where artists were willing to spend many years upon a single statue or altar or crucifix. All Europe is still full of churches, palaces, pictures, statues, that were made in this blossoming time of art. And this age of beauty, remember, is also the age of the gilds. Many of the loveliest cities were the ones where the gilds were strongest, the free cities who gloried in their independence. Traders The way in which trading was carried on in those days differed from our way. For one thing it was much more difficult to send goods from place to place. There were no railroads, there were not even stage-coaches. Moreover, the roads were poor and unfit for wheeled wagons. There were no continuous streams of goods flowing to and fro across the country, as there are now. In seaport towns people could buy many kinds of strange things from far-off shores, brought by ships. But in inland places people had to be content with little. Now and then peddlers visited them, bringing foreign goods in packs on their own backs or on horses. _ -, „ Peddlers They were welcomed at castles and spread out their stock in the courtyard for servant lasses and 278 THE NEWER NATIONS lads and the rough soldiers to buy. Sometimes they were invited into the ladies' bower to show their goods to gentler eyes. They went through the street of a peasant village, calling out their wares in some such song as this : Will you buy any tape, Or lace for your cape, My dainty duck, my dear-a? Any silk, any thread, Any toys for your head, Of the newest and finest, finest wear-a ? But by the time a piece of leather from Spain had traveled in a ship for three or four months, lain in a merchants' storehouse in a German seaport, and been packed along dangerous country roads to a village a hundred miles inland, it was too expensive for a poor cobbler or harness maker to buy. So most men had to use only the things produced around their own town, except for the salt and the pepper and the spices, which could be found only in far countries, and they were much more expensive than they are to-day. These peddlers were only merchants on a small scale. Greater traders also had to carry goods sometimes from town to town. They, too, had to pack them on horses, and themselves rode with the pack train. For the sake of safety they always went in large companies and even hired strong, warlike fellows to go with them to protect the train against robbers. This land travel was a slow way, a costly way, and a dangerous way. It was better, whenever it was possible, to go by flat- boats on rivers. There was no expense of buying and feeding horses, and it was possible sometimes to escape from enemies by keeping to the middle of the river. Yet there was danger from river pirates, from robber barons THE WORKERS 279 Landing at a Seaport As they land, strangers must pay toll to the coast guard. Notice the docks whose castles lay on the banks, and from accidents of upsetting. There were, too, river tolls to pay at every ford and every bridge. Little wonder that prices were high! The best way of all to travel was on the sea. Of course, there were storms, but boats had improved since 28o THE NEWER NATIONS Viking days. 1 The ship of earlier times had been a great rowboat with a temporary sail. The vessel that medieval merchants used was a ship with one, two, or even three high masts. It needed a crew of thirty or forty men to work it. It had a real rudder, while the Vikings and Greeks had used an oar for Ships Merchant Ships Carrying Soldiers Notice the crow's nest on the mast. The ship nearer us is a galley. The rowers sit in galleries built on outside the vessel. The artist has drawn the men too large for the ships steering. The ship was perhaps a hundred feet long and would carry hundreds of men, if need was. At bow and stern were decked spaces for shelter from storm and cold. All the central part was undecked — a great open place for storing goods, and it would hold perhaps three hundred tons. This heavy boat could not be drawn up on shore, as 1 See page 157. THE WORKERS 281 the Vikings and Greeks had done with theirs. She an- chored in a bay and sent out rowboats, as our ships do now. But, even as in Viking days, a vessel had to be both merchant ship and warship, all in one. So in the for- ward and after ends were platforms with bulwarks about them where men stood to fight. People called these walled platforms castles, and fighting from them was much like fighting from the wall of a stone castle on land. Men used the same weapons — bows and arrows and hurling engines. Near the top of the tall mast, also, was a crow's nest, or fighting-top, where a guard was always stationed to watch for rocks or shoals or, worse still, for pirates ; and there, in time of battle, men stood to fight. Just as the men of a town combined into gilds for the sake of protecting their liberty against their lords, so cities often banded together for the same reason, with the added purpose of helping Lea j^ e trade and protecting their traders against pi- rates. One of the strongest of these associations was the "Hanseatic League." Germany was a distracted country after the days of Frederick II. 1 There was no emperor, or rather there were two or three at a time, all fighting for possession and caring nothing for the safety and prosperity of their people. There were pirates on the sea and robbers on the country roads and no warships or armies to hold them in check. Many of the German cities were filled with craftsmen and merchants and gilds, just as Florence was. They wished to trade with the ruder nations around the Baltic Sea, — Russians and Poles and the Viking races of Denmark and Sweden and Norway. These peoples were only beginning to make things for themselves. They were, consequently, eager to buy, and it was profitable to trade with them. 1 See page 173. Cities with names underlined are important Hanseatic towns [282I 25* 30° 35° 40° 45* 50 Those heavily underlined are foreign Hanseatic factories [283] 284 THE NEWER NATIONS Therefore, since the government could not protect them, the trading cities of Germany and the neighboring countries banded together into the Hanseatic League. At one time more than eighty towns belonged to it. Men were elected from the gilds of each place to go to a congress in one of the cities. Here they decided what share of money each town was to contribute to the League, they elected officers, ordered ships to be built, hired horsemen to police the roads between their cities, made laws to govern their merchants in foreign lands. Then- ships sailed to and fro across the Baltic, carrying to the towns of Sweden and Norway and Denmark and Russia the cloth and jewelry and leather goods made by German craftsmen, and bringing back the furs, pitch, lumber, amber, tallow, fish, iron, copper, tar, and salt of the North. Sometimes a trading expedition was turned into a war against pirates. Sometimes, too, the ships of the League were not welcome in a foreign city. Often the native merchants were jealous of the newcomers and rose up and drove them out and even burned the storehouses where their goods were. In cases like this, the men of the League often made war upon the unfriendly city. In towns where the native merchants had already formed gilds, these gilds sometimes made it very unpleasant and difficult for the visitors. The foreigners were taxed for whatever they bought or sold, and certain things they were not allowed to sell at all. They might not remain longer than the town gild was willing to have them. They were forced to live with some gildsmen of the town who could keep an eye on them. But gradually the League begged a privilege here and bought one there and fought for one in another place. And as they grew stronger, their ships more numerous, THE WORKERS 285 their cashbox fuller, no people dared insult them, for they answered with war. They even declared war against kings and won. So in some cities they were given land and were allowed to build storehouses for their goods, dwellings for their merchants, a hall for their meetings, a dock for their ships. The greatest of these factories, as they were called, were at Novgorod in Russia, Bergen in Sweden, London in England, and Bruges in Flanders. At these factories officers and merchants of the League lived all the year round, dwelling together like brothers, eating at the same table, all going to bed at a given signal, doing business and playing games together. These Hanse men were the real lords of some of the foreign towns where they had posts. In Bergen, for instance, there were three thousand of them, and they owned the city, allowing the natives to live only where the Hanse willed, and not permitting them to own ships or to go to sea. The cities that they honored grew great and rich from the business that the League brought. Moreover, the goods and the manners and the knowledge of cultured Europe went in the Hanseatic ships to the less cultured lands of the North. These Hanse traders did for Scan- dinavia and Russia what the old Greek traders had done for Italy and France. European traders covered not only all of Europe, but the African and Asiatic shores of the Mediterranean, besides. The Hanseatic towns took care of most of the northern trading. From Russia and Scandinavia they brought down largely useful things, and most people, of course, had to be satisfied with these. But the wealthy people — nobles and bishops and the monks in rich monasteries — hungered also for beautiful things. 286 THE NEWER NATIONS Now, the place where people were most trained in making things of beauty was the East. There was western Asia, that Alexander long ago had con- quered. 1 Here he had found Persians dressed in gorgeous red and purple and golden embroidery and bath- ing their hands in golden bowls. Here he had found the king's army tent sweet with perfumes and burning incense. During the hundreds of years since Alexander the country had kept all its gorgeousness. There was Arabia, too, with its rose gardens and silk tapestries and delicate wines and heavy perfumes and rare & Traders Landing at an Eastern Town fruits, — oranges, peaches, pears, pomegranates. Behind that was India, a land of gold and silk and carved ivory, of great temples, rich with statues of marble and bronze. For India even then was the home of an old race, who had been writing books and building palaces when even the Greeks had been a half-civilized people. And there were the islands of the sea beyond India, where grew rare spices for preserving food, — cloves, pepper, cinnamon, allspice, 1 See page 63. THE WORKERS 287 nutmegs, — and choice woods for making beautiful crosses and altars and tables. Sweet-smelling things they had, also, to make perfumes for the toilet of elegant nobles and ladies, and incense to burn before holy altars in churches. And yet farther away, in the dim East, was China, from which came embroidered silk and costly carvings and precious gems. Everything, indeed, that was gorgeous and rare and costly came to Europe from Asia, and she seemed to the men of medieval France and Italy and Spain and Ger- many and England like a real fairyland, filled with beauty and richness and magic. One of these Eastern lands is thus described by a medieval author, in a letter which its king himself is supposed to write. The description is not true, doubtless, but it shows what Europeans of the time thought of the East. "Over the gables of our palace," the king is supposed to say, " are two golden apples, in each of which are two carbuncles, so that the gold may shine by day and the carbuncles by night. . . . The [doors] are of ebony, the windows are of crystal. The tables are partly of gold, partly of amethyst, and the columns supporting the tables are partly of ivory, partly of amethyst." How to get the riches of this wonderful world of the East into the West was the great problem of medieval merchants. Between these Eastern peoples who wanted to sell and the Western peoples who T f ade wanted to buy were thousands of miles of land, East with steep mountains, cold, barren plains, and dry, hot deserts; with unknown tribes that hated strangers. From Germany to China, or even from Italy to India, was too long a way and too strange a way for merchants to go. But the East was as eager to sell and buy as the West was. So each people brought their goods half the way. 288 THE NEWER NATIONS There were different routes of travel from the East. One of them ended at Novgorod in northern Russia. Chinese merchants who lived near the Hoang-Ho Route 6 ™ Ri yer P u t their bundles into slow river boats and rowed them or perhaps sailed them upstream as far as they could go. There they sold them, perhaps, to other merchants, who packed them upon horses and carried them by land for hundreds of miles to the Irtish River. Here perhaps a Western merchant bought them, loaded them again into boats, and floated them down- stream toward the northwest. But where the river made a sharp turn northward into barren lands that border the Arctic Sea, he stopped and sold his goods to another man, who packed them across land to the Kama River. Here they were sold again, perhaps, and went down the Kama to the great Volga and up the Volga as far as boat could go. Perhaps here they changed hands again, went overland to the Lovat and down this to Novgorod the Great. But not only Chinese goods had been coming toward Novgorod. With just as many changes from horse or camel to boat and back again, there had been coming, for many months, shawls and fine cotton cloth and diamonds and gold from India, furs from the north country, leather and lumber and beeswax from parts of Russia. And here at Novgorod sat the Hanseatic merchants ready to buy these things, to load them upon river boats, to float them down to the Baltic Sea, to put them into their good ships and carry them to the towns of Germany, Holland, Den- mark, Sweden, Norway, England. Moreover, they had brought to sell whatever the West could make — woolen cloth, iron goods, wine, salt. That fair at Novgorod must have been a wonderful sight. It went on for several weeks in the summer. THE WORKERS 289 A Fair There were hundreds of people to visit it. Every inn must have been so crowded that men slept on the floors. Many of the merchants, doubtless, put up tents of cloth or skin or brush and camped on the edge of town. The Hanse traders, perhaps, invited a few of the richest visitors to be their guests in their large, comfortable buildings, where everything could be securely locked at night, inside the stout, high fence, with guards and dogs, to keep all safe. The town was busy with nothing but the great fair. There were a few shops where costly things could be displayed. Some merchants who dealt in precious goods built temporary huts for them. But most things were heaped up on the ground. In one place were hundreds of piles of furs. In another place were bundles of silks. Here were bags of salt. There were piles of German iron. So every kind of thing had its place. Hundreds of merchants walked about among the piles, chattering in a dozen different languages. It was a place where the ends of the earth met. At the same time that goods from northern and central Asia were traveling west and north to Novgorod, other things from southern Asia were taking a shorter journey to A Fair There seem to be Chinese characters on two of the parcels. Notice the scales. Another painted glass window 200 THE NEWER NATIONS Constantinople or Damascus or Alexandria, — spices from Ceylon, perfume from Arabia, rugs from Persia, pearls and fine weaving from India. And merchants ou em Q £ y en j ce or f pi orence or f Genoa — three Route trading cities of Italy — met the East at these places and exchanged their goods at great fairs, like the one at Novgorod. At first the Venetians were the chief of these Italian traders. They were children of the sea. In early times, „ . when their enemies had driven them from the Venice mainland, they had taken refuge on low islands near the coast. Here they had been safe, had grown strong, and had learned to sail the sea, because there was no other way to move about. Since sailors are almost always merchants, these Venetians had become traders. Because they were tucked away on the eastern side of Italy, it was the eastern end of the Mediterranean which interested them. Their ships went to the rich cities of Cairo and Constantinople and the other ports of Asia Minor and Egypt. Their merchants were welcome at these places, for they brought European woolen cloth and European money. Moreover, the Venetians had made friends in the East by giving help in time of war. The Greek emperor at Constantinople made a treaty with them, granting their merchants the right to "buy and sell in all parts of the Greek empire unmolested by agents of the custom- houses, finances, and harbors. The latter were for- bidden to inspect their goods, or to subject them to any tax whatsoever." So the Venetian merchants built storehouses and dwellings for themselves in the busiest Eastern towns. Along the shores of Greece and Egypt and Asia was many a little Venice with its rich merchants, its ships THE WORKERS 291 going and coming, its storehouses, and its own governor, sent over from the mother city. They were like the colonies and trading posts of old Greek days, and like the Hanse settlements at Novgorod and other northern towns. From these Eastern posts the Venetian merchants carried silk, cotton, indigo, camphor, pearls, diamonds, gold, ivory, pepper, ginger, cinnamon, allspice. All these things were taken to Venice, but there was more than Venice could use. So from here the busy traders carried them to other places. Every year a fleet of Venetian ships, even larger and stronger than the Hanse ships, sailed west through the Strait of Gibraltar, rounded Spain, and went on to England and Flanders. Here, at fairs much like the one at Novgorod, they met Hanse merchants and other men from the north coun- tries and traded goods with them. When the ships again reached Venice, after a year's absence, they brought to her English wool and tin, Russian furs and leather, Ger- man iron and amber, Swedish copper and tar and pitch. So Venice became Queen of the Adriatic and of the eastern Mediterranean. She won islands in the iEgean Sea and strips of coast along the Adriatic and thus built up a little empire for herself. At home she had beautiful palaces and churches like those of Florence. She had two hundred ships of war. Each year her governor, or Doge, was rowed out to sea in a vessel decked with hangings of silk and em- broidery from the East. With him were great nobles and merchants* of Venice in long glisten- Redding ing robes, dyed with the purples and reds and Adriatic blues that their ships had brought from far lands. Behind the vessel came all the boats and gon- dolas of Venice crowded with her people. Priests sang, and one prayed, " Grant, O Lord, that this sea may be 292 THE NEWER NATIONS to us, and to all who sail upon it, tranquil and quiet. Hear us, good Lord." Then the Doge threw into the S3 The Doge of Venice Going in Procession through the City This picture was made in the sixteenth century. Fashions in clothes had changed since 1300. Men from the East looking from the windows show the great Eastern trade of Venice. The Doge's costly robes and the gorgeous parasol show the wealth of the city THE WORKERS 293 sea a ring like a wedding ring, and cried, "We espouse thee, O sea, in token of our just and everlasting union." Thus did proud Venice proclaim that she was the favorite of the sea, and the ruler of it. Most of this carrying and selling of rich goods, both in the North and the South, was done by meh of common blood. To be sure, Frederick II had a fleet of merchant ships and sent them out to the T c , East to buy, and to bring back goods to the West for sale. 1 But in general, princes and nobles still felt that any business, except the business of war, was un- worthy of gentlemen. So they sat in their castles or rode on their war-horses, encased in their armor and their pride, while merchants about them grew rich from their travels and their buying and selling. But did this mean that all the common people were Uf ted up out of poverty into comfort ? Did it mean that there were no longer any "poor in the cottage, charged with a crew of children and with a landlord's rent"? 2 Did it mean that every man in a free town belonged to a powerful gild and had the privilege of helping to make the city laws ? By no means. It meant that half the common people, perhaps, had stepped up out of their slavery and poverty, some of them to a place only a little below princes. A new class had been formed. There were now not only the noble, proud of his blood, and the peasant, proud of nothing; but there was the rich man, proud of his riches. A certain German merchant "sat upon a silver seat, and had his rooms hung with costly [tapestry]. When he married, he, like a royal personage, caused the road from his house to the church to be overspread with a Flanders carpet, while musicians played, day and night, before his door." But these rich men, though they were 1 See page 169. * See page'257. 294 THE NEWER NATIONS of common blood, were no more friends to the poor man than the nobles were. It was the gilds who had been the best helpers of the poor man in his fight against his lord, but soon they Merchants Welcoming a Queen She is being carried to the Gate of Paris. There a bishop awaits her while ladies and a jester look down from the wall. Wealthy merchants on horseback line the streets to do her honor, and are themselves honored by being present deserted him and set up a new master over him. For Change almost every gild, as it grew old and powerful, in the grew proud and narrow and hard and forgot its Gilds early belief in brotherhood. Its richest mem- bers began to change its rules in order to shut out the poor man. It refused to take any new members, per- haps, except the sons of its old members. Or it raised the dues until no poor man could pay them. In this way THE WORKERS 295 the gilds came to be rich men's societies ; and outside of them were the poor weavers, coopers, stonecutters, cobblers, eager to be hired by these richer brothers of their trades. And often they were hired at miserably low wages, so that they lived in poverty and discomfort. An old Florentine writer speaks of "the hatred with which the lower classes always regarded the rich citizens and the heads of the gilds, because the workmen were always dis- satisfied with the wage they received." And many broils and much bloodshed this discontent caused in Florence, where the gilds were all-powerful, — the gilds which had once been poor men's brotherhoods but were now the poor men's hard masters. The same thing became true of all the great manu- facturing and trading cities of Italy, France, Germany, the Netherlands, England. That same struggle between the workers and the men who hire them is still going on to-day. It is one of the old, unsettled questions that we have inherited from the Middle Ages. 1. Your grandfathers "rested" their land in the same way that men did in the Middle Ages. Find out whether farmers do it now, and, if not, what they do, instead, to keep their land fertile. 2. Collect pictures of modern farm implements. Mount them on cardboard and draw beside each one the old-fashioned way of doing the work that the implement does. 3. Should you rather be an apprentice in a shop like the medieval harness-maker's shop described on page 265 or a worker in a large modern harness factory? Why? 4. Tell somebody who belongs to a labor union about the old gilds and ask him whether they are at all like the unions and how they are different. 5. What is the difference between the fairs of the Middle Ages and the county and state fairs that we have now? Members of the Choir Sitting in Their Stalls at Church A bishop is reading from a missal which a boy holds. Notice the bishop's cap and his staff, or crosier. It is made like a shepherd's crook, because the bishop is the shepherd of his people CHAPTER XII RELIGION IN THE MIDDLE AGES Christian Missionaries By Constantine's time Christianity had become the chief religion of the Roman empire. 1 But that did not satisfy Christians. They wanted it to be the religion of the whole world. With some it was a matter of pride : they longed to see their church the mistress of the world. f With many it was a matter of love : they believed that any who were not Christians would suffer after death, and they could not bear that thought. So men kept going out 1 See pag« 135. RELIGION IN THE MIDDLE AGES 297 among the heathen to preach, as Paul and the apostles had done in the beginning, 1 and as men are still doing to-day. When the fierce Angles and Jutes and Saxons came into England, 2 they still worshiped Woden and Thor. But about six hundred years after Christ, Augustine, a saintly priest, with forty helpers, Augustine was sent from Rome to convert these English. 3 597 A D The king of Kent, learning that they were come, bade them remain on a certain little island until he should go to meet them. Bede, an English bishop, who lived a hundred years or more after this time, tells of that meeting in his book. "Some days after, the king came into the island, and sit- ting in the open air, ordered Augustine and his com- panions to be brought into his presence, for he had taken precaution that they should not come to him in any house, lest, according to an ancient superstition, if they prac- tised any magical arts, they might impose upon him and so get the better of him. But they came furnished with divine, not with magic virtue, bearing a silver cross for their banner and the image of our Lord and Savior painted on a board ; and singing the litany they offered up prayers to the Lord for the eternal salvation both of themselves and of those to whom they were come." The king allowed them to enter the greatest of his cities and to dwell there. They lived sweetly, praying* and preaching ; many people were baptized, and presently the king himself. Churches were built, and old temples purified, — the idols destroyed, holy water sprinkled, and altars set up. Even so, it was long before all England had become Christian. The new religion began in a southern corner and only slowly spread through the whole country. A 1 See page 130. 2 See page 182. 3 See note on page 187. 298 THE NEWER NATIONS hundred years or more after Augustine, however, Chris- tian England herself began to send out missionaries to other lands about her who were yet heathen — to the Swedes and the Danes and the Germans. One of the greatest of these Christian teachers was Boniface. Many missionaries before him had worked in Germany, and here and there were small churches with Boniface ^le bands of Christians. Yet these were so among the few and so weak that they were lost in the Germans, great heathen mass of the German nation ; and 71 ' Boniface was eager to convert the whole people. Indeed, inside of seventeen years after he began to work, one hundred thousand people were baptized. He went about it in a way somewhat different from that in which earlier missionaries had worked. He built churches as the others had done, but instead of settling down with his first church he left it in charge of two or three helpers who had come with him from England, while he pushed on into new places to found new churches. Now, Boniface had seen other new Christians who, left alone in the heathen lands, had sunk back into their old heathen customs. So he planned to bind all his German churches together that they might become a part of a great Christian world, sisters among sisters and all obedient to the same father, the pope. Church Organization There was a wonderful family of churches in Europe at that time, all knit together from the lowest priest to the mighty pope. It was done in this way. Priests ^ everv church there were priests to preach, Bishops t° give communion, to hear the confessions of their people. In some great churches there were many, as well as the priests' assistants with their dif- RELIGION IN THE MIDDLE AGES 299 ferent duties of singing, of reading the scriptures, of carrying the sacred vessels. One priest was chosen to be head of this company, and a deacon to be in charge of the assistants. Over all the churches of a certain region ruled a bishop. He received new members, created priests, planned the A Bishop Ordaining a Priest services for all his churches, advised all the priests and assistants, and punished them if it became necessary. He visited the churches of his district, or diocese, and he called meetings of his priests to consider church questions. There were about thirty bishops in England and three or four times as many in France and Germany. These 300 THE NEWER NATIONS bishops must not stray too far apart, so an archbishop was in charge of ten or twenty of them. He held meet- ings for discussions and lawmaking. Standing above all these priests and bishops and arch- bishops was the pope/ whom people regarded as Christ's special representative on earth, supreme ruler of all the church and father of all Christian people. To him bishops and archbishops reported the condition of their priests, their people, their finances. From him they sought advice and took laws. He was the mightiest ruler of the world, and ruled the greatest of all kingdoms — western Christendom. To help him with his work he had cardinals. They assisted when he said mass, they carried his messages to princes and kings, they were ready to advise if he asked them and to do anything that he willed. In order to keep the whole Christian world still more closely linked, the pope held great councils now and then to discuss large matters and to make church laws. To these councils came cardinals, archbishops, bishops, abbots, and even the most learned and wise of the lower priests. Thus the pope, besides being a priest of God, was a mighty lord among men, and in the same way bishops and cardinals were princes and the equals of kings. It was into this great Christian family that Boniface led his churches, when the pope made him archbishop of all Germany. With the help and encouragement of this wonderful organization the German church prospered and spread. Monasteries Another thing that Boniface did for the Germans was to build monasteries among them. Monasteries were wonderful institutions, and this is how they came to be. J See pages 164-165. A Cathedral of the Middle Ages Built in the thirteenth century at Rheims, France [301] 302 THE NEWER NATIONS Many people of those times felt that the world was wicked or that it was frivolous. A man found that when he lived with his family, his mind was most of the time busy with thoughts of them. If he worked in the world to make his living, his mind was full of business and money affairs. "I want to think only about God," he said to himself. "I must run away from all these things that hold my soul down to the earth. I must forget my business, my family, my body. I must remember only God." In trying to cut their souls loose from all earthly interests men at first did what seem to some of us strange things. They fled into the deserts and lived alone in caves, thinking there to find time to muse upon God's goodness. They kept themselves awake for many days and nights together, that they might pray continually. They said : "It is our bodies that keep our souls from God. They make us think of food and drink and com- fort and pleasure." So they punished their bodies by starving them, by lashing them with whips, by leaving them bare in the cold, and by dressing them in rough, harsh clothes. Some men almost made skeletons of them- selves, thinking that in this way their souls would be free to dwell upon thoughts of God. Benedict, a young Italian nobleman, was one of these people who fled from men in order to be with God. When Benedict he was only fifteen years old he went alone and His ^q the bare, desert mountains near Rome. Monks* There he found a little gorge with sides so steep 526 (?) that it was almost like a pit. He lived here for A.D. three years, only one man knowing where he was. This man visited him sometimes and let down to him a little bread by a rope. After a while people learned that Benedict was living RELIGION IN THE MIDDLE AGES 303 a hermit's life there in the mountains, and they came to see him. They found him with wild hair and beard, his thin, weather-beaten body dressed in skins. But they found him full of wisdom, too, and gentleness and holi- ness. Now that men had discovered him, he left his rocky pit and went back into the world to preach. But his longing soul drew him back again into the wilderness. Yet men kept coming to ask him to teach them and to pray for them; and they begged that they might stay with him. So at last he built there in the mountains twelve houses. And in these lived people who came flee- ing from wickedness and seeking goodness. But after a time there were troubles here, and Benedict with a few followers went away to a new place and built a new monastery where lovers of God might dwell to- gether in the wilderness. Many people came there, poor men and rich, old men and boys, drawn, by the great fame of Benedict. He, seeing his home full of brothers, knew that there must be rules to govern so great a family ; moreover he had faith that the monastery would live for many years and that others would spring up from seeds sown by him; so he needed to think long and to pray earnestly in making his plans. The rules which he finally wrote we can still read to- day. The monks, as they were called, were to live together as brothers. They ate in one great room. They slept in little alcoves or cells opening off one large dormitory. Together they sang and prayed in the chapel. They were to be courteous and kind one to the other. Older monks called the younger ones " brother," and the younger called the older " father." The younger always stood in the presence of the older brother and asked his blessing. The brothers were to live together simply and in loving equality. There were no rich 3°4 THE NEWER NATIONS clothes in the monastery. Every monk wore a long, loose robe of coarse stuff, and a cape with a hood, clean and warm, but poor and homely, giving no temptation to vanity. Nor did the monks have costly food. There were but two meals a day, and these consisted of only bread and vegetables and perhaps fruit and fish or fowl. There was no such thing as private wealth in the monastery. Every man when he became a monk put aside his money, giving it to some relative, to the poor, or to the monastery. The rule says: "[The monk] should have abso- lutely not anything : neither a book nor A Monk with Gifts tables nor a pen, — nothing at all. For for His Monastery indeed ft y ^ ^^ ^ ^ monks tQ have their own bodies or wills in their own power. But all things necessary they must expect from, the Father of the monastery." This Father, or abbot, was to be chosen by the monks themselves. He was to rule the great family lovingly, but wisely and firmly. The brothers were to obey him absolutely. Any one who disobeyed him or who broke any of the rules was to be punished : he might not eat at the table with his brothers or go with them into the chapel to pray; he might not speak to them. He might, if the abbot thought best, be whipped ; or, if he continued disobedient, he might be expelled from the monastery. These men had come together for the sake of cleansing their souls and praising God. Seven times during the day they gathered in the church and sang psalms and prayers. The first of these services was at the dawning of the day, RELIGION IN THE MIDDLE AGES 305 the last after sunset. At midnight, too, the monks arose from their sleep and went to church for prayer. The rule says, "They shall sleep clothed and ^^ p girt with belts or with ropes. . . . And let the Monastery monks be always on the alert." There was a library, too, stored with religious books. These the brothers borrowed and read alone in their little alcoves off the dormitory. The monks were to behave always in such a way that their minds and the minds of their brothers would be free to think of great things, not of little. The rule bids them to "speak slowly and without laughter, humbly, with gravity, using few and reason- able words." At meal time all sat without speaking and listened to one who read to them out of some reli- gious book. And after the evening services they sat together again silent, while one read. But not all the day could be given over to prayer and reading ; for, after all, men's bodies must live. Food had to be cooked, floors had to be scrubbed, clothes had to be washed, garments had to be made. ^f 0T ^ m At all these tasks the brothers took turns; no tery work was thought to be mean. A monk who had lived as the son of a duke, perhaps, knelt and scrubbed a floor beside a man who had been his father's villain, and was glad in such a way to serve his brothers. Nor were these housekeeping tasks all the work that was done. "Idleness is the enemy of the soul," says the rule. "And therefore at fixed times the brothers ought to be occupied in manual labor." So the monastery An Abbot 306 THE NEWER NATIONS The Crowning of the Virgin Mary An old picture on the wall of a monastery in Florence, painted by a monk called Fra Angelico. Six saints are watching the coronation. The one at the right of the center is St. Francis, wearing the brown dress of the Franciscan order. Facing him is St. Dominic, wearing the black-and-white costume of the Dominicans. Behind Dominic is St. Benedict. planned work for its monks. There was always the kitchen garden where vegetables for the table were grown. There were sheep to be tended, cows to be fed and milked, and butter and cheese to be made. There RELIGION IN THE MIDDLE AGES 307 was fuel to be brought from the peat bogs or the forest. There were shoes to be cobbled, chairs to be mended, wooden platters and bowls for the tables to be made. Perhaps there was a vineyard with grapes to be gathered and made into wine. Each brother worked at some manual labor for seven hours each day. Men found life in the monasteries so cheering to their souls that thousands were built throughout Europe, some with Benedict's rule for their law, others with new rules, but all with the same purpose. Many women, also, felt the call to live holy lives, and convents were built for them, with the same sort of rules and much the same kind of costumes as were found in the monasteries. Some monasteries were like great workshops, others like great farms. This fact was one of the things that made them good civilizers. Imagine a large monastery built in the forests of Germany, where the people knew little about farming and manufacturing, but were content to live in a wild way in a wild forest. They would see the monks every day at work, cutting down trees, clearing land, draining swamps, plowing, planting, cultivating. They would see growing new crops that they had never seen before, the seed brought by some monk from his own more civilized country. They would see men using tools and making things of which they had never heard before. They would see new breeds- of cattle and see them fed and treated in new ways. Moreover, the monks were eager to teach what they knew about farm- ing and industry, and soon their neighbors would be copy- ing their ways, borrowing their seed, buying their cattle, learning the habits of more civilized people. The monks were not content to teach only these manual arts, nor were their neighbors content to learn only these. They saw the monks reading books, they heard them 3 o8 THE NEWER NATIONS Monastery Schools sing, they listened to their talk of other lands and peoples and times. They wanted their sons to learn these things also. Therefore the monks opened schools in their monasteries. Here they taught boys to read and write and to speak in Latin. That was the language of learning and of the church. All her prayers and masses and psalms were written in it ; for they had been made in the days when the Romans were masters of the world and when all men had spoken their language. Besides teaching boys how to read and farmers Book- k° w to do their making work better and in the q\\ men now to Monastery live together in A Monk in a Library Before him is a reading stand peace and love, the monas- tery did another thing for civilization. The monks liked to have books to read, but books in those days were very rare and precious things. Nowadays printing is a rapid process ; 5000 copies of this book that you are reading were printed in 14 days. But in those early times men did not know how to print with type. Every book had to be written by hand. Nor was it written on sheets of paper; for paper is another modern invention. It was done on sheepskin and calfskin. The monks themselves prepared this. They first soaked the hide in limewater to loosen the hair. Then they spread it on boards and cleaned it of the hair and flesh, washed it thoroughly, and stretched it on a frame to dry. After that it had to be pared and thinned RELIGION IN THE MIDDLE AGES 309 A Picture painted by a Monk in an Old Book It shows a new baby in Paris about the year 1400. The baby is wrapped swaddling clothes. Notice the gentlemen's fur-lined cloaks and the soft shoes. These are probably wealthy merchants with sharp knives and rubbed smooth with pumice and chalk. At last it lay there a beautiful, clean, shining, creamy piece of vellum ready for the writing. A monk cut it into pieces of the right size for the pages of his new book. Suppose he were going to make a missal 3io THE NEWER NATIONS with the words of the mass, from which several brothers might read at once, as they stood shoulder to shoulder in the choir of the church. Perhaps he would cut his pages three feet long and two feet wide. He might need a hundred sheets or more, and it would take a goodly flock of sheep or calves to make such a book. With these fair, creamy pages he sat down in the library, or the scriptorium, with ink pot and brushes and little sticks of color. Carefully he began to paint on the precious vel- lum the great, sturdy black letters of the Latin hymns. But he was not content with the gloomy black ; the words seemed to him so beautiful that all the time pictures of joy were floating through his mind. And he thought, too, ".I must remind my singing brothers of the beauty of God's earth and of His word." So he dipped his brushes into bright colors and made flowers bloom on his page, along the margins and between the lines. And sometimes a spreading letter " Y" took the form of an elm tree with a clambering grape vine laden with fruit. Or angels stepped from the top of the capital "T." When all the pages were done, they were bound between boards made beauti- ful with silver nails and carved silver corners and clasps. To Initial Letter from an Old ^ Manuscript make such a book needed in it a monk is shown at work on a many months. It was a labor book of love; only a lover of the words would have spent the time, and only an artist would have had the power to draw such pages. While one brother was making this missal, perhaps in RELIGION IN THE MIDDLE AGES 311 the corner of the room another monk was reading slowly from some rare book while six or seven brothers sat near him at writing desks carefully printing the words again on vellum pages. Day after day they worked so, until they had made six or seven new copies of an old book. One of these was sent, perhaps, to the brothers of some friendly monastery who had longed to read the book, yet did not possess it. Perhaps one copy went to some great prince who cared for learning as Charlemagne or Alfred did. It was such work as this that saved for us until to-day the writings of olden times. When types were invented and we began to make books on printing presses, it was most often to old monasteries that people went to get the matter to be printed. The libraries were full not only of the writings of the church fathers who had lived in the Middle Ages, but they were filled, also, with copies of old Roman and Greek works, for these monks had loved all learning. And sometimes the brothers did more than merely copy old books; they made new ones. A monk lived perhaps fifty, sixty, or eighty years and died, . but his monastery lived on. Some of them have lived through a thousand years of history, have seen kings come and go, wars rage, cities spring up and grow old, gilds flourish and die. In many of them the monks, though sitting apart from the world, yet heard of all these interesting things that happened and thought fit to write them down. At other times, a monk would keep a kind of diary of the happenings inside the monastery — what visitors came, what abbots were elected, what cures were performed, what holy deeds were done. After the death of the writer another continued the diary. Soon it came to seem a precious book, worth keeping and continuing. 312 THE NEWER NATIONS It was given a place, perhaps, in the scriptorium, or writing room, and a monk was appointed to write in it all important happenings. Thus a chronicle or history of the time grew, month by month, and was preserved in the library. Now when we want to learn of a certain time in the Middle Ages, we look in the old monastery chronicles for information and see the very people of the time as the people of the time saw them. In this book that you are reading, I have quoted from several of these old monkish chronicles — from the one by William of Malmesbury, the one by Matthew Paris, and the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. Monasteries had another use in early days. Remem- ber that roads were few and poor, but robbers were many Guests anc ^ bold. There was little travel; yet some at the men did travel, and on important business, Monas- but they found few places where they might spend the night and get their meals. There were inns in towns, but they were crowded and noisy and too far apart for comfortable traveling. So the monasteries felt it their duty to open their gates to guests. They built houses for visitors, and stables for horses; and brothers were appointed to serve the strangers. The abbot himself invited them to his own table. Benedict's rule says: "All guests who come shall be received as though they were Christ ; for He himself said, 'I was a stranger and ye took me in.' . . . When, there- fore, a guest is announced, the prior or the brothers shall run to meet him with every office of love. And first they shall pray together; and thus they shall be joined together in peace. . . . The abbot shall give water into the hands of his guests; and the abbot as well as the whole congregation shall wash the feet of all guests. . . . Chiefly in the reception of the poor and of the pilgrims RELIGION IN THE MIDDLE -AGES 313 shall care be most anxiously exhibited : for in them Christ is received the more," Some monasteries became very rich; for many men made presents to them because they loved the monks and because they loved God, and some- ^ ift 5 r t0 times because they were wicked and hoped in teries this way to win forgiveness for their sins. In the reign of William the Conqueror, a certain Thorold made a good gift to the monastery of Croyland, namely his whole manor, with all the buildings and cattle and rents that serfs were paying. "He applied himself with all diligence," the old chronicle says, "to re- move his household from the said estate, and then to put his chapel in better condition, and to change the hall into a refectory, the chamber into a dormitory, and the place for exercise into a cloister for the monks. Besides this, he gave to the monks all the beasts of burden in the manor that were suited for the purposes of agriculture, and all the other implements and utensils that were [needed] for cook- ing, brewing, and baking." We have, moreover, the names of twelve other people who made gifts to Croyland. One of them was a countess, some were knights, others were servants of the king, — his butler, his cook, his messenger. Some of them gave only a few acres of land, others gave hundreds A GlFT T °J* E Mo * as - of acres of meadow and marsh and plow land, with churches and mills and houses and poor cottages where villains lived. In such ways many monasteries came to own thousands of acres with farms and villages and castles upon them. 314 THE NEWER NATIONS Wealth of the Monas- teries The people on these farms and in these villages paid dues to the monastery, as other men did to their lords, and worked the monks' lands, as other peasants worked the lands of their lords. The knights of castles that were built on the lands of the monastery paid homage to the abbot, as other knights did to great dukes, and fought for him if it became necessary. So money and crops came pouring in. Much of this went to help the poor, perhaps; for every monastery had officers appointed to care for the needy, to give them food and clothing, and to tend them if they were sick. Every day at a certain hour the poor came to the gates, and the monks gave out bread and wine. At a certain German monastery the monks gave help to thirty people every day. mi i But much of this money went to make the monastery b eautif ul . Perhaps the altar would be covered over with wrought gold. Won- derful golden cups and pitchers and bowls would be bought to be used in the mass. Beau- tiful windows of s tained glass with pictures of Christ and the saints would be put into the chapel. A new church of stone, with carved doorways and a watching statue above, would be built. A Monastery Cloister In a California mission 1 D IS J u 14 i r 13 f& 1 □ 2 & II □ 3 □ 5 n« NlNTH-CENTTTRY PLAN OF A MONASTERY (St. GALL, SWITZERLAND) 1. Large building unmarked on the original plan. 2. Servants' quarters. 3. Pigsty. 4. Stable. 5. Cattle shed. 6. Goat house. 7. Sheep shed. 8. Brew-house and bakehouse for guests. 9. Towers with spiral staircases. 10. Guest house for the poor, with brew-house and bakehouse attached. 11. Another stable. 12. Quarters for serv- ants. 13. House for drying fruits. 14. Storehouse for grain for brewing. 15. Cooper shop and wood-turning shop. 16. Church. 17. Porter's lodge. 18. House for greater guests. 19. Cellar with storehouses above. 20. Kitchen for monks. 21. Brew-house and bakehouse for monks. 22. Buildings with mills. 23. Shops of shoemakers, sad- dlers, carvers, tanners, goldsmiths, blacksmiths, fullers, shield-makers, and sword- makers. 24. 1st floor, refectory ; 2d floor, wardrobe. 25. Garth with cloisters. 26. School-master's lodging. 27. School. 28. Abbot's house. 29. Home of visiting monks. 30. 1st floor, scriptorium; 2d floor, library. 31. Dormitory, heating ap- paratus on 1st floor. '32. Baths. 33. Granary and threshing floor. 34. Hen-houses and duck houses. 35. Poultry-keeper's house. 36. Kitchen garden. 37. Gardener's house. 38. Cemetery and orchard. 39. House for novices. 40. Chapel for novice* and invalids. 41. Infirmary. 42. Garden of medicinal plants. 43. Physician's house. 44. House for blood-letting [31S] 316 THE NEWER NATIONS Artists would be paid to paint its walls with angels and saints. Strange plants would be bought to be put into the garth, or garden, beside the church. Around this new cloisters, with twisted marble columns, would be built. These were covered walks where the monks would stroll or sit reading or teach their classes of boys. Imagine yourself wandering through the monastery of St. Gall in Switzerland. If it was really like the wonderful old map that is still preserved, you would have needed a day to visit it. It was almost a village, with more than thirty buildings. Such a great monastery was factory, farm, school, library, and church all combined. There were hundreds like it, greater or smaller, throughout Europe, and they did much during hundreds of years to civilize and educate the people. Saints and Pilgrimages Wonderful stories are told about the holiness of some of the Christians of the Middle Ages, especially of the monks. One of them used often to stay on oy his knees all night praying and weeping over the sufferings of Christ. According to old stories many holy men and women had visions of angels or of Christ or of the Virgin Mary. Some holy men, the old books say, were able by their holiness to perform miracles, to cure sickness by touching the ill person with their hands, to heal a wound by a kiss, to put out a fire by prayer, to tame wild beasts by speaking to them, and to raise the dead to life. A beautiful story is told of Francis, a saintly man of . Italy. One day as he was going along a road, "he lifted up his eyes and beheld some trees hard by the road whereon sat a great company of birds RELIGION IN THE MIDDLE AGES 317 well-nigh without number; whereat Saint Francis mar- veled, and said to his companions : ' Ye shall wait for me here upon the way and I will go to preach unto my little sisters, the birds.' And he went unto the field and began to preach unto the birds that were on the ground : and immediately those that were on the trees flew down to him." When Saint Francis preached to them, " those birds began all of them to open their beaks, and stretch their necks, and spread their wings, and reverently bend their heads down to the ground, and by their acts and by their songs to show that the holy father gave them joy exceed- ing great. ... At the last, having ended the preaching, Saint Francis made over them the sign of the cross, and gave them leave to go away; and thereby all the birds with wondrous singing rose up in the air" and flew away in the shape of the cross that Saint Francis had made over them. While a holy man of this sort was alive, people almost adored him. They came from great distances to see him. They begged one of his shoes, his girdle, a piece of his robe, as a precious keepsake. There was a power in these things, they thought, to work miracles. When a holy man with such power as this died, people did not cease to love him. They talked of his deeds. They sent to the pope the story of his holy life and of the miracles he had done. Then the pope, after he had examined into his life and found it miraculous, declared him a saint and commanded all Christians to honor him. Hundreds of holy men and women were made saints and were revered in this way. Benedict was one ; Boni- face was another ; and Francis, and King Louis ; and many of the martyrs who had died for their religion in the Roman times ; and all the apostles of Christ. Then the 318 THE NEWER NATIONS people, thinking of these saints in heaven and believing that they looked down upon the world and loved it, prayed to them and asked them to intercede with God for their sakes. Even the dead body of such a man was "more valuable than precious stones and finer than refined gold." An old writer says, "Even though the soul is not Shrines . .. present, a virtue resides in the body of the saints because of the righteous soul which has for so many years tenanted and used it." So people made a rich tomb all carved and even encrusted with gold, and they took up the body and placed it in that tomb. They built a church around it, and perhaps put an altar over the body or before it, and kept candles always burning there. And those bodies which before death had been able to perform miracles were still able, people thought, to do so after death. By touching the tomb or the chest that contained the bones or even by merely seeing the holy relics, people were cured of sorrow, sickness, and madness. Therefore men were eager to visit these shrines, taking their sorrows, their sins, and their sickness to be cured. Besides, the pope counted it a virtue for a man to visit such holy places. He some- ages , . . . times promised forgiveness of sins to those who with contrite hearts performed the journey, and priests often commanded some great sinner to make such a pilgrimage to this or that shrine, perhaps walking barefoot all the way, perhaps going on his knees for the last part of the journey. Travel was difficult and slow, but special privileges were given to pilgrims. They were allowed to travel the roads without paying toll as other travelers had to do. They went under the special protection of the RELIGION IN THE MIDDLE AGES 319 Hi A Tomb The body is placed in the wall of the church behind the tombstone. Tnere are scores of such tombs in many old churches. See cut on page 150 church. Along the roads where they journeyed were houses for their needs, built by religious men and women. Many gilds opened their houses to them, and all the monasteries, of course, were eager to receive them in 320 THE NEWER NATIONS Christ's name. Moreover, most people were glad to entertain pilgrims in their homes, for the travelers brought news of strange lands ; and, besides, doing a kindness to pilgrims seemed like doing it to Christ or to the saint whose shrine they were going to visit. Pilgrims, therefore/ made themselves known by wear- ing a certain costume — perhaps a long cape with a hood and a great hat looped up in front. They carried a staff in the hand and a little wallet at the belt for the money and food kind people gave them. So by the help of charity even poor people could make these pil- grimages, and the great shrines were visited by thousands from all corners of Europe. In one year more than two thousand pilgrims from England alone visited Compostella in Spain. Many of these had traveled through France on foot, begging for bed and bread as they went. Some did this from need, but others because they thought by this pov- erty and humility to please God. So people of fame and wealth sometimes walked and begged in the pilgrim cos- tume. * Thus did Saint Louis, even though king of France. But others rode on horses or went by ship as far as they could and spent their money as they went, staying at inns when there were any, buying at the markets, and giving alms to the poor pilgrims. So where the great shrines were and the great crowds of pilgrims, there came to be great fairs and prosperous cities. Business hung to the skirts of religion. A Pilgrim RELIGION IN THE MIDDLE AGES 32 1 A Great Noble Goes on a Pilgrimage The ship is too large to come to shore. It anchors and sends its boat. Notice the two masts, crow's nest, roofed cabin, and embroidered or painted sails But of all the holy places of the world, the most holy, of course, was Jerusalem, where Christ had piigrim- lived and died. Men longed to see the Jordan ages to river, where he had been baptized, the garden Jerusalem of Gethsemane where he had suffered, the mount where 322 THE NEWER NATIONS he had been crucified, the tomb where his body had been placed and from which he had risen to be their Savior. Even people who were not very religious were eager to go to Palestine. Priests thought it was a holy deed to make the long journey. So they promised forgiveness of sins to those who went. For the men of western Europe it was a journey of two or three thousand miles, and many months were needed to make it. But even so, people went by hundreds. Merchants left their business, knights left their castles, and women their children, to seek Palestine. Some of them went by land through Hungary to Constantinople, across the straits and down to the holy city. Others went in one way or another to some seaport of Italy — Venice, Genoa, Brindisi, Pisa. There they took ship and were carried along the Mediterranean to Jaffa or to Acre. Even in this easy way they had to spend a long time. Saewulf, a merchant of England, who made the pilgrim- age in 1100, says that he was thirteen weeks voyaging from Italy to Jaffa. And then the journey was not at an end. "We went up from Jaffa," he says, "to the city of Jerusalem, a journey of two days, by a mountain- ous road, very rough and dangerous on account of the Saracens, who lie in wait in the caves of the mountains to surprise the Christians." Mohammedanism, the New Religion in Asia Who were these Saracens who robbed the Christian pilgrims? The answer to this is a long story. Chris- Moham- tianity had begun in Palestine, a little land of med and Asia. Six hundred years after the birth of His Re- Christ another great religion was born, and this also in Asia. Arabia was a country of dry deserts and rich oases and fertile coast lands, a country RELIGION IN THE MIDDLE AGES 323 of camels and perfumes and jewels and gold mines. It was in this land that the new religion began, and Moham- med, an Arab, was the father of it. He had visions, he said, in which an angel appeared to him carrying silken scrolls written over with messages from God. These messages Mohammed at the angel's command read aloud and remembered. Then he recited them to his family and his neighbors and preached on the meaning of them. At first few people would listen. Indeed, Mohammed and his handful of followers were driven out of his own city of Mecca. But another town, Medina, received them, and many of its people were converted. From that time the new religion spread rapidly, so that before its prophet died, most of Arabia was Mohammedan. One reason for its rapid growth was that Mohammed had noble things to say. He saw men worshiping idols and believing in many gods. Against such beliefs he cried, "Your God is one God. There is no God but Him the most merciful. " Moreover, this God whom Mo- hammed preached was a God of love. "By the bright- ness of the morning ; and by the night, when it groweth dark : thy Lord hath not forsaken thee, neither doth He hate thee. Verily the life to come shall be better for thee than this present life : and thy Lord shall give thee a reward wherewith thou shalt be well pleased. Did He not find thee an orphan, and hath He not taken care of thee ? And did He not find thee wandering in error and hath He not guided thee into the truth ? And did He not find thee needy, and hath He not enriched thee ? Where- fore oppress not the orphan, neither repulse the beggar : but declare the goodness of the Lord." People who accepted the new religion were to live good lives. "Whatsoever good ye do, God knoweth it," says 324 THE NEWER NATIONS the Koran, the holy book of the Mohammedans, made up of the messages that the angel delivered to Mohammed. In another place it says, "A fair speech and to forgive is better than alms followed by mischief. " "Deal not unjustly with others, and ye shall not be dealt with unjustly." But Mohammed did not preach peace as Christ had done, but rather he preached war against the infidels, for so he called all people not Mohammedans. He wanted to convert all the world to his religion, just as the Christians wanted to do. But his way was to send out, not peaceful missionaries to teach and to preach, but armies to slay and conquer and frighten men into becom- ing Mohammedans. He said: "The sword is the key of heaven and of hell ; a drop of blood shed in the cause of God, a night spent in arms, is of more avail than two months of fasting or prayer. Whosoever falls in battle, his sins are forgiven ; at the day of judgment his wounds shall be resplendent as vermilion, and odoriferous as musk ; and the loss of his limbs shall be supplied by the wings of angels and cherubim." The heaven to which the faithful will go, is thus de- scribed in the Koran: "They shall dwell in gardens of delight, . . . reposing on couches adorned with gold and precious stones, sitting opposite to one another thereon. Youths which shall continue in their bloom forever, shall go round about to attend them, with goblets and beakers and a cup of flowing wine. . . . And there shall accompany them fair damsels having large black eyes. . . . And [they] shall have their abode among lote trees free from thorns . . . under an extended shade, near a flowing water and amidst fruits in abundance, which shall not fail nor shall be forbidden to be gathered, and they shall repose themselves on lofty beds." RELIGION IN THE MIDDLE AGES 325 With such a promise as that, is it any wonder that Mohammed's followers were eager to fight TheMo- and that they fought against any odds as hamme- though their lives were worthless? The Arabs ^l^° n " were a warlike race and loved fighting for its Great own sake. So now they set out to conquer Empire and convert the world. Their neighbors to the north belonged to what was left of the Roman empire. In the West the empire was gone, and the Germans were growing up on its old land. But in the East the throne of Constantine yet stood. He had moved the capital of the empire from Rome and had built a splendid city at the old Greek town of Byzantium, calling it, after himself, Constantinople. 1 In Mohammedan times this Constantinople was still rich and beautiful — her harbor full of ships, her streets busy with traders, her court gay with fine lords and ladies, her libraries filled with learned books and learned men, her generals in command of great armies. She still owned Greece and the country north of it, almost to the Danube, and, besides that, Asia Minor and Palestine and Egypt* and some of the northern shore of Africa. In fact the eastern Mediterranean and its lands were hers. 2 So when the Arabs began to press outward, they soon met the armies of this eastern Christian empire. But those Mohammedans were a new kind of fighters. They were burning with enthusiasm. They were lean and wiry and quick as lizards. They were afraid of noth- ing and never dreamed of giving up. They fought on ' horseback and could wheel their flying steeds as quickly as a man could turn. They rode into battle on the run, shouting shrilly their war-cry, "God is God, and Mo- hammed is his prophet." 1 See page HS- 2 See map on page 149, 326 THE NEWER NATIONS Before this rush of enthusiasm and courage the East- ern empire was not able to hold its outlying provinces. Twelve years after Mohammed's death his followers possessed not only their own Arabia, but Persia, Syria, Palestine, and Egypt. Inside of seventy years they had all northern Africa and were looking across the Strait of Gibraltar at Spain. So far their conquests had been in Asia and Africa. It would be more serious if an Asiatic people and an Asiatic religion should step into Europe. Yet so it happened. In 711 the Saracens, as Europeans called them, crossed over. The Spaniards whom they met were descendants of those Goths who had followed Adolf over into Spain after Alaric's death. 1 They had become enthusiastic Chris- tians. The nobles were rich, owning thousands of acres of land and hundreds of slaves. They were disloyal to their king and disunited among themselves. They had lost the strength and courage of their ancestors. Twelve thousand Saracens from Africa, under a brave leader, Tarik, met a Spanish army four or five times as large and conquered it. The Gothic hosts — killed, captured, and fleeing — melted away. One city after another opened its gates to the Saracen leaders, so that within two or three years after Tarik's landing, almost all of Spain belonged to the strangers. So here were the Saracens with an empire more than five thousand miles long, stretching from India to the most western tip of Europe. And no man could tell where Mohammedan rule would stop. Its warriors were brave and active, its cities were growing richer, its people prouder. Now, all this had happened before any great nations had grown up in Europe. The European people were so busy with their own affairs, they traveled so 1 See page 148. RELIGION IN THE MIDDLE AGES 327 little and were so ignorant of anything beyond their own eyesight, that they hardly knew of this great Moham- medan empire in the East and South that had grown so magically and that threatened to keep on growing. A Vista in a Saracen Palace The Alhambra in Spain Meanwhile the Saracen people had prospered in body and soul. The upper class, men and women alike, dressed in gorgeous silk robes that hung from neck to toe, and they wore bracelets and neck- Mo ^ am - laces of gold, set with bright gems. The palaces Life of the wealthy were great rambling buildings with flat roofs and tall, slender towers. The open courts were planted with palms and orange trees and brilliant flowers and were cooled with spraying fountains or with still pools of water. Upon those airy courts opened rich 328 THE NEWER NATIONS rooms with delicate columns and arches covered with colored plaster all traced over with finely woven lines in lovely patterns. There were soft, glowing carpets on the floors of mosaic marble, there were deep cushions for lounging, and fountains of perfume playing to scent the air. With all these riches went learning also. Arabia and Moorish Spain were much more civilized and learned than were the England of King John or the Moham- F rance of Saint Louis or the Germany of Learning Frederick II, five hundred years later. In- deed, it was from the Moors of Spain and of Sicily that Frederick II got much of that great learning which made him the wonder of the world. 1 The large Saracen cities had libraries, observatories, hospitals. The Spanish Moors had universities long before the rest of Europe, and men who were eager to become really trained in medicine or astronomy or mathematics or chemistry went, not to some Christian city to study, but down into Spain, to Mohammedan Toledo, Cordova, Seville, or Granada. Even to-day we use Arabic words for ideas, inventions, and products which our ancestors learned from the Arabs — algebra, alcohol, almanac, damask, muslin, sugar, cotton. The first of these words shows the Arabs as great mathematicians ; the second proves them chemists ; the third, astronomers ; the fourth and fifth, fine weavers ; the last two, good farmers. It was the Moors who brought into Spain, and so into all Europe, certain prod- ucts of their warmer climates that seem now like our own — rice, sugar cane, cotton, apricots, peaches, yellow roses, tulips. These Saracens were traders and merchants, too. They traded "by vessels or caravans with China, from which 1 See page 169. RELIGION IN THE MIDDLE AGES 329 they obtained silk, tea, lac, and china; with Calcutta and Sumatra, whence they brought spices, drugs, pearls, and precious stones ; with [the remoter parts of] Africa, which supplied them with slaves, ivory, and gold dust; with the country at the north of the Black Sea, which furnished furs and amber." The Crusades It was such people as these who had won holy Jeru- salem from the Christians and had taken several provinces away from the Eastern empire. Religious men of western Europe regretted most the fact that " infidels" should hold the city of Christ and collect a tax from pilgrims at its gates. Merchants regretted, also, that the Saracens had possession of the great ports where the Christian ships went to trade for the wonderful goods of the East. Chris- tian knights heard tales of the bravery and courtesy and skill of the gentlemen warriors of Arabia and longed to measure swords with them. The emperor at Constantinople and the other rulers of Europe began to fear lest the Mohammedans should cross the narrow straits between Asia and Europe or pass over the mountains that cut off Spain from France and conquer all Europe and crush out Christianity. Soon the emperor at Constantinople saw the Turks, a new Mohammedan tribe, more fierce and less cultured than the Arabs, capturing his lands and facing him across the straits. Then in 1095 he called to the pope at Rome to help him in keeping the " infidels" out of Europe. The pope's answer was to preach a fiery sermon at a council of churchmen and nobles, urging them to rescue the holy sepulcher from the " infidels." After this burning sermon the people shouted, "It is the will of God!" and begged for the privilege to go. 330 THE NEWER NATIONS Crosses were quickly cut from red cloth, men sewed them to their cloaks as a sign that they had entered c Crusade upon a holy war — a war of the cross. The pope gave his blessing and a promise of sins forgiven, and a few months later a great army started out across eastern Europe toward Jerusalem. Terrible sufferings and danger beset it. Many died or were captured and sold into slavery or became ill from hunger and weariness and had to drop behind. Yet at last many of the knights and foot-soldiers — perhaps a hundred thousand of them — did arrive in Asia. There were fierce battles with the Mohammedans and long sieges of Mohammedan cities, deaths from honorable wounds received in fights and less glorious deaths from starvation and sickness brought on by the strange climate. After many trials, however, at last the Christian army, in 1099, did rescue Jerusalem from the Mohammedans. Moreover, it conquered a narrow strip for 500 apture o jjjjjgg a i ng the coast of Palestine and Syria Jerusalem ,,..,,.. r and divided it into four states, with one or an- other of the crusaders for ruler, and the Christian knights for garrisons. For about eighty years there were Chris- tian " kings of Jerusalem" ruling the land that King David had once ruled. Here, on the edge of a strange world, these knights of western Europe lived their lives much as they had lived them at home — building castles, holding tournaments, quarreling among themselves, fighting their enemies, ruling their vassals, training their squires to become knights, listening to troubadour songs. Many pilgrims came and went, — common people and princes. Yet, in spite of courage and strength, a little gar- rison of foreigners could not hold this strip of Holy Land from the warlike hosts that were seething about it. The kingdom was lost and won and lost again. There RELIGION IN THE MIDDLE AGES 331 was almost constant war. During two hundred years six European kings and scores of great dukes led crusading armies to the East to try to hold the land or regain it for the Christians : yet the crusades were unsuccess- ful. They did not permanently rescue the sepulcher of Jerusalem Much like any European city except that the temple is at the heart of it Christ ; they did not push the Mohammedans back and keep them out of Europe. Before the two hundred years were quite passed the little J he Mo " Christian kingdoms in Palestine and Syria had victory vanished, and the Mohammedans had won back every foot of land. Then came the turn of eastern Europe. The Turks crossed over from Asia Minor and at last, in 1453, captured Constantinople and thus put an end to the Roman empire of the East. Old Christian 332 THE NEWER NATIONS Constantinople is to-day the capital of Mohammedan Turkey. In another way, however, the crusades accomplished much. The knights of Europe found Mohammedan cavaliers quite as religious and as courteous and Results as b rave as themselves. And they found cities Crusades cleaner and pleasanter than their own, with paved streets and flowing water. They saw houses filled with beautiful rugs and cushions, and sweet with perfume and sparkling fountains and furnished with baths. They saw strange plants and animals and new kinds of agriculture; they saw richness of clothing arftl jewelry that they had only dreamed of. Hundreds of thousands of common men took the cross, followed the princes and nobles upon these holy wars, and saw the wonderful life of the East. Some of them went back home again, carrying curios with them, and telling marvelous tales about their travels. Every minstrel in Europe tuned his lyre and sang the glorious tale of this or that crusader. In these ways men became acquainted with a different world, with different ways of building, of eating, of dressing, of talking, of worshiping, of thinking, and their minds had to grow to fit this new knowledge. Moreover, merchants and crusaders went hand in hand, and though the crusaders returned home, the merchants remained and shipped new goods from the East back to Europe. Beside the religious pilgrimages grew up a habit of travel, a curiosity to see the world, a desire to know new peoples. All that great traveling across land and sea and that exchanging of goods between Asia and Europe, all that commerce of the Hanse towns and the cities of Italy which is told of in the chapter before this, was growing up during the time of the crusades. While RELIGION IN THE MIDDLE AGES 333 King Richard of England was fighting the " infidels' ' before Jerusalem, the Venetian merchants were living at Acre, near by, and were trading in friendly way with Mohammedan caravans. And that commerce, that love of travel, that exploring spirit, lived on after the crusades had died out. 1. Read " Friar Jerome's Beautiful Book," a poem by T. B. Aldrich, the story of the making of an old manuscript book. Draw some of the designs and letters that you think Friar Jerome made. 2. Choose some beautiful poem or inspiring sentence and print it, using a brush and India ink on parchment paper. Make the initial letters bright and lovely. It will be a good Christmas card. 3. For a few days keep a chronicle of interesting things that happen in classes or on the play- ground. What could people of 2400 a.d. learn about the life of our day from reading your chronicle ? 4. What monks came to America in the early days as missionaries? Did they do anything besides preach ? 5. Find out about the Trappist monks in America to-day. 6. What are the California missions, and who built them? 7. Moham- medans date events from the year when Mohammed fled from Mecca, and they call the flight the Hejira. That was in 622 a.d. They would say that Charlemagne was crowned 178 years after the Hejira. What number do they give the present year ? 8. What peoples to-day are Mohammedans? PART III BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES CHAPTER XIII GREAT CHANGES Our modern world is very different from the medieval world. In those earlier times the great lived in stone castles, and the poor were bound to the soil. Only a few men owned land, and most men served some other with plow or sword in payment for the use of a piece of ground. Then books were rare, and the few who could read them were churchmen. Practically all the people of western Europe were members of one church and were obedient to priest and pope. Yet things never stand still, and before the year 1600 many great changes had come about. The invention of gunpowder had changed the style of buildings for the great : smiling palaces were taking the place of grim castles. 1 Professional soldiers with strange firearms had taken the place of steel-clad knights. Most of the serfs were free : they had bought their freedom or had snatched it by running away from their lords. 2 The manors had begun to change : many free workers had come to rent or own little farms. National States In many of the countries of western Europe the kings had humbled their great nobles, as Saint Louis had done. 3 1 See pages 247-248. 2 See pages 258 and 263. 8 See pages 176-178. 334 GREAT CHANGES 335 In the early Middle Ages men had thought of themselves not so much as Englishmen or Frenchmen, but as vassals of this count or that duke. As the The king's power increased, however, men came to Growth of think less about whose vassals they were, and Kingly more and more of the monarch who was strong ower enough to protect life and property. The kings gained authority over the towns, often by helping them against the greed of their lords. As the king grew stronger the great nobles were less and less able to defy him. Often, too, the king's need of money or of support against the lords led him to ask the aid of the richer common men. Then parliaments began at last to grow, — great assemblies where the king presided and where men from all corners of his realm met to discuss affairs and to make laws. 1 Then all men's eyes and hearts began to turn toward a common center, and in France, England, Spain, and Portugal men began to say: "We are Frenchmen," "We are English- men," "We are Spaniards," "We are Portuguese." The king of such a country, when he was a wise king, felt that the interest of his subjects was his interest. If Soldier with an Early Form of Firearm Notice that he wears no steel armor 1 See pages 186-187. 336 BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES his merchants were prosperous, he was prosperous. There- fore he exerted himself to help them, and being much The Nation stronger than an old feudal king, he could Regulates aid them better. If Englishmen needed per- Trade and mission to trade in a French port or a Russian port, the English king would send an ambassador to the king of France or to the czar of Russia to obtain such a permission. Kings came, moreover, to consider it their business to make laws regulating manufacture and agriculture and the hiring of laborers. They found the old gilds selfish and narrow. 1 Trade and industry, more- over, had grown too broad for gilds and towns to manage. Therefore the kings altered the old rules and made new national laws. Under Queen Elizabeth, England, for ex- ample, set the laborer's day at twelve hours in summer, gave justices of the peace the power to fix the legal wages, and regulated contracts between employers and laborers. Gilds were now no longer needed in the old way, and they broke up or served merely to , carry out national laws. The national government had an eye to the welfare of the laborer, of the farmer, of the merchant. How the World Began to Read Another great change was in education. Common men in great numbers began to read. This happened as . . the result of what must at first have seemed like an unimportant invention. Between the years 1445 and 1454 men in Holland and Germany were casting individual letters in metal. By putting these letters together into words and spreading ink over them and pressing paper upon them they could print a page. And the great point was that when a man had the type set up he could in a few minutes make many copies of the matter. 1 See page 294. GREAT CHANGES 337 Therefore a hundred books could be printed almost as quickly as one and almost as cheaply. You remember how slow a task it had been before this time for a monk to copy t a manuscript, 1 and how costly, therefore, books had been. With the movable types and the printing press, however, it was made possible for even poor men to buy books. By 1490 printing presses were busy in almost two hundred cities in western Europe, from Sweden to Sicily and from Constantinople to Portugal. Common people began to learn what the great minds of the past had thought and what the scholars of their own time were talking about. Sailors could buy books of travel, students could get writings on astronomy and medicine and law, and many people had copies of the Bible. The world began to read. A Change in Religion A great change occurred, too, in religion. Many people began to question whether the church t^ was perfect. "The priests and the monks," Protestant they said, "do not live holy lives. Many Revolt of them are wicked men, greedy and pleasure-loving." 1 See pages 310-311. A Printing Office of the Six- teenth Century In the background men are setting type by hand. Those in front are working at the press 33* BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES People had been carefully reading their newly printed Bibles, and they began to criticise the beliefs and cere- monies of the church. "The church does many things not taught in the Bible/' they said. "It is too rich, too pompous. The ceremonies of the mass are wrong. Pilgrimages, too are mistaken. The priests encour- age men to buy pardons to save their dead friends from suffering for their sins. This, too, is wrong. The church needs re- forming." Martin Luther in Ger- many and John Calvin in France and Switzerland were the leaders of this revolt, which soon went to the length of rejecting alto- gether the author- ity of the pope. If the revolt suc- ceeded, the uni- versal sway of the old medieval church would be broken. But most people remained loyal to the church, and they declared that some of the charges were exaggerated or wholly untrue, and that the reformers did not understand the true meaning of the Bible. " And even if there are things wrong with the church," said the loyal Catholics, "it would be wicked and sinful to try to destroy its Martin Luther as a Monk GREAT CHANGES 339 ancient unity and authority instead of gradually working to make things better/ ■ There were debates between scholars on church ques- tions. The pope and the emperor held meetings to discuss church matters. Books, both earnest and scornful, were written on both sides. Men grew more and more bitter, and wars arose out of the trouble. Most of the people of southern Europe remained faithful to the church : Italy, Spain, Portugal, France, southern Germany, con- tinued Catholic and are so to-day. Most of the people of northern Europe left the old church and established new ones with slightly changed ceremonies and creeds. There were the Lutheran and Calvinist churches in north- ern Germany, Holland, Sweden, Norway, and Denmark ; the Episcopalian, in England ; the Presbyterian, in Scot- land. These are still Protestant countries. But the struggle went on. Every church, new or old, was so certain of being in the right that it had no patience or sympathy with those of another faith. Catholic and Protestant alike condemned liberty of thought and be- lief and cruelly persecuted each other when they could. It was an age of intolerance. To the Catholic church the new creeds seemed utterly wrong, and she called them heresies. She fought them with two strong weapons. One was the Society of Jesus, an order of priests somewhat like the ** - old monkish orders. By learning, by eloquent inquisition preaching and writing, these devoted Catholics sought to keep the world Catholic. The other great weapon was the Inquisition. This was a body of church- men whose business it was to root out heresy. They had the right to arrest men, women, and children who were accused of being heretics. They tried these prisoners, and if a man was found guilty, he was punished, Per- 340 BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES haps he was only scourged. Perhaps he was sent to the galleys, where he sat chained to the bench and helped to row the great ship. Perhaps he was imprisoned for life. Perhaps, even, he was burned at the stake. During the eighteen years of one Spanish judge's work, more than two thousand people of Spain were burned as heretics. But not only did Catholics try to root out heresy, they saw the need of correcting things that were wrong The and of stating clearly the teachings of the Catholic church. Several councils of bishops and great Reforma- churchmen were held to clear up disputed points, to write out fully the Catholic creed, to make rules for the actions of bishops and priests and monks. Seminaries were established for the teaching of priests. The Jesuits encouraged learning and good habits among churchmen. The Catholic church of to-day has grown from that reformation on the inside, and the various Protestant churches are the result of the refor- mation on the outside. Thus by inventions and education, by the changing of manors and gilds, by the curbing of nobles and towns and the uniting of people under strong governments, by the breaking up of the powerful church and the formation of new creeds, Europe was becoming different from the Europe of the Middle Ages; it was becoming modern Europe. 1. Suppose all the printing presses were destroyed to-night; what difference would it make in our world? 2. Visit a newspaper printing office. How is the type set? Find out how the early type was set. How is the press. run? Find out how the early presses were run. 3. From an almanac find out how many religious sects there are in the United States. 4. French Jesuits went as missionaries to Canada. Find out the names of some of them and learn about their work. One book that will help you is James Baldwin's Discovery of the Old Northwest. A Map op the World Made in Alexandria 1 about 150 a.d. CHAPTER XIV SHIPS IN STRANGE SEAS Changes in religion and education and government were all very important in creating our modern world, but a change more full of story and adventure and quite as important had to do with men's knowledge of geog- raphy. To the people of Europe in 1422 the known world was not much larger than it had been to the Greeks. To the Mediterranean countries they had added only northern Europe and a vague knowledge of India and China and Japan. In 1522, a hundred years later, a ship had sailed all the way around the world and so had demonstrated that the earth is a sphere ; a sailing route around Africa had been discovered ; and men had found the hitherto unknown Americas. Early Sailors and Their Ways Sailing the sea is a fairly simple matter if one keeps close to shore and sails over well-known routes. The pilot watches the color of the water and the breaking of 34i 342 . BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES waves for hidden reefs. He sights some object on land and guides his course by it. He judges his speed by not- ing how long it takes him to go from this well-known cape to that, familiar town. When a storm threatens, he makes for a harbor that he knows. Such was the sailing in the Mediterranean in the time of the Greeks and Romans, and such the sailing of the early merchants of Florence and Venice and Genoa. During the hundreds of years of voyaging over this inland sea, however, sailors invented some very useful aids. Some man — some Arab or Chinaman perhaps : we do not know who he was, or where he lived, or when — found that if he rubbed a needle with a magnet and floated it on a straw in a dish of water, it would faith- fully point north. If a pilot was out of sight of land on a cloudy night, without sun or moon or stars to show him direction, this little needle helped him to keep prove- a straight course. So it rapidly grew in im- i. Compass P 0I *tance. Improvements were made in it, Italian traders in Asia carried the invention to the West, and by 1300 every Mediterranean ship had a compass, a neat little box with its bottom marked off with the directions, and with a magnetized needle swing- ing inside it. But though a compass might help a pilot to steer a straight course, it could not tell him in what direction to go in order to find a port which he had never seen. Captains, therefore, were glad to have in their crews men who had sailed in different parts of the Mediterranean, that they might serve as pilots. Yet such men were not always to be found. So there grew up the custom of writ- ing out sailing directions and selling them to ships' captains. They might read somewhat like this, perhaps : "From Naples sail south, past the burning island of Stromboli, SHIPS IN STRANGE SEAS 343 2. Sailing Directions Sixty-three leagues * will bring you to the strait between Sicily and Italy. Here the ship is in much danger from the swift tide, which piles up the water in the narrow strait. After rounding the point of Italy lay your course eastward for one hundred leagues, until you sight the Greek island of Zante, where many grapes are grown. From here sail south- ward, keeping the shore in sight and passing to the left of the is- land of Stri- vali, where the monas- tery is. After turning east around Cape Gallo, hug the shore in order to avoid the winds blow- ing from the north. But as you approach Cape Malia make a wide sweep to the southward ; for this is a most dangerous point, on account of wind and hidden rocks." Gradually, instead of writing such directions, men of much travel came to make drawings of the coasts they 1 The league as here used is the modern English league of three miles. A Sailor's Map of Europe and Africa, Made in 1351 Compare the shape of Africa with that in the map on page 341. Yet this is probably only a guess. Notice how much better the Mediterranean is drawn : this part the sailors knew well 344 BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES m knew. At last captains could buy charts showing the shores of the whole Mediterranean as experienced sailors had seen them. Think what it means for a man to be able to make such a map. No one person, of course, had sailed along all the thousands of miles of the Mediterranean coast and explored all the harbors. One had gone up and down the west shore of Italy until he knew it well, had measured its distances and noted its directions. Another had done the like on the east coast, another among the Greek islands, yet another had often run the course from Sicily to Egypt. Every one of them, perhaps, could map his own little piece of coast ; but in order to put all these together, to know how far apart to draw the two shores of Italy, to know whether Athens was directly east of Rome or somewhat to the south of it — how could any seaman know these things ? The maker of a map that showed a great stretch of coast, with correct directions and distances, had to be able to find out, when he stood in a certain spot, where he was in relation to some other place, whether north, south, east, or west, and how far in that direction. To help them in doing this the scientists of the Middle Ages had invented an instrument called the astrolabe. They could point it at the north star and at the horizon, and thereby find out how far above the horizon the star was. This told them how far north of the equator they stood. In drawing their maps they used the plan of lines and cross lines that the geographers of Alexandria had in- vented. 1 They imagined lines on the earth running from the north pole to the south pole, and other lines running around the earth from east to west and cutting it into spaces much as the lines of longitude and latitude do on our maps to-day. 1 See pages 48 and 69. SHIPS IN STRANGE SEAS 345 Besides having the compass to direct them, maps to guide them, and the astrolabe to show them their loca- tion, Mediterranean sailors had improved their ships. These were larger than those of Greek days and carried three masts instead of one. Each sail was divided, so that parts of it could be reefed in a heavy 4. Ships A Portuguese Ship wind and yet other parts remain spread. There were jibs flying over the bow to catch the wind. With all this spread of sail, a ship went very fast. A German monk who made a pilgrimage to the Holy Land in 1480 wrote a book about his travels. In it he says: "In storms, when the wind is fair and strong, a ship runs violently and with uneasy tossing on its course 346 BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES with exceeding great swiftness, so fast that an arrow from a catapult or a bow cannot equal the pace of the ship. . . . The wind draws the ship along by its sails with such force that the sea water seems to run to meet the prow, and the beak of the prow seems to be plowing furiously *up against the stream of a river so that sometimes the water rises above the horns of the prow." Wanted: A New Route to India Yet, in spite of better ships and aids to navigation, Mediterranean sailors had not ventured out into the Atlantic. A few of them, to be sure, skirted the coast on a yearly trip to England and Flanders, 1 but most of them were content to sail up and down the familiar sea. There had been little need to go elsewhere. Ships sailed in order to carry goods, and the things that people wanted had been waiting for them in the ports of Egypt and Asia Minor and Syria. But something had happened to change all this, so that the European traders of the fifteenth century began Changes *° ^ n ^ little in their old markets at Constan- inthe tinople, Smyrna, and the other cities of Asia East Minor. Western Asia had long been disturbed. About 1200, Mongol tribes under great rulers and fighters, after conquering China, had moved westward, had seized practically all of Asia, and had pushed into Europe, con- quering and holding much of Russia. A little later the Ottoman Turks began to move out southward and east- ward from the northwest corner of Asia Minor. It was through this country, so often raided and conquered by people who were in race, religion, and habits unlike the Europeans, that the caravans went from the East to the l See page 291. SHIPS IN STRANGE SEAS 347 West. Merchants became afraid to risk their goods in this fierce war zone. Fewer and fewer caravans came from India and China. Trading ships lay idle, and trade dwindled. 1 Yet men knew that far off, beyond that hostile Turkish land, lay rich China and India and the Spice Islands. People began to read with more eager- ness than ever before the old book of the travels of Marco Polo. This fortunate boy and his two uncles had traveled, sometimes on ship, sometimes on camel back, and by horse, and afoot, from their Marco own city of Venice, through Polo's the well-known Mediterran- Travels, ean, through the old lands of I2 7 I_I2 95 Asia that Alexander had conquered, past ruins of ancient cities, across deserts, among fierce tribes, over mountain passes, down great river valleys, to the farthest coast of China, a journey of more than a thousand From t he first edition d^VS . of his book Here they had lived for seventeen years, in the court of the emperor Kublai Khan, acting as his messengers and advisers. They went with the emperor from his summer palace to his winter palace. They traveled into far corners of the country on the emperor's business. They saw the great land of China from end to end and Chinese life from top to bottom. And always Marco's eyes were open to everything interesting and important. 1 Though some trade still flowed through Syria and Egypt, Damascus and Jaffa and Alexandria, still it was plain that these, too, must come under the yoke of the Turk, as indeed they did early in the sixteenth century. 348 BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES When at last he returned to Italy and told his story, a friend, hearing it, wrote it down in a book. That book was so full of marvels that when it was finally published, all who could, put hands upon a copy and read and went The Polos Begin Their Journey away with excited eyes, telling it again to whoever would listen. Men told over and over of the Grand Khan's palace and its gilt columns entwined with carved dragons ; of the sacred herd of ten thousand milk-white horses ; of the level roads with their flying horsemen and fleet run- ners that could make a ten days' journey in one ; of the SHIPS IN STRANGE SEAS 349 great Kiang River, ten miles wide in some places ; of the river town where fifteen thousand boats were tied up ; of that marvelous Celestial City, a hundred miles around, with twelve thousand bridges across its rivers and canals, with its stone-paved streets, by means of which " passen- gers can travel to every part without soiling their feet"; of the island of Java, where grew ' ' pepper, nutmegs, spike- nard, galangal, cubebs, cloves, and all the other valuable spices and drugs." The Polos had gone home by ship through the China Sea, past the Spice Islands, past Ceylon and the Indian coast, through the Indian Ocean and the Persian Gulf, without being troubled by the Turks. "If only we might get our ships into those waters!" thought the traders who read Polo's book. "Now that the Turks have shut the gates of land travel to Asia, it would be good to find some sea route from our Mediterranean into those eastern seas. If we could only sail around Africa, we might come into the Indian Ocean." One man in the fifteenth cen- tury accomplished a wonderful work that made such a voyage possible. He was a prince of the little country of Portugal. . Kublai Khan A Chinese picture Portugal's Great Explorers This country was on the western edge of the world, looking out over the terrible, the unguessed Atlantic. Men standing on her cliffs and gazing westward must have felt a thrill of terror. They could see nothing 350 BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES beyond but endless waters. What lay out there under the sunset? Ignorant men thought: "Of course the ocean stretches as far as eye can see, but it must tiiTocean ^ ave an en( *' -^ * s P r °kably cut off suddenly, and a ship would slip over its edge into — what ? Besides, do you see how a ship keeps dropping down as it sails out in that direction? First the hull disappears, then the sail, then the flag on the mast. It is going down- hill toward that awful jumping-off place." And toward the south, what was there? These same ignorant men thought that a few hundred miles south of the Mediterranean the earth became so hot that the air was aflame and the sea steaming. For as one journeyed into Africa, did not the climate grow hotter and hotter, and was not the ground parched so that no plants could grow, and were not the people scorched brown? Men believed, too, that a magnet mountain lay somewhere in that far-off sea. Acting upon the iron of the ships it would draw them toward it, would pull out the nails that held them together and strew the timbers of the wrecks over the waves. Monsters, moreover, lived on the land, men thought, death-dealing creatures and man- eaters. Yet there were educated men who knew that these were foolish superstitions, who had learned from the writings of the old Greek philosophers that the earth is a sphere and that the ocean laps it round like a blanket. Prince Henry of Portugal was one of these learned men. He knew much about the sha£e of the earth and wished to learn more. He was a scientist and mathematician, liking to figure out problems in astronomy and surveying. He was a great reader, too, and had read Herodotus and Marco Polo's book and Ptolemy's "Geography," written ages before in learned Alexandria. He had, besides, a SHIPS IN STRANGE SEAS 351 great deal of money, so that he could buy maps and make experiments quite impossible for poorer men. So he chose a home for himself on the very southwestern point of Portugal where the Atlantic tides and the sea winds swept in. Here he built a palace where he could live, an observatory where he could prince study the stars, a dock where he could have ships Henry's built. He encouraged all men of learning and ans all sailors who had had interesting voyages to visit him and to tell him their stories. For centuries ships had gone along the desert coast of northwestern Africa for seven hundred miles or more, stopping here and there to trade with the Moorish in- habitants for gold and ivory and curious things. But at a certain cape that stretched outward into the strange west, beaten by great waves, the ships had always turned back. Men had named the point Cape Non or Cape Not, because for the ship that sailed past it there was not any return. To pass this impassable cape, to push exploration as far as possible down the African coast became the dream and the purpose of Prince Henry's life. He sat in his observatory and studied the stars, in his library and pored over his maps, all telling different things about the unknown parts of the world. He had ships built, he hired sailors, he offered prizes to captains who should find new lands. He sketched maps for them, wrote sailing direc- tions. He commanded his captains at any risk to sail beyond Cape Non. He laughed at the foolish belief in the sea of darkness and the magnet Th ? mountain and the flaming air. At last he en- Coast ticed one ship past the cape. And since, as the old Portuguese chronicler says, "the beginning is two parts of the whole matter," soon others followed and Henry the Navigator On the shelves notice his books, astrolabe, compass, sundial, drawing instru- ments, and globe — the tools of the explorer. But he was also knight and crusader: note his armor and the garter about his knee. That is the badge of an English order of knighthood. In the upper right-hand corner is the seal of that order with its French motto, "Evil to him who evil thinks." At the bottom of the picture are the armies with which Prince Henry helped to cap- ture the Mohammedan city of Ceuta in Africa (352 SHIPS IN STRANGE SEAS 353 learned that the sea beyond Cape Non was no different from that nearer home. Before long, however, a new cape barred the way. It thrust a long finger a hundred miles westward, and the waves ran fiercely at its point. So for many years ships ran bravely the thousand miles to Cape Bojador and then went back home, having seen no new lands, having got no nearer to Asia. But at last a daring captain doubled this cape, too, and found the sea on the other side "as easy to sail in as the waters at home." He carried back to the prince not only his story, but some roses that he had gathered in a land hitherto untouched, perhaps, by white men. Every new cape conquered made the captains bolder. The very summer, indeed, that Gil Eannes passed Bo- jador, two young knights of his company, landing with their horses, rode twenty miles and had a glimpse Slaves of the wild natives. After that Antonio Gon- and galves, a daring young nobleman in charge of a Wealth, ship, being eager for adventure and for honor, I442 and wishing to please his beloved prince, sailed into these strange waters. He and his good friend, together with twenty men, surprised a little village, crying out, "Saint James for Portugal," as they fell upon the people and captured ten men, women, and children. This capturing of people who had done no harm does not seem to-day like a very noble adventure, but the men of Goncalves's company thought so highly of it that they considered the young man worthy of knighthood, and there on the savage African shore he knelt and re- ceived the accolade * from the hands of his friend, already a knight. It seemed important to these men to be able to carry back to their prince real living natives of that 1 See page 238. 354 BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES far-off fairyland. Prince Henry, also, thought this a great and useful deed, for he hoped to make Christians of these captives and to get from them, too, more definite knowledge concerning their country. So, indeed, it proved, and a little later Goncalves got in partial exchange for one of his captives a little bag of gold dust together with a few black men, the slaves of the Moorish tribe to which the captives belonged. Gold and slaves to be had for the capturing! White men needed no further encouragement to make the African voyage. Little trading settlements grew up on this gold coast. Then began the slave traffic, that con- tinued for almost four hundred years. Ships came and went, laden with gold and with black men, the sea roads grew busy, and Portugal grew rich. But though many men set out for Africa only in the hope of gain, caring nothing for finding new lands or for getting new knowledge, yet the prince kept his scientific interest, his love of discovery. He had read the old story told by Herodotus, the N Greek historian, who says: "Neco, king of Egypt, . . . sent certain Phoenicians in ships [from the Red Sea] with orders to sail back through .the Pillars of Hercules into the northern sea [that is, the Mediterranean] and so to return to Egypt. The Phoenicians, accordingly, setting out from the Red Sea, navigated the southern sea. When autumn came, they went ashore and sowed the land by whatever part of Libya [that is, Africa] they happened to be sailing, and waited for the harvest. Then, having reaped the grain, they put to sea again. When two years had thus passed, in the third, having doubled the Pillars of Hercules, they arrived in Egypt. " 1 As the prince's discoveries and studies continued, he 1 See page 8. SHIPS IN STRANGE SEAS 355 probably came to think: "That voyage is a proof that Africa has an end toward the south. The Indian Ocean over east of it and the Atlantic west of it must flow to- gether at that southern end. If we could round that point, we should come into the Indian Ocean and might sail on to China and the Spice Islands." But Prince Henry died before his ships had gone half the way down the African coast as we know it now. Yet he had not spent his forty years of work in vain. Men had sailed westward for eight hundred miles and had found, not a sea of darkness, not the edge of Results the world, but the fair islands of the Azores, of Prince They had sailed southward to the equator, and Henry's their ships had not been sucked down into or a boiling whirlpool, nor had the men been burned black by a scorching sun. Indeed, they had found a land rich with more nourishing plants than grew in Portugal. Moreover, Prince Henry had trained up a class of captains and sailors who knew better how to handle a ship and to take reckonings than seamen before them. And hun- dreds of people became interested in sailing around Africa. So the voyages continued after Prince Henry's death. In 1486 his nephew, King John, sent out four expeditions at once. One man went through Egypt to the hidden lands of Africa, exploring the shore. Here he found, stretching along the eastern coast, a line of Mohammedan towns of busy traders, where came ships from V* e India and Arabia. He sent letters home, say- Turned ing: "Keep southward. If you persist, Africa must come to an end. And when ships come to the Eastern Ocean let them ask for Sofala and the island of the Moon [Madagascar], and they will find pilots to take them to Malabar [in India]." 356 BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES 1487 That was an encouraging message, indeed, and a helpful discovery. But another of King John's expeditions made a still more important one. Bartholomew Diaz with two ships sailed southward along Africa for sixteen months. In winter cold and on tossing seas he rounded the end of Africa at last, and knew that the next Portuguese ship might sail on into the warm, busy waters of the East. But his own men did not realize what a great thing they had done, and, worn out with cold and long sailing, de- manded to go home. The king of Portugal, when he heard Diaz's story, knew that Prince Henry's dream was realized, that the sea road to India was open. Therefore he refused to call the new point "Cape of Storms,'' as the wind-tossed sailor Diaz had named it, but rather "Cape of Good Hope," because it opened to Portugal so good hopes of trade and wealth. Yet it was ten years before any one again doubled the cape and made the much-hoped-for voyage into the Indian Ocean. Four ships were built on purpose, and the king put in command of them a Portuguese gentle- man, Vasco da Gama. The king and the queen and the nobles of the court gathered to see the beginning of this Exploration Moves down can Coast the Afri- SHIPS IN STRANGE SEAS 357 yet untried voyage. They and the adventurers crowded into a chapel to ask God's blessing on this great Alound attempt. After that, two long years passed, the Cape and no news came to the king concerning the fate t0 ^^a- of the expedition. But in another two months I497 the ships sailed into harbor with the rich smell of spices Mediterranean Western Africa From a globe made in 149'^ by Behaim. The large flags show the discoveries of the Portuguese. Notice that the people live in tents clinging about them, and Da Gama put into the hands of the king a letter from an Indian ruler. " Vasco da Gama, a nobleman of your household," it said, "has visited my 35& BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES kingdom and has given me great pleasure. In my king- dom there is abundance of cinnamon, cloves, ginger, pepper, and precious stones. What I seek from thy country is gold, silver, coral, and scarlet." Da Gama had a marvelous story to tell. In his voyage southward he had not clung to the coast of Africa, as others had done, but had laid a circling course through the broad Atlantic, thinking , to shorten the dis- Da Gama s . . Experience tance - For ninety- three days he had sailed without sight of land. Then he had touched Africa, and from that time on he had stopped here and there to explore or to get fresh water or fish or game. Farther north along the coast they had found the Mohammedan country that King John's traveler had written of. Here were well- built cities, with beautiful palaces and gardens, some- what like those of Moorish Spain and northern Africa. The people were civilized Arabs, dressing in silks and sit- ting upon rich cushions. In the harbors were trading ships from India. The king of one of these towns had given Da Gama pilots, who had guided him to the kingdom of Calicut, in India, the land of silks and gems and spices. The Portuguese sailors had actually set foot upon this fabulous land, had talked with the people, had bowed before its king, and had received a letter from his hand. Vasco da Gama SHIPS IN STRANGE SEAS 359 But Moorish merchants who lived in this country, being jealous of the strangers, had made them much trouble, so that the Portuguese had scarcely escaped with their lives. On the way home, moreover, they had met hard winds in crossing the Indian Ocean and had been three months and three days without sighting land, so that food had become scarce and water low. Thirty men had died of scurvy, and only seven or eight in each ship had been able to work the ropes and attend to the sailing. When they had at last landed on the African coast they had burned one ship, because they had had too few men to sail them all . Hard and long had been the first voyage to India . That expedition was the joy of geographers, because it laid open a half of the world hitherto un- APortu . known. That letter from an Indian ruler was guese a trumpet call to Portuguese merchants, be- Empire cause it promised trade and wealth. Before m sia twenty years were gone, a Portuguese army had fought in Persia and India and Siam, had captured the five most useful seaports, had built up a Portuguese empire in the East over which a Portuguese viceroy ruled. Storehouses, markets, and dwellings were built in the cities of Asia like those in the factories of the Hanse towns in northern Europe x and of the Italian towns in the eastern Mediter- ranean. Portuguese officers were left in charge of these factories, with workmen to repair and build ships and handle goods and with soldiers and warships to guard the settlements. Fleets of Portuguese vessels passed to and fro around the Cape of Good Hope to trade in Arabia, India, and the eastern islands. From Europe they carried copper, quicksilver, vermilion dye, brass basins from Flanders, scarlet cloth, colored silks, perhaps made in Florence. 1 See page 286. 360 BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES They found in the storehouses at the Indian factories rice, sugar, honey, oil, cocoanuts. Portuguese ships went even further, out into the island-sown ocean south of Siam, and one little fleet of vessels turned northward and visited that marvelous China that Marco Polo had written of. Travelers explored lands unknown before and wrote books about them. Europeans were beginning to be at home in Africa and Asia. Spanish Ships in a New World While Portugal was uncovering hidden Africa and before she had found the southeastern path to India through strange seas and dreaded dangers, another sailor and scientist was forming a different plan — to sail westward from Por- tugal across the Atlantic and so to come to China. For A New Plan The World as Europeans Knew it before 1492 he, like Prince Henry, had read the Greek books about geography and believed that the earth is round. He had read, too, the books of the great travelers in China, SHIPS IN STRANGE SEAS 361 and he noted that they said the ocean was east of Asia as it was west of Europe. He thought, therefore, that the sea lapped over the globe from Europe to Asia, that the ocean lying at his feet as he stood on the Portuguese shore washed the rich coasts of China on the other side of the world. This dreamer was Christopher Columbus. He had grown up in Genoa, the great Italian trading town. There he had seen ships sail out for strange- sounding places at the far end of the sea, and ?f ly , he had beheld them come back and unload Columbus jewels and silks and spices that smelled of China and the yet more distant Cipango or Japan. Being an imaginative boy, he had formed a " magnificent and great desire to find a way to where the spices grew." He had gone to the university to learn mathematics and astronomy so that he should be able to find his way through unknown waters. He had learned Latin so that he might read the books that Eastern travelers had written. Then he had gone to Portugal, the sailors' paradise. He had become acquainted with some of her great cap- tains and had married the daughter of one of them. He himself says in his journal: "I have traversed the sea for twenty-three years without leaving it for any time worth counting, and I saw all in the east and the west, going on the route of the north, which is England, and I have been to Guinea [that is, Africa]." He had talked with some of the wise men in Prince Henry's old school and had seen the precious maps in his museum. And all the time his dream kept growing stronger and more real before his eyes. At last he was received by the king of Portugal and told him of his plan. But it seemed like a wild scheme [362] SHIPS IN STRANGE SEAS 363 to the king and his councilors, and they refused him ships. Columbus left Portugal in anger, but he did not give up his plan. He was determined to cross that uncrossed sea. Yet' he was a poor man, ^^ and only a king's purse was large enough to supply the ships and hire the men necessary for the great voyage. During eight years he sought one government, then another, perhaps Genoa and Venice and England. He interviewed great nobles of Spain, and they sent him to King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella. But they were busy with their wars against the Moors ; for they had determined to free Spain utterly from her old-time Mo- hammedan conquerors. 1 So Columbus was kept waiting four years at the court. The stories of that weary time, with the learned scoffing at him and the ignorant laughing, with the delays on account of wars and princely marriages and royal business, with the examination by men who thought themselves wiser than this unknown sailor ; the story of his bitter dis- appointment, of his leaving the court, of his poverty, of his wanderings, of the friends he found, and of his second visit to the court — all these stories show him as a sad and suffering man, but a man of burning enthusiasm and of iron will. He believed in his dream. And because he believed, because he would not give up, and because he had real knowledge and science on his side, he won at last. On August 3, 1492, seven months after the Moorish war was finished and Spain was at last free from the Mohammedans and proud of her ^ ol ^ im- victory, three little ships set sail from the voyage Spanish harbor of Palos — the Santa Maria, the Pinta, and the Nifia. There were one hundred twenty 1 See page 326. 364 BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES men on board, and Columbus commanded them as admiral. The wharves were crowded with their friends, weeping; for they thought never again to see ships or sailors who were facing the horrors of an unsailed ocean. Columbus, Departing on His First Voyage, Takes Leave of the King and Queen Notice that the ships anchor and send rowboats ashore It proved, however, to be a very mild, safe voyage. 'The sea was like a river, the air pleasant and very mild," says Columbus in his journal, where every night he wrote down with care all the happenings of the day. Again he says, "It is a pleasure to be here, so balmy are the breezes." The sailors even bathed alongside, bathed in bottomless waters, in seas thousands of miles broad, in an ocean never before touched by ships ! But even in fair weather it is a hard thing to face the unknown, day after day, to see every evening at sunset and every morning at dawn the same empty ocean. SHIPS IN STRANGE SEAS 365 Moreover, the constant east wind that pleased Columbus because it was driving him on towards Asia frightened the sailors because it was driving them away from home. "My people were much excited/' Columbus says, "at the thought that in these seas no wind ever blew in the direction of Spain." After a month the men could endure no longer. They had been grumbling among themselves. At last they complained aloud to the admiral and de- manded that he should turn the ship about and sail home. "But," says Columbus, "the admiral cheered them up in the best way he could." Doubtless he painted glowing pictures of the riches they would find in China. He per- haps reminded them of the letter, written on parchment and bearing the great seals of the king and the queen. This he was carrying to that magnificent monarch of China, the Grand Khan. When encouragement failed to calm his sailors, this man of iron will told them that "However much they might complain, he had to go to the Indies, and that he would go on until he found them, with the help of our Lord." Two nights later they saw land, and on the morning of Friday, October r f w d twelfth, they set foot upon solid earth. For the next three months they explored these coasts. Columbus must have been disappointed. He had ex- pected to find the gorgeous China of which he had read in Marco Polo's book, with its thousands of ships, its marble bridges, its palaces, its exquisite gardens, its princes in embroidered silk, its gold and jewels and per- fumes and precious spices. Instead he saw naked people, living in rude huts, with hardly a glint of gold. Yet he seems to have enjoyed those months of exploration. He had an eye for beautiful scenery, and he found here a landscape that delighted him. "I walked among the 366 BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES l&ceanica trees," he says, " which was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. ... I can never tire my eyes in looking at such lovely vegetation. ... I found the smell of the trees and flowers so delicious that it seemed the pleasantest thing in the world. ... I wanted to go and anchor there/' he says of a certain coast, "so as to go on shore and see so much beauty.' ' He was gentle and friendly with the natives, never allowing his men to hurt them or to take their goods. For he knew that many ships of Spain would follow him, that the king and queen would build towns in this new land, and he hoped to have the natives receive Spaniards as friends. Moreover, the great admiral was a man of religious heart. "This The Santa Maria Perhaps Columbus himself drew the picture was the beginning and end of the undertaking," he says, "namely, the increase and glory of the Christian reli- gion," and he begged the king and queen to send mis- sionaries to convert the natives. When the explorers set sail for home, instead of costly cinnamon and pepper they carried a few rolls of a strange thing that the natives burned in their mouths and which they called "tobacco." Instead of silks they had samples of cotton. Instead of embroidered robes they had curious things woven of string in which the people slept and which they called "hammocks." No wealthy Chinese mer- SHIPS IN STRANGE SEAS 367 chants accompanied them, but a few naked and painted " Indians," as Columbus called them. The admiral still carried the royal letter for the Grand Khan, un- delivered. There had been tears and smiles of scorn and gloomy prophecies when Columbus had sailed from Spain. When he returned, there were processions and shout- ings of joy and crowded roadsides and house- r ,^ 118 tops wherever he passed. Noblemen rode out of the city to welcome him. The whole court assembled to meet him, and the king and queen rose up from their thrones to do him honor. People gazed with wonder and surprise at the Indians, the stuffed animals, and the dried branches of fruits and flowers that he had brought. They listened with delight to his descriptions of the countries he had seen and to his hopes of finding the Grand Khan on his next voyage. Every one felt that he had well earned his title of Spanish Admiral of the High Seas for himself and his heirs forever, of viceroy and governor over all continents and islands that he should discover, and the noble name of Don. What had he really done? He himself thought that he had found a new way to China and India. The Span- ish king and queen evidently thought that he had discovered some new islands, probably near at D ® e neighbors to Asia. He had in reality done a great deal more. The shores which he had found were the island fringe of a new world, the West Indies of our America. He had, moreover, broken the magic of the unknown sea. Men had for centuries lived on its edge and wondered how far it stretched and what manner of end it had, but no man had dared to explore it. Now, however, a man had laughed at fears and foolish stories, had risked all the horrors, had proved that this sea was 368 BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES as much a sailor's home as any other. He had laid out a road across that untraveled ocean; for where one ship had gone others might go. Spain rang with the glory of the voyage, and the sailors in every seaport of Europe must have longed to try their skill and their luck in a like adventure. Rival Explorers In England, indeed, men were unwilling to see Spain monopolize the new lands. In 1497, only five years after Columbus' voyage, John Cabot, a Vene- Expiora- tian sailor, put out from Bristol, England, with tion : a letter in his sea chest, giving him the right to Cabot, explore in the west and claim new lands for the English king. An Italian, visiting in Eng- land, wrote to an Italian duke: "In this kingdom there is a certain Venetian named Zoanne Caboto, of gentle disposition, very expert in navigation, who seeing that the most serene kings of Portugal and Spain had oc- cupied unknown islands, meditates the achievement of a similar expedition for the said Majesty. Having obtained royal privileges securing to himself the use of the dominions he might discover, the sovereignty being reserved to the Crown, he intrusted his fortune to a small vessel with a crew of eighteen persons and set out from Bristol, a port in the western part of this kingdom. ... At length he hit upon land, where he hoisted the royal standard and took possession for his highness, and having obtained various proofs of his discovery, he returned." In two voyages he touched upon the shores of modern Canada and of the United States. What country could find more lands and richer ones? That was the question. The Portuguese kept pushing farther and farther east, even as far as the Molucca SHIPS IN STRANGE SEAS 369 Islands, where the spices grew. One of their captains on his way southward to round Africa was rortu^uese carried by wind and current far to the west, in Brazil, so that he touched the coast that we now call I 5°° Brazil. He claimed it for his country, and hers it re- mained for almost four hundred years. But Spain was yet busier. Columbus himself made four voyages, exploring many islands of the Columbus' West Indies and the north coast of South Amer- Voyages, ica. Other captains coasted around the shore J 492-i502 of the Gulf of Mexico and touched upon Florida. They explored the coasts opposite Cuba and sailed southward almost to the tip of South America. Americus still Vespucius, an Italian, whose name men later Searching gave to the new continents, went with many of for China these exploring captains and wrote accounts of the voyages. 1 For a long time these trips up and down the shores were not put together in men's minds. People did not realize that the land which Vespucius saw north of the Gulf of Mexico was connected with that which he found hundreds of miles farther south. That northern part was, to them, Asia. But what was the southern part? Marco Polo and the old maps had said nothing of a continent south of Asia. Some people began to call this the New World. They wondered what shape it had. Where was its southern end, or did it have any end? What lay east of it ? Other men, however, held a differ- ent opinion about that southern land. They considered it to be a long cape attached to Asia. It stretched out into the ocean and cut off the way to the Spice Islands. Magellan, a Portuguese navigator, determined to find 1 A German professor of geography, reading these rather boastful accounts and thinking that Vespucius had found the southern mainland before Columbus had touched it on his third voyage, suggested that the new continent be called America after that discov©r«r, and so marked it on the map that he published . 37° BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES Part op a Globe Made in 1531 It shows South America connected with Asia his way around this troublesome land to the rich Indies hiding behind it. He was already an experi- age ans encec } sa ii or . He had rounded the Cape of Good Hope and had done brave fighting for Portugal on the shores of Asia. He had sailed farther east than most white men of his time. But for one reason or another the king of Portugal thought ill of his plan, and Magellan, like Columbus, turned from Portu- gal to Spain. Again Spain accepted the great man whom her neighbor had rejected. With five ships and two hundred eighty men Magellan started out to meet — he knew not what — and to prove beyond all doubt that the earth is round. It was all plain sailing to the Canaries, then across the TiieSearch new ^ opened Atlantic to Brazil which Portugal already owned, and along the coast of the new world in Vespucius' track. Here they sailed into many a harbor and river mouth, looking for a cut through the land from ocean to ocean. But far down on the coast of SHIPS IN STRANGE SEAS 371 A Fleet of Magellan's Time South America, in St. Julian's Bay, the stormy winter caught the party, and they anchored in the sheltered harbor to wait for good sailing weather. Here they "set up at the top of the highest mountain which was there a very large cross, as a sign that this country be- longed to the king of Spain/ ! So says Pigafetta, an Italian gentleman who went on the expedition and who wrote a journal about it. The five months of waiting in severe cold, with little to eat and little to do, were hard to bear. The men talked among themselves: "This captain-general of ours is a Portuguese, while we are Spaniards, and do not the Portuguese and Spaniards hate each other ? He is trying to destroy us by keeping us in this miserable frozen land. Besides, we have gone farther south than any man ever went before. Why do more? Let us kill this captain- general and go home." So they made their plan, but Magellan learned of it, and he had the leaders of the mutiny killed, and some of the others he put into chains and imprisoned them in the hulls of his ships to work the pumps. The Spaniards came to feel fear and respect for this man of prompt action and heavy hand and stout Trouble 372 BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES heart. When he was ready to sail out in the spring he set his prisoners at liberty and gave them work to do, though three of the worst trouble makers he abandoned on that wild shore to shift for themselves. Before he left the harbor one of his ships ran upon rocks and was wrecked, though the men were saved. So only four ships sailed southward. They went on for two months and then did, indeed, find a strait leading through the land. This they entered, exploring as they went, and when the ships were scattered and out from under Magellan's eye, one of them, filled with jealous and discontented men, sailed away for Spain. The three others, however, kept on feeling their way along the winding channel, between lands that were " rocky and also stark with eternal cold," so that Magellan thought them not worth exploring. Every man's eyes were always ahead seeking a glimpse of the ocean that held the Moluccas and the well-known world of Asia. At last the strait did indeed open out. The shore of the new world bent northward. The open Pacific lay before the voyagers. But where were the rich Spice Islands? Magellan pointed his ships' heads northwest and sailed out into the unmapped sea. " Wednesday, the 28th Pacific ** of November > 1520 > we came forth out of the said strait," says Pigafetta, "and entered into the Pacific Sea, where we remained three months and twenty days, without taking in provision or other refresh- ment." Soon the drinking water was yellow and foul. Before much longer the food was gone, and men had only the sawdust that they could scrape up in the hull and the dirty, wormy crumbs and dust left from the biscuits. They even caught the ship's rats and ate them and cut off strips of the leather that was bound around the yardarm and ate that. SHIPS IN STRANGE SEAS 373 Three months and twenty days without proper food and proper drink and proper rest! The men suffered many diseases, and nineteen of them died and were buried in that strange sea. Nobody knew how far away the Spice Islands were. Every day for all that time men must have gazed ahead expecting to see the end of their horrible voyage. And at last it came. The thing that Columbus had hoped to do was done. A European ship by sailing west had reached the East. The seaworn sailors of Spain and Portugal after a voy- age of a year and a half set foot first upon the Ladrones, or Thieves' Islands, and then upon the Phil- ippines. In this latter place they found the w sian people friendly and gentle and eager to imitate the ways of the wonderful strangers. Magellan straight- way set about making them Christians, for he was as much a missionary as a discoverer. He had with him a slave who had been born in one of the Spice Islands and could speak the language of the Philippines. So Magellan preached through this interpreter, and the people listened with delight and asked to become Christians. They tore down their idols and burned them, and Magellan set up a cross. " In eight days/' says Pigafetta, " all the inhabit- ants of this island were baptized and some belonging to the neighboring islands." Magellan, loving these new friends and converts of his, determined to help them in war and peace. With sixty of his men he went to a near-by island to fight the king's battles for him. And there on the edge of the world fifteen hundred natives with arrows and javelins and spears and stones defeated the white men and killed the brave Magellan, "our mirror, light, comfort, and true guide," as Pigafetta calls him. And then these new- made Christians showed how much their new religion 374 BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES Magellan's Victorious Ship Note the " very good iron cannon," as they were called by a writer of the time. The flying Victory is a wooden figurehead such as many old ships had and new friendship meant to them, for they turned against the defeated white men, tore down the cross and broke it to pieces, and killed any Spaniards upon whom they could put their hands. The rest sailed sadly away, mourning for their captain and their slain comrades. They had not enough men Around ^° sa ^ three ships, and so they burned one. the World The other two went on to the Moluccas, and Home where the men traded for several months, that they might not go home empty-handed. But of those two ships one was lost somewhere in the eastern seas. The men of the other suffered almost as much on the way around Africa as they had suffered on the open Pacific. Pigafetta speaks of the Cape of Good Hope as SHIPS IN STRANGE SEAS 375 "that terrible cape/' and again calls it "the largest and most dangerous cape in the world." "We remained off that cape for nine weeks/' he says, "with the sails struck on account of the western and northwestern gales which beat against our bows with fierce squalls." They suffered from the cold, and they had nothing but rice and water to eat. "But the greater number of us, prizing honor more than life itself, decided on attempting at any risk to return to Spain. . . . We then sailed towards the northwest for two whole months without ever taking rest ; and in this short time we lost twenty-one men." So, after three years and two weeks, all that was left of Magellan's fleet limped into the home harbor — one broken ship and eighteen gaunt men. They were the first of men to sail around the world. They had done a marvelous thing, and their story stirred people's hearts then as it has done ever since. * ' Worthier, indeed, are our sailors of eternal fame," says an old Span- ish writer of the time, "than the Argonauts who sailed with Jason to Colchis and much more worthy was their ship of being placed among the stars than that old Argo." Spain had found the southwest passage to the Indies. Portugal held that to the southeast. Two other routes seemed possible — to the northeast around Europe and to the northwest around North America. France began to search for the northwest passage. The king of France sent word to the king of Spain "asking him by what right he and the king of Portugal undertook to monopolize the earth. Had our first father, Adam, made them his sole heirs? If so, it would be no more than proper for them to produce a copy of the will ; and meanwhile he should feel at liberty to seize upon all he could get." [3T6J SHIPS IN STRANGE SEAS 377 Thereupon this ambitious King Francis sent Verrazano, an Italian, who explored the shores of what The is now the United States in an effort to find a J e ™\ .Begin to strait cutting through it. Of course he failed, Explore, because there is no such strait. Ten years later 1524 Cartier, a Frenchman, found the mouth of the great St. Lawrence River and claimed the land for France. Spain, Portugal, England, and France were now snatching at the new land and its promises of trade. The Results of a Century's Work Many wonderful things had happened in the hundred years since Prince Henry the Navigator had begun his work. Men had learned that the torrid zone is not a place where crews and ships are burned ew . to ashes. The end of Africa had been found, and vessels had rounded it, making a familiar path to Asia. It had been proved that the Atlantic is not a sea of darkness and does not end in a horrible abyss. Two new continents had been discovered in the West. A way had been found through that new land to the old world of the East beyond it. Men's ships had sailed all around the ball of the earth. 1. By looking in all the books you can find, get pictures of boats of different times down to the present. What various kinds of power have been used to move them? Where has the power been applied? 2. Find out the speed of modern steamships. The journal of Colum- bus records the runs for days of 24 hours as all the way from 63 leagues on a day with a fresh, favoring breeze, to 9 leagues in a storm when they "took in much sea over the bows," and 7 or 8 leagues when the ship's "head was all round the compass owing to the calm that pre- vailed." The average run was about 31 leagues. 3. Make a compass like the one described on page 342. On a paper a little larger than 378 BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES the dish, mark the directions (North, South, East, and West) and lay it correctly under the compass. Of what use is it? Compare your compass with a pocket compass or a ship's compass. 4. Make a careful map of some creek or some crooked street or some field or village that you know well. What are the difficulties of a map maker ? 5. Lay a modern map beside each of the old maps in this chapter. Note the old map maker's mistakes. Note quite as carefully what he has' right. 6. Look on a modern map of the world and see what regions are still unexplored. What is the latest geographical dis- covery? 7. What aids does a modern sea captain have that the early navigators did not have? 8. The customs and buildings of India have not greatly changed since the times of Marco Polo and Vasco da Gama. From the Perry Pictures Company you can get interesting scenes in this country. Use them to make an illustrated book. CHAPTER XV SPAIN AND HER RIVALS Spaniards in America A new world had been found. What use was to be made of it? Spain's answer was, "I will get gold and silver from it." Spain was a proud country at the beginning of the sixteenth century. Her G ^ c nobles had proved their courage and strength by overcoming the once conquering Moors and driving them back into Africa. 1 Except for Portugal her rulers now held all the great peninsula, a country as broad as any in Europe, and they held, besides, across the sea, posses- sions of unknown size, perhaps as wide as the empire of Portugal in the East. But Spain herself was poor. She had great castles and beautiful churches, populous cities and haughty nobles, but farms were few and poorly worked, and the cities were more crowded than busy. Most Spaniards loved glory and scorned work ; they were eager to handle swords rather than tools. To the new country now opened to them the most adventurous of the Spaniards began tc go. They explored its coasts, its rivers, its lakes, . fi *~ its forests, and its mountains in search of riches. Balboa in 1513 struggled across the Isthmus of Darien and found, not wealth, but the Pacific Ocean. Cortez with a little Spanish army won Mexico, I 5 I 9~ I 5 21 and Piz&rro cruelly conquered Peru, and each ^won vast treasure. Expeditions made their way through 1 See pages 326, 363. 379 38o BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES Spanish Conquest of Mexico The Aztec Indians of Mexico made this wall painting. Men who can paint like this are not uncivilized. Note the feather head-dress and the wicker shields of the Aztecs. Before the time of the Spaniards there were no horses in America. The Aztec artist has here hinted at the terrible Spanish cruelty. Florida and pushed northward from Mexico into what are now our southwestern states. De Soto explored the shores of the Gulf of Mexico and found the Mississippi River. In the islands of the West Indies the conquerors found great numbers of Indians living a peaceful, rather idle life in the mild, fruitful country. According to the Spanish idea the land belonged to the king, and he gave great tracts of it to the Spanish explorers and conquerors and settlers. One man often received thousands of acres, with three or four Indian towns upon them. The inhab- itants became his serfs. SPAIN AND HER RIVALS 381 Men from Spain could not work in this new climate, warmer and more moist than their own. Sunstroke and fever killed many in the early years. So they turned to their serfs and put them to ^^ work on their farms and in their mines. But these simple people, used to outdoor life and little work, could not endure this new kind of labor. The white men, too, by ill fortune, brought disease among them, and the Indians died like summer flowers under a frost. The first discoverers found perhaps 300,000 inhabitants. on the island of Haiti : twenty-four years later there were but 14,000.! Since the Indians could not be used, what was to be done? The earth held gold; Spaniards must have it; somebody must get it for them. They were soon making sugar, too, in the islands, and S1 ^L each sugar-mill needed from thirty to eighty workers. You will remember that the Portuguese, as they crept down the coast of Africa in the time of Prince Henry, had found a black people, 2 whom they thought fitted for slavery; that they began slave raids, and car- ried away slaves to Portugal and to Spain. When the Spanish, therefore, found the natives of the West Indies unable to endure the hard labor put upon them, they thought of their black slaves at home, and ten years after Columbus ' discovery, a few were brought over as an experiment. The experiment succeeded, the negro slaves proved good workers, and a few years later another shipload came over. But Spain could not spare her own slaves, born in Spain of Christianized parents, trained to work in the white man's fashion. So the king of Spain, 1 The Spanish government and the Catholic church felt a sincere interest in the Indians and a strong desire to civilize and convert them. The terrible story of the islands was not r«p«at«d on the mainland. 2 See page 364. 382 BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES owner of the new world, granted to Portugal, owner of the African coast, the right to sell four thousand African black men every year in the West Indies. All this negro labor brought from the earth great wealth in gold and silver, for the chief business was mining. Down from the mountains in all parts of New wealth Spain wound trains of donkeys or of the strange American llamas, packed with sticks of silver and gold. In storehouses the precious bars were piled up to. wait for ships to take them to Spain. In companies of sixty or seventy the ships set sail, " laden," as a writer of the times says, "with cochineal, hides, gold, silver, pearls, and other rich wares.'' Again he tells of a ship un- loading " five millions of silver ... so that the whole quay lay covered with plates and chests of silver . . . most wonderful to behold . . . besides pearls, gold, and other stones." He speaks again of a West Indian fleet of one hundred ships and says that during one year two hundred twenty vessels sailed from America for Spain and Portugal. To a country where gold seemed to grow on bushes many colonists flocked, and New Spain was changed from an Indian land to a white man's country, pams j^ a j^ky |3 0rn m ^h e y ear when Columbus dis- covered the new land had lived to be seventy- five or eighty years old, he would have seen another Spain transplanted into that new world. He would have seen over two hundred cities and towns, Spanish towns, with streets like those in Spain, with pretty houses of stone and plaster, with open squares for pleasure and trade, with churches of carved stone. Outside the towns were great plantations, growing cattle, spices, and rice, all worked by hundreds of slaves. A hundred and sixty thousand Spaniards lived on these plantations and in these towns, and th«y had a rich, SPAIN AND HER RIVALS 383 San Domingo in 1586 A town on the island of Haiti built by Columbus' brother. The city wall and the cannon on the water front protect it. Notice the beautiful church in the center of the town beautiful life. There were balls where the gentlemen danced in long tight hose and silken trunks and velvet doublets slashed and puffed and set off with bright linings. The ladies were lovely in rich brocades and gold cord and falling lace. There were church festivals with processions and gay sports in the streets and the square, like the festivals at home in Spain. There were monas- teries with schools where the children were taught. There were a few high schools, too, for boys and girls, and the young men went to universities where learned pro- fessors were writing books. There were hospitals and skilled physicians. In fact, Spain did in America what Rome had long ago done in Spain : she transplanted her own civilization into it. Yet there was this difference : the native Spaniards 384 BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES had adopted Roman ways and Roman learning, had inter- married with the Romans, and had built up a new people ; the Spaniards in America, on the other hand, were little changed by their transplanting, and most of the Indians remained a distinct and ignorant people. A thing that would seem curious to American eyes in this New Spain was the fact that it was almost entirely a land of one nationality. There were the negroes, to be sure, but they were slaves, and there were Indians, but they were almost slaves. There was hardly a Frenchman or a German or an Englishman or an Italian to be seen, only Spaniards. In the city of Seville sat the Council of the Indies, to help the Spanish king in ruling this new country. The king and this council made all laws, sent governors and generals, gave land and collected taxes. These rulers planned to save America for Spaniards of true blood and Catholic religion. One of the laws was to the effect that "no descendants of Jews, Moors, or of heretics . . . down to the fourth generation, be allowed to come to the island [that is, Cuba]." It was as though there were a wall around Spanish America, with a single gate, and only those who could speak the Spanish password might go through. Indeed it was so, in a way. Colonists could come to America only in ships, and ships could unload only in harbors. Every harbor town was in charge of a Spanish officer with troops and guns for defense. His order was to receive only ships carrying papers from the Council at Seville stating that they had sailed from that city and had a right to put in at Spanish American ports. The officer had orders, besides, to permit only Catholic Spaniards to land on his shores. There were officers of the Inquisition x to make sure that those landing were 1 See page 339. SPAIN AND HER RIVALS 385 Catholics. If they were found to be heretics, they were sometimes burned. The plan was largely successful, and to-day almost all of America below the United States is Catholic, and nearly all but Brazil is Spanish in speech and custom. Spain and Her Enemies: 1. France When Columbus discovered America, Spain was ruled by King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella, and had little to do with the rest of Europe. Their daughter, however, married a prince of the powerful Ch ^ le r s e y German family of Hapsburg, and so it hap- pened that a few years later a young man inherited the crown who was not only king of Spain, but archduke of Austria and duke and count of many places, besides being king of several others. In addition to all this he soon became emperor of the Holy Roman empire. His titles would have filled a page. Francis I, king of France, looked with dread and jealousy upon the overgrown possessions of this Charles, encircling France and threatening to strangle her. It was he who had haughtily questioned " over Spain's right to monopolize the world. 1 He sent Verrazano and Cartier to snatch a part of the new world from Charles. 2 In Europe, too, he tried to humble him. Ever since two years after Columbus discovered America France and Spain had been at war over Italy. This war Francis I gladly continued in order to lower the Hapsburg pride and lessen the Hapsburg dominions. At last, however, it was he who was humbled and had to make peace. After that defeat Frenchmen continued to hate Spain, and wherever French and Spanish met there was 1 See page 375. 2 See page 377. 386 BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES Emperor Charles V likely to be blood spilled. An event that happened in America illustrates the hard feeling between the two nations. Revolt from the Catholic Church, you remember, had spread into France. 1 Thousands of people had left the » See pages 337-338. SPAIN AND HER RIVALS 387 old church and become Protestants, or Huguenots, after Calvin's teaching. But the majority of French- men remained Catholic and, as happened at .J enc . . . Huguenots first in every country, looked with suspicion and anger upon the new religious rebels. They thought to root out heresy by persecution. Occasionally French Protes- tants were arrested and burned, and Protestant churches torn down. Yet the Huguenots increased in numbers, especially among the nobles. One of these Huguenot nobles, Coligny, had the high position of Admiral of France and was a friend and adviser of his king. He looked across the ocean and saw, he thought, a refuge for his persecuted fellow-Protestants and at the same time a chance to get new land for France and to break Spain's monopoly. Three times Coligny got his king's consent for groups of Huguenots to found settlements in America. The first was in Portuguese Brazil, but the Portu- guese drove the colonists out. The second . u p en ° ts in America was on the shore of what is now South Carolina, but hunger, mutiny, Indian troubles, and disappointment made this a failure also. The third attempt was on the shore of Florida. This was Spanish territory. Back in 1513 Ponce de Leon had landed there, had explored the shore and claimed it for Spain, and had given it the Spanish name of Florida. Frenchmen would have been glad to cut off this possession of the Spanish king. So in 1564 Coligny' s colony built Fort Caroline on the St. John's River and began to explore for gold. Some mutineers left the settlement, sailed out to sea, and raided a Spanish ship. Spain took terrible revenge. The Spanish king sent Menendez, a wolf of a man, with ships and men to wipe the Frenchmen out. He did it thoroughly, killing in cold 388 BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES blood over five hundred French captives. Some he hanged to trees with a sign that read, "Not as to Frenchmen, but as to Lutherans/ ' Two years later a Frenchman, seeking revenge, landed on the Florida coast with two hundred men, surprised the Spanish fort at St. Augustine, killed the garrison, and hanged several to trees with a sign that read, "Not as to Spaniards, but as to liars and murderers." Frenchmen had taken vengeance, but they never again tried to colonize Florida. A few years later they returned to America again, but not to the Spanish south. They sought once more the great St. Lawrence, which Cartier had found more than seventy years earlier. 1 Spain and Her Enemies: 2. The Netherlands Philip II, the son of Charles V, inherited all of his father's possessions except those connected with Austria. United Spain was his, so was southern Italy and Spain ° Sicily, so was the Netherlands, or what is now Holland and Belgium; America, besides, was his, and during his reign he conquered Portugal. But in spite of all his great kingdom and all his great titles he was not a great man. He was an enemy to liberty : men must think as he directed. He was suspicious and jealous : a general who served him badly was hated and punished for failure ; and one who served him well was hated and punished for success. Philip was cruel ; it was he who sent Menendez to wipe out the French colony, and he was angry that any man, woman, or child had escaped the butcher. He was a strong Catholic, and he meant to free the world of heretics. He gloried in the bloody work of the Inquisition and, it is said, laughed when he heard of a great massacre of the Huguenots in Paris. He was ambitious to be the most important ruler i See page 377. SPAIN AND HER RIVALS 389 of Europe, and he had spies in every court, that he might know all secrets and turn them to his advantage. If the other peoples of Europe hated Spain under the great Charles, they hated it still more under Philip, and of them all the Nether- lands hated most, hav- ing suffered most. The Netherlands was a country of great cities. For hundreds of years it had been filled with rich weavers and merchant princes. The gilds, in their day, had nowhere been stronger, and every city of the Netherlands had its beautiful old gild halls. These rich merchants and gilds- men had bought the freedom of their towns. That was in the days when the cities had be- longed some to the duke of this, others to the count of that. Even in Philip's day, though he possessed all the titles of these old dukes and counts, yet the Netherlands was not a united country, but, like Germany and Italy, a group of separate states, each with its own laws and customs and privileges. Every state was fond of its privileges and proud of its history and its wealth. Trouble began to brew, therefore, when haughty Philip inherited the country Philip II 390 BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES and planned to rule like a tyrant. He snapped his fingers at old laws. He insulted Dutch and Flemings and put Spanish officers over them. Being hungry for money, he laid so heavy a tax on the country that " merchants de- clined to deal, shops were shut, trade was at a standstill, debtors were not able to meet their creditors, and many banks broke." The Netherlands, moreover, was full of heretics. From Germany at the east the people had learned Lutheranism, and from France at the south they ersecu- ^^ i earnec [ p re sbyterianism, and Philip, His Most Catholic Majesty, hated all heretics. He set up the Inquisition 1 here in the Netherlands, as he did throughout all his great empire, to punish heretics, and he sent an army and a butcher of a governor to punish rebels. That governor, the Duke of Alva, boasted that during the six years of his rule, he killed eighteen thousand heretics. Sixty thousand more fled to England, and even more than that to Germany, but the people of the Nether- lands were sturdy, stubborn folk, and they would not be subdued. For more than fifty years they fought for their freedom. Sometimes they had England's help, because England also was Protestant. Sometimes they had the aid of France, because France also feared and hated Spain. But both were fickle friends, and it was the strength of the Dutch themselves and the wisdom of the men of one of their own noble families that at last won independence. Of these patriotic nobles the first and most stubborn fighter was William, Prince of Orange, he whom 555" the Hollanders to-day call the father of their of Orange . freedom. Though he had begun life as a wealthy, honored, ambitious prince, a Catholic and a 1 See page 339. SPAIN AND HER RIVALS 391 favorite of the Spanish king, yet for twenty years he labored for the freedom of his country, spending his money in her cause, risking his life for her, and finally dying a martyr in her behalf. He was determined to sweep the Netherlands clean of Spaniards, to restore the old laws and liberty of the land, to win freedom of worship for Protestants and Catholics alike. To gain these purposes he fought battle after battle and with- stood siege after siege. Some of those sieges were among the bravest and saddest in all the sad history of war. Men, women, and children, shut up for ten months in Leyden, surrounded by Spanish armies so that no food and no mes- Sie s eof . , , Leyden, serigers except carrier pigeons could pass, saw I574 their dearest and best drop from famine or disease, saw their strongest starve to skeletons, themselves reduced to eat refuse ; and yet they held out. Holland is a low, salt marsh, lying below the level of the sea. The people through centuries had built dikes through the shallow shore waters, cutting the ocean off from the land, had pumped the sea out of this fenced country, and at last sat safe and serene behind their sea walls. Now in their great need the people of Leyden cut the dikes and flooded the land in order to float their own navy in to their rescue. Nor was this the only time the Dutch made the sea their ally. " Better ruin the land than lose the land," they said. The Spanish Duke of Alva, who was fighting against the people, wrote to his king : " Never was seen on this earth such a war as this, never was a fortress so well de- fended of men. They have an excellent engineer [that is, William],, who has devices that were never yet heard, or seen." Through it all William was not only fighting battles, but he was writing protests to the king of Spain and 392 BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES pleas to the queen of England and the rulers of France to help the suffering Netherlands with troops and money. He was sending eloquent appeals to the little states of the Netherlands to hold together in the cause of freedom. "A fagot bound together cannot be broken as easily as single sticks/ ' he said. But he could gain only a part of his purpose. The ten states of the southern Netherlands combined and declared Dutch their loyalty to Spain and to the Catholic re- Declaration ligion. But the seven northern states joined of Inde- together as the United Provinces of the Nether- pen ence i anc [ s j n their declaration of independence they said : " All mankind know that a prince is appointed by God to cherish his subjects, even as a shepherd to guard his sheep. When, therefore, the prince does not fulfill his duty as protector; when he oppresses his sub- jects, destroys their ancient liberties, and treats them as slaves, he is to be considered, not a prince but a tyrant. As such the estates of the land [that is, the assembly of dele- gates, like our Congress] may lawfully and reasonably depose him, and elect another in his room." And so the Dutch deputies, gathered at The Hague, proceeded to depose Philip and to elect in his place the patriot William and another prince. Inside of two years, however, the noble Prince of Orange was assassinated, crying out as he fell, "God pity my poor country!" The struggle with Spain continued, and William's son took his place in the government and in the army. There were more brave sieges, more battles on land and fighting on sea. Not for twenty-five years was the war quite over, and Holland ! able to stand forth as a united 1 The United Netherlands was frequently called Holland, as it still is, from the name of its largest and most important state. SPAIN AND HER RIVALS 393 and free country, a new member of the family of modern national states. After that Holland prospered. The number of her ships increased and the boldness of her seamen. They harried Spaniards wherever they found them. They sailed into all the ports of the world and traded. They rounded Africa in the track of the Portuguese, who were then under the rule of Spain, 1 and took their Eastern empire from them. In 1609 Henry Hudson, an English seaman employed 6 U son ' by Holland, seeking a new route to the Indies, discovered on the American shores the great river now called the Hudson, and claimed for Holland all the land that it drained. "The Dutch had made themselves the common carriers of the world," says a writer of the time. The inhabitants of Holland " sucked honey, like the bee, from all parts," says another. And all these prosperous Dutch merchants were haters of Spain. Spain and Her Enemies: 3. England Spain had another bitter enemy — England. One reason for English hatred was commercial jealousy. England had become a trading nation. During the Middle Ages trade had been in other hands. ^ ng ^ sh Hanse ships had carried to her shores the prod- Begins ucts of the North, and Venetian ships the products of the East. But the Hanseatic League had grown weak as the new nations of Europe grew strong, had lost its great factories and many of its members. The Italian trade in the East had been spoiled by the Turks 2 and the new route around Africa, 3 and the Venetian gal- leys visited England less and less often. As trade dropped 1 See page 419. » See page 346. • See pages 358-369. 394 BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES out of the hands of these earlier merchants, Englishmen picked it up. They began to build better ships and to sail into distant waters after the goods that foreigners had once brought to them. Instead of sending their raw wool to Flemish towns, they had begun to weave it them- selves and to send out the cloth. These ambitious merchants saw a great new world opened up in America, a world full of riches, yet in this new world they were not permitted to set foot. Much of its gold found its way into England, for the Spanish colonies needed the grain and the cloth which England produced and Spain neglected, but Englishmen might not take their goods direct to America. They had to carry them to Spanish ports and there sell them to be loaded upon the Spanish ships of the colonial fleets. Eng- lish traders felt that in this way many drops were spilled between the cup and the lip. They wanted to go, them- selves, into this new land that was at once rich and hungry, and there trade foods and cloth for gold. Another cause of England's hatred of Spain was the difference in religion. About 1534 England broke away from the Roman church, and became Protes- Rehgwus tant s pam? on the other hand, boasted that ences there was not a heretic in her country. The Inquisition guarded the ports, lest foreign heretics should come in. Its officers boarded every in- coming ship and examined the crew. Many an English- man was arrested and thrown into prison for the crime of having an English Bible in his sea chest. Thus jealousy and religious difference made Englishmen and Spaniards enemies. If English sailors could slip into some unguarded harbor in Spanish America, unload a cargo and trade it to the people for gold, without being caught by the officials, they not only filled their pockets, 395 J 396 BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES but rejoiced that they had struck a little blow at the enemy of their land and their religion. Were not the rich ships of the Spanish fleet filled, not only with gold, but with men who imprisoned good English patriots ? There- fore, if a ship in a storm should be driven away from its company, to drift alone on the broad sea, would it not be a just act for patriotic Englishmen to capture her ? Many an English crew shouted a hearty "yes" to such a question. "English smacks that had once gone fishing to Iceland, now turned their prows southward, for there were better fish in the sea than cod, namely, Spanish gal- Pnvateers i eons . an( j ca tching them was an act of patriot- Pirates i sm - Trading goods for gold in Spanish towns was slow business for merchant ships, but trad- ing cannon balls for gold on the high seas was a rich and exciting adventure and was done in the service of God and country. England had few warships, and dared not go to war with mighty Spain, but the English queen, Elizabeth, was glad to see her bold seamen prick the Spanish king with their private swords, so she only smiled and kept silent when he complained of her lawless citizens. When such sailors could get special letters from the queen, they were "privateers," that is, men who were privately doing their queen's work. But without these letters, they had to run the risk of being hanged as pirates if the Spaniards captured them. That risk they were willing to take in order to gather riches and to punish the Spanish king for abusing English seamen and to break down the Spanish fence around America. Francis Drake was one of the boldest and most success- ful of these seamen. He was a very religious and patriotic man. He hated Catholics, and he hated Spaniards. He loved England, he loved his " Francis Drake most noble knight of England, in the forty-third year of his age." So says the Latin above the picture. In the time of this knight armor was rare. If it was worn at all, it was much ornamented, like the helmet under Drake's hand. In the upper right-hand corner is Sir Francis' coat of arms, like those painted on earlier knightly shields. (397) 398 BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES queen, Elizabeth, he loved adventure, and he had no dis- like for treasure. He never feared man or storm. He lived all his life on the sea and could fight as well as he could sail. For years he was the daredevil of the sea. The Spaniards called him "the dragon/' "the demon.' ' With two little ships and seventy-three men he sailed into the Spanish sea in the elbow of Central America, found the hiding place of Spanish treasure, made friends with Spain's enemies there, nursed forty of his men through the fever, slipped out of the fingers of a Spanish fleet, captured a mule train of treasure and a storehouse where lay "a pile of silver bars ten feet in breadth, ten feet in height, and seventy feet in length," took a town from a full Spanish garrison, scuttled one of his ships, filled the other with treasure, and sailed home under the very nose of the Spanish fleet. On that trip, from a tree top on the Isthmus of Darien, Drake had caught sight of the Pacific Ocean, where an Eng- lish ship had never floated, and he longed to sail it. So within a few months he manned five ships with a hundred sixty-four men and was off again. He swung across the south Atlantic to the very harbor on the far southern coast of America where Magellan had wintered fifty- eight years earlier. 1 Like Magellan he had to quell a mutiny. Two ships he had to break up and leave, because he had not men enough to work them in heavy weather. A terrible storm blew him southward and kept him for a month on the open sea, past Cape Horn, without chance of harbor. "The seas . . . were rolled up from the depths, even from the roots of the rocks . . . ; and being aloft were carried in most strange manner and abundance, as feathers or drifts of snow, by the violence of the winds, to water the exceeding tops of high and lofty 1 See page 371. SPAIN AND HER RIVALS 399 mountains." Thus writes one who was on the expedi- tion. Drake lost one ship in the great storm and was de- serted by another. Only one was left at last to work its way in better weather up the west coast of South America. Here his experience was very different from Magellan's. The Portuguese had cut westward across the empty ocean. 1 The Englishman hugged the coast northward, for he was after treasure and Spanish trouble. He found the wild coast planted with Spanish towns and met Spanish ships carrying treasure from one to another. "In two barks here, " says the journal, "we found some forty and odd bars of silver." In another they found "some fruits, conserves, sugars, meal, and other victuals, and ... a certain quantity of jewels and precious stones, thirteen chests of royals of plate, eighty pound weight in gold, twenty-six ton of uncoined silver, two very fair gilt silver drinking bowls, and the like trifles." Once when they landed they "met a Spaniard with an Indian boy driving eight lambs or Peruvian sheep ; each sheep bore two leathern bags, and in each bag was fifty pound weight of refined silver, in the whole eight hundred weight." After filling their ship with all this Spanish treasure the Englishmen, because the love of exploring was on them, sailed far north along the shore, past our California 2 and even up to our state of Washington. Somewhere on our coast they camped for many days and had much converse with the Indians, who were " a people of a tractable, free, and loving nature, without guile or treachery." The English visited their houses, put ointment on their wounds and sores, preached to them, fed them. 1 See page 372. 2 The people of Marin County, California, every year hole} a IHe on the day that Drake is thought to have landed there. 400 BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES "Before we went from thence," the journal goes on, "our general caused to be set up a monument of our being there, as also of her Majesty's and successors' right and title to that kingdom, namely, a plate of brass, fast nailed to a great and firm post, whereon is engraven her Grace's name and the day and year of our arrival there." The navigators hoped to find a sea passage through the land toward the east and home, but finding none and meeting cold weather, they at last turned across the sea toward Asia. It was a long and perilous voyage, threading a way through the Spice Islands amid storms and reefs and peoples friendly and unfriendly. But at last the " master thief of the unknown world" reached home. His worn-out ship, the Golden Hinde, was hauled up on the English shore, a banquet was given on board with all the great men of England doing honor to the bold adventurer. Queen Elizabeth herself was there, and afterward, on the deck, knighted the daredevil sailor and made him Sir Francis Drake. But this trip around the world was only the beginning of his adventures. Once with a fleet of twenty-three ships he started south to " singe the king of Spain's beard." He ran into the great harbor of Cadiz, where lay a forest of merchant ships with ten great war galleys. With his little swift vessels he dipped under the very noses of the tall galleys, darted past them, poured shots into their sides, sunk more than twenty vessels, captured four loaded with provisions, slipped out of the narrow harbor mouth, and spent the night at anchor under the very eyes of the town. For a month more he swept the seas and the coasts of Spain, capturing forts, sinking or taking forty large ships and a hundred small ones. Spain, of course, could not permit these insults to her SPAIN AND HER RIVALS 401 power. She wanted, moreover, to punish England for having helped the Dutch. During all Holland's brave fight the little country had looked to | n jf^* ol _ England for aid, partly because she, too, was land Protestant and partly because she, too, hated and feared Spain. In answer English merchants sent two million dollars or more to William, and little parties of Englishmen " stole across the channel" to enter his army. But Queen Elizabeth dreaded to do anything that should push King Philip into war with her, so she hesitated long whether to send troops to aid the Dutch, but at last she did it. A year after the great William died one of her favorite earls sailed from England with six thousand soldiers, and for two years he was in Holland acting for some of the time as governor general. King Philip had a dream of adding England to his realm and of forcing its people to become Catholic. He pretended to have some shadowy claim to its crown. So in 1588 a great Spanish fleet set ^.f? 11 " sail for England, "the Invincible Armada," the Armada" Spaniards called it, for it was the greatest fleet ever yet assembled. There were one hundred thirty ships, the largest ships of the world, with great sails to catch the wind and sweeping oars to aid them. Hakluyt, an English writer of the time, describes the fleet. He says that the galleons " were of an huge bigness and very stately built ... so high that they resembled great castles. . . . The upper works of the said galleons was of thickness and strength to bear off musket shot. The lower works and the timbers thereof were out of measure strong, being framed of planks or ribs four or five foot in thickness, in so much that no bullets could pierce them. . . . The galleasses [the largest ships of all] were of such bigness that they contained within them chambers, chapels, turrets, pulpits 402 BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES and other commodities of great houses. The galleasses were rowed with great oars, there being in each one of them three hundred slaves for the same purpose. ... All these [ships] . . . were furnished and beautified with trumpets, streamers, banners, warlike ensigns and other such like ornaments." On board the fleet were thirty thousand fighting men, and every man was filled with love of Holy Church and hatred of heretic England and of insulting English sailors. It was another crusade. At the masthead of the admiral's ship floated a banner with pictures of Christ and Mary, His mother, and the motto on it read, "Rise, O God, and vindicate your cause." Before the battle began, mass was said on every Spanish ship, and every Spanish sailor prayed for victory against the enemies of his country and his church. But the Englishmen, too, were fighting a religious war. "God give us grace to depend upon Him," wrote Drake in a letter just before the fight, "so we shall not doubt victory, for our cause is good." The great fleet sailed northward to land her army on the shores of England, but the English sea dogs flew out at her. Their ships were of a build quite different from the Spanish. They were small, low, and light, without oars, but with better placed sails. The great Spanish galleons were like wallowing whales, the English vessels like skimming swallows. Two of them, indeed, were named by their proud owners Swallow and Antelope. These swift little ships could repeat the savage play of Drake in the harbor of Cadiz. As Hakluyt says, "Albeit there were many excellent and warlike ships in the English fleet, yet scarce were there twenty-two or twenty-three among them all which matched ninety of the Spanish ships in bigness or could conveniently assault them. Wherefore the English ships, using their 1 403] 404 BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES . . . nimble steerage, whereby they could turn and wield themselves with the wind which way they listed, came oftentimes very near upon the Spaniards and charged them so sore that now and then they were but a pike's length asunder.'' The men who sailed those seaworthy ships were sons of the sea. Only fifty-three of the hundred ninety-seven ships belonged to the government; the others were owned by the merchants and fishermen who for years had been learning their lessons of seamanship and daring in plunder- ing Spain. It was old privateers who fought and won the nine-day fight, with its retreats and advances, its roar of cannon, its sinking ships, its fire ships drifting by night into the Spanish fleet. To end all came a great storm that wrecked the re- treating Spanish vessels, so that, says Hakluyt, "of one hundred thirty ships which set sail out of Portugal, there returned home fifty-three only, small and great." After the victory, there were solemn festivals in England and prayers in the churches. Queen Elizabeth rode through London, down streets hung with blue cloth and decked with captured Spanish banners. The defeat of the Invincible Armada was an inspiration to England. "The sea is ours," Englishmen thought ; "why not the shores of it?" The world was ospen y Q p en ^ th enij trade prospered. In order to feed that trade, manufactures flourished at home, money poured into England, and life became more gorgeous for the nobles and more comfortable for the commoners. Noblemen "wore a manor on their backs," and rich merchants dressed like nobles, in gay velvets and silks, with slashes and puffs. New houses were built with windows of glass, so that the sunshine flooded in where in the old days had been unhealthful gloom. Even poor 4°5 406 BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES men's houses began to have chimneys and clean air and pleasant fireplaces. Well-made chairs and bedsteads began to take the place of the rude benches and straw pallets of earlier days. There were com- fortable pillows on many a common man's bed, and even carpets on his floor. On his table were dishes of pewter or silver instead of the old wooden bowls, and good fresh meat oftener took the place of the cheap salt fish. Men's minds, too, be- came more active. Young nobles and com- moners, alike, flocked to the universi- ties, and grammar schools were numerous. English- men went everywhere, especially to the great cities of France and Italy, and brought back books and learning and new ideas. The science, of astronomy was being re- made. For hundreds of years men had thought of the earth as the center of the universe, with sun, moon, and stars swinging about it. Now, however, in 1543, a Polish scientist, Copernicus, Learning God's Providence House Built in 1652, it stili copies the style of Queen Elizabeth's time. It was given its name because its inhabitants escaped the plague. Before the days of numbering houses, names for them were convenient 407 408 BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES declared the sun to be the center. Some years later the Italian Galileo perfected the telescope, and after that hardly a month passed without a new discovery in the heavens. Medical discoveries also were being made, and in 1628 Harvey, an English surgeon, found out how the blood circulates through the body. With so much happening in war, industry, science, and exploration men were driven to writing to express the ideas Literature teemm S m tne ^ r minds. Printing presses be- came common in England, and the land was flooded with histories, books of travel, sermons, stories, essays, plays, poetry. Some one says that " England became a nest of singing birds." Learning now counted as much as noble blood. Queen Elizabeth's wise ministers were not great nobles but learned commoners. The poets to whom all England listened were many of them sons of cobblers or tradesmen. Shakespeare, the greatest of them all, was a tanner's son. Noblemen now had more to think of than in the old days when war had been their only occupation. Courtiers talked of poetry and philoso- phy and geography. Many of them could write a poem as well as dance a minuet or swing a sword or sail a ship. England in America One of the great men of the time was Richard Hakluyt. He did much to make Englishmen love the sea, to make England proud of her sailors, to encourage his countrymen to colonize America. He was a professor of geography and map-making in Oxford University. Of himself he says : "I read over whatsoever printed or written discoveries and voyages I found extant, either in the Greek, Latin, Italian, Spanish, Portugal, French or English languages. I grew familiarly ac- quainted with the chiefest captains at sea, the greatest SPAIN AND HER RIVALS 409 merchants, and the best mariners of our nation.' ' He de- termined to make the noble story of English seamanship known to the world. He printed all the stories he could find of English exploration. He called attention to Cabot's early discovery 1 and urged England to take North America for her own. He wrote a description of Vir- ginia and an appeal to his countrymen to colonize it. 2 It seemed to him that God had reserved the new lands north of Florida for the English to occupy, while the Spanish might hold those to the south. A few years before the Armada fight a noble English gentleman, Sir Humphrey Gilbert, determined "to dis- cover, possess, and to reduce unto the service of God and Christian piety," as Hakluyt says, s " rHum_ " those remote and heathen countries of America Gilbert not actually possessed by Christians and most rightly [belonging] unto the crown of England," because of Cabot's discovery. With the help of interested friends he fitted out two expeditions. On the second he sailed to Newfoundland and set up on its shores the arms of England. But he was a man "of no good hap by sea," and on the return voyage in a great storm he went down with one of his ships, saying, "We are as near to heaven by sea as by land." Gilbert's half brother, Sir Walter Raleigh, was unwilling to let Gilbert's work be quite swallowed by the sea. He was a many-sided man. He had been on voyages with Drake. He had gained Queen Q^f hs Elizabeth's favor by gay and courtly behavior. He had played his part in war. He had written poems, 1 See page 368. 2 It is in his greatest book, " The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffics, and Discoveries of the English Nation," that we read of the work of Drake, Cabot, Gilbert, Raleigh, and many others, and learn much of what we know about their voyages. 4io BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES and had gained great wealth. After Gilbert's death Raleigh sent three parties in different years to make settlements in America. All the attempts were sad failures. On the little island of Roanoke in Pamlico Sound the first party of about two hundred settlers landed in the summer of 1585 and spent a winter harassed with Indian troubles and fear of starvation. Sir Francis Drake passed that way in the next summer, after one of his raids on Spanish America, and the distressed party gladly left the wilderness and returned with him to England. They had scarcely gone before relief ships came from Raleigh and left provisions and a party of fifteen men. The next year another party of settlers came to the island but found no trace of the fifteen men — a sad hint. This new party landed, and their ships sailed away to get more provisions. They planned to return in a few months, but meantime the Armada fight was threatening, England needed every ship, men had no time to think of America. For four years the little com- pany of Englishmen were alone in the wilderness, cut off from the world and at the mercy of the Indians. When An Indian of Virginia From the water-color drawing by John White of Raleigh's expedition of 1585 SPAIN AND HER RIVALS 4 II at last a relief party did come, they found only ruins of houses, a deserted fort, broken chests, discarded tools, all overgrown with grass. The settlers had disappeared, and the Indians would tell no tales. Thus in sorrow and disaster began the English settlements in America. But Englishmen were not to be discouraged. Other expeditions came, and in 1607 Jamestown was successfully founded, the first permanent settlement of England in the new world. In those early years men came for commerce, and they got from the king permission to trade, just as merchants did who wished to buy and sell in the cities of Europe. 1 But in order to get the riches of this new country, English- men had to build houses, work the ground, cut the timber, trap the fur-bearing animals. They needed to own land and build towns. The land belonged to the English king. Therefore traders going there and colonists settling there must get his consent. So there grew up the custom of chartering companies for trading and colonizing. A number of men would make plans to form a company for settling and trading in America; each member would furnish c a certain amount of money and would expect in return a certain amount of the profits. After their plan was made they would present themselves to the king. If he favored the idea, he would give them a signed per- mission, called a patent. In this patent he gave tracts of land to the company. He also laid down rules for its governing; for these settlers across the ocean were still his subjects, and he considered it his duty to protect them. Queen Elizabeth had given such patents to many com- panies desiring to trade and settle in different parts of the old world. There was the Russia Company, the Cathay or China Company, the Baltic Company, the 1 See page 336. 412 BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES The Town of New Amsterdam, or New York Notice the cannon, the stockade, the Dutch windmill Turkey Company, the Morocco Company, the Africa Company, the East India Company. The kings who followed Elizabeth granted charters to trade in America to the Newfoundland Company, the Bermuda Company, the Plymouth Company, the New England Company, the Massachusetts Bay Company, the Hudson Bay Company. England's Rivals in the New World In the meantime Holland and France were doing the same thing — all picking plums from Spain's tree in America, all claiming that Spain's share lay to The . the south, all exploring the northern coast and Canada claiming what was found, all chartering com- panies, all trying to make settlements and to hold their new-found lands. The French began slowly to work their way up the St. Lawrence River, exploring its banks and the forests that led back from them, making friends with the natives, trading for furs, using the Indians as guides to the great inland seas of which they told. By the year 1615 they had gone on foot or canoe as far as Lake Ontario and had tramped across the country to the eastern shore of Lake Huron. For the next seventy years the wonderful waterway of the SPAIN AND HER RIVALS 413 As It Appeared in 1673 Compare this Dutch town with the Spanish San Domingo nearly a century earlier pictured on page 383 Great Lakes and their connecting rivers was the road that led Frenchmen on and on into the western wilderness, planting forts and missions and trading posts all the way from the mouth of the St. Lawrence to the heart of the Mississippi Valley. By 1615, however, they had made only two settlements, one in Nova Scotia and one at Quebec. South of the French country the Dutch founded a colony at the mouth of the Hudson, and England was beginning settlements further south. Thirteen Dutch ^ years after her colony at Jamestown she planted English another at Plymouth. These were coast Settle- towns, looking back to England across the sea. ments It was long before Englishmen reached the mountains far behind them and began to thread their way across into the unknown wilderness beyond. South of Virginia, where Jamestown was, all the western world, except for Brazil, was Spain's. She was little interested, however, in the country Spanish north of Mexico, and except for Santa F6 in the Towns distant southwest, she had planted only one colony there, St. Augustine in Florida. 414 BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES By 1623, then, there were in the country which was some time to be English-speaking America, seven towns — two French, two English, one Dutch, and two Spanish. Old Spanish Gate at St. Augustine It is still standing. St. Augustine is the only walled town in the United States They were all mere villages with a few log houses, a little log fort to protect the settlers' bodies, and a log church to guard their souls. They were surrounded by Indians whom they did not trust. They lacked most of the things that they had been used to have in the old countries of Europe. Most of them were homesick much of the time, I have no doubt, eagerly waiting for a visiting ship to bring them a few letters from home, a few delicacies to eat and drink, a pretty bonnet or a bright ribbon, — something to make them forget for a little that they were dropped down in the wilderness all but cut off from civilization. Upon the few ships they were dependent, too, for the many necessities of life — for flour and ham, for sugar and cloth, for iron and paper and tools and furniture. Six of these towns were on the eastern edge of a conti- nent whose great size nobody had guessed. The Spaniards SPAIN AND HER RIVALS 415 had plunged a finger, one might say, into its southern edge by making their adventurous trip through our southwest- ern states. 1 Drake had touched the coast of California. France had pushed westward a thousand miles and was hoping that every step would bring her out to the Pacific, to a waterway through America to Asia. The Dutch and the English knew only a narrow fringe on the east coast. The great mass of the continent white men had never seen. Yet the path to America had been made, and the door had been opened. Men found its soil as rich as that of Europe, its harbors as safe, its forests as beautiful, its climate as pleasant. To men in Europe who wanted to make money it offered its timber, its furs, its mines. To farmers who found land hard to get in Europe it opened broad, empty acres. To the Huguenots of France who found their Catholic rulers unfriendly and harsh, to Quakers and Puritans and Presbyterians and Catholics of England who found themselves annoyed and oppressed by the Episcopalian Church, the far-distant and unpeopled America offered an opportunity to worship according to their own consciences. With the settling of America there had opened a new chapter in man's history. We might call it "New Homes in a New World." Into these new homes men carried as precious heirlooms the great books, the religion, the science, the art, the laws, the ideals of freedom and of honor, that all the ages had been toiling over. Out of these things Americans and their cousins across the Atlantic have gone on making new history. The tale is not finished. We are still making it to-day. After us our descendants will continue it. It is, perhaps, a never ending tale, and chapter rises out of chapter, age rests upon age, as do the stories of a lofty building. 1 See page 380. 4 i 6 BEGINNINGS OF OUR OWN TIMES 1. What connection do you see between trade and exploration? Between trade and the spread of civilization? 2. How do you think civilized people, entering a new country, ought to treat the uncivilized natives? 3. Find out when the different states of South America became independent of Spain. 4. Did Spain succeed in keeping her American colonies Spanish and Catholic? From encyclopedias or Shepherd's Latin America find what the speech and the religion of Mexico, the larger islands of the West Indies, and the South American states are to-day. 5. What was the difference between the aims of Magellan and those of Drake? Which man do you admire more? 6. Read " The Revenge," by Tennyson, a poem about a brave fight between a little English ship and fifty-three Spanish galleons. The Revenge had once been Drake's ship. 7. Before 1600 what countries claimed land in North America? On what did they found their claims ? 1. The story told by this book covers 2000 years and more. Dur- ing that time what very great changes occurred in the world ? What did the men of 1600 know that the Greeks did not know? What could they do that the Greeks could not do? What have we learned since 1600 ? 2. Who are the great men of this book ? Why are they great ? 3. What countries of Europe had not developed very far in unity and strength in 1600? Why do you think the northern countries were slower in developing than the southern ? 4. Imagine Greece, Rome, France, Germany, England, Spain, Portugal, Florence, Venice, each telling what she had done for the world up to 1600. Write their speeches. Costume members of the class to represent the various countries and let them walk on and make these speeches. Study the pictures of this book for the costume. IMPORTANT DATES GREECE (The Greeks themselves counted time in Olympiads. Modern men have figured out that the first Olympic game-festival was held in 776 B.C. There were four years in this first Olympiad, until the second festival began the second Olympiad. According to the Greek reckoning, the battle of Mara- thon took place in the third year of the 72nd Olympiad. But many things happened before the first Olympiad. These the Greeks could not date ac- curately. The events from which grew the legends of the Trojan war, the voyages of Odysseus and the Argonauts, and the founding of all the great cities on the islands of the ^Egean and the mainland of Greece, are some of these early happenings.) B.C. 785 First Greek settlement on the Black Sea. 776 Beginning of first Olympiad. 736 First settlement in Sicily. 600 Founding of Massilia. 490 Battle of Marathon. 480 Battles of Thermopylae and Salamis. 479 Battle of Platsea. 438 Completion of Parthenon. 404 Humbling of Athens by Sparta. 371 Humbling of Sparta by Thebes. 338 Philip's conquest of Greece. 336 Alexander becomes king. 334 Alexander's first battle in Asia. 332 Founding of Alexandria. 323 Death of Alexander. ROME (The Romans counted time from the founding of Rome. That hap- pened so far back that they did not know accurately when it was. But the date that they set is, according to our way of counting time, 753 B.C. Caesar became sole ruler of Rome the 709th year after the founding of the city. That is the way the Romans expressed it. This means that 708 years had passed between the founding of Rome and the victory of Caesar. By subtracting 708 from 753 we find that according to our method of mark- ing dates, Caesar became ruler in 45 B.C.) B.C. 753 Supposed founding of Rome. 509 (?) Kings expelled. . 266 Rome mistress of Italy. 264-241 First Punic war. 218-201 Second Punic war. 167 Macedon (Greece) conquered. 149-146 Third Punic war. 146 Carthage and Corinth destroyed. 66-63 Pompey conquers Asia Minor and Syria. 58-50 Csesar conquers Gaul. 49-45 Caesar fights civil war and becomes sole ruler. A.D. 85 Britain is conquered. 211 All freemen in the empire are given citizenship. 313 Constantine gives Christians privilege of worship. 4i7 4i8 IMPORTANT DATES GERMAN CONQUESTS A.D. 376 West Goths cross the Danube into the Roman empire. 378 West Goths defeat the emperor at Adrianople. 395 Alaric king of the Goths. They plunder Greece. 410 Alaric sacks Rome. 415 Adolf and the West Goths settle in Gaul and Spain. 429 Vandals conquer Roman Africa and set up kingdom . 486 Clovis and the Franks begin conquest of Gaul. 493 East Goths rule Italy. 496 Franks under Clovis become Christian. A.D. 732 771 800 803 814 911 936 1100-1250 1212-1250 1254-1273 1273 1370 1519 1525 1520-1648 GERMANY AND FRANCE Franks defeat Moors and prevent invasion of Frankland. Charlemagne king of the Franks. Charlemagne emperor of Holy Roman Em- pire. Saxony conquered. Charlemagne dies . Empire begins to crumble. Germany Feudal dukes choose one of themselves king. King is usually emperor also. Emperors become strong. Growth of free cities. Frederick II king. Empire falls into confusion. Austria becomes strong under Hapsburgs. Greatest strength of Hanseatic League. Charles V is chosen emperor. Peasants' war against nobles and churchmen. Religious troubles and wars. France 911 Northmen settle in Normandy. 987 Feudal lords choose Hugh Capet king. 1100-1250 Growth of free cities. 1226-1270 St. Louis (Louis IX) rules. 1337-1453 Hundred Years' War with England. 1358 Peasant uprising. 1494 Italian wars begin. 1572 Massacre of Huguenots (St. Bartholomew's Day). 1589 Henry IV, a Protestant, becomes king; later turns Catholic, but grants freedom of worship to Protestants. IMPORTANT DATES 419 ENGLAND A.D. 411 Roman legions recalled Irom Britain. 449 Angles and Saxons begin to conquer Britain. 829 Egbert becomes overlord of all England. 871-901 Alfred king. 793 ( ? )-1016 Danes often invade England. 1016-1042 Danish kings rule England. 1066 Norman William conquers England. 1100-1250 Growth of free cities. 1100-1350 Rise and growth of merchant and craft gilds. 1154-1189 Henry II makes good laws. 1215 John compelled to grant Magna Charta. 1337-1453 Hundred Years' War with France. 1362 (?) Piers Plowman written. 1381 Great Revolt of peasants. 1485 Tudor kings begin to build up strong na- tional power. 1558-1603 Elizabeth queen (the last Tudor). 1564-1616 Shakespeare lives. 1588 England defeats the Spanish Armada. SPAIN, PORTUGAL, AND THE NETHERLANDS A.D. 711 Mohammedans begin to conquer Spain. Christian kingdoms slowly grow in northern mountains. 1140 Portugal becomes independent; 1248-1354 Alhambra built. . High state of Moorish civil- ization. 1469 Christian Spain united by marriage of Fer- dinand and Isabella. 1492 Ferdinand and Isabella conquer the Moors. 1502 First negro slaves sent to America. 1516 Hapsburg Charles (later Emperor Charles V) becomes king of Spain. 1556-1598 Philip II king of Spain. 1564 Spanish war with Netherlands begins. 1574 Siege of Leyden. 1580-1640 Kings of Spain rule Portugal. 1581 Dutch declaration of independence. 1584 William of Orange assassinated. 420 IMPORTANT DATES THE EAST A.D. 622 630 634-644 708 786 1040 1096 1099-1187 1237 1259-1294 1300-1450 1453 1500-1517 Mohammed flees from Mecca. Mohammed conquers Arabia. Arabian Mohammedans conquer Syria, Persia, Egypt. Arabian Mohammedans conquer northern Africa. Arabian empire at height. Haroun-al- Raschid caliph. Seljuk Turks (Mohammedans) begin to con- quer western Asia. Crusades begin. Kingdom of Jerusalem maintained by crusaders. Mongols begin conquest of Russia. Kublai Khan emperor of China. Ottoman Turks found an empire in Asia Minor and southeastern Europe. (Modern Turks are Ottomans.) Ottoman Turks conquer Constantinople, last remnant of Roman empire. Ottoman Turks conquer Syria and Egypt. THE CHURCH A.D. 440 Leo I the first great pope. 526 (?) St. Benedict founds Benedictine order of monks. 597 St. Augustine begins conversion of England. 716 Boniface begins work among Germans. 1075 Struggle between popes and emperors begins. 1096-1270 Crusades. 1200-1300 Many universities founded. 1210 St. Francis founds Franciscan order of preaching friars. 1215 St. Dominic founds Dominican order. 1466 First German Bible printed. 1480 Spanish Inquisition established. 1517 Luther in Germany begins Protestant Re- volt. 1532 Calvin preaches Protestantism in France. 1534 English church under Henry VIII breaks away from pope. 1539 First English Bible printed. 1540 St. Ignatius Loyola founds order of Jesuits to counteract Protestantism. 1545-1563 Catholic Church holds Council of Trent, restates creed, reforms practices. IMPORTANT DATES 421 INVENTIONS, EXPLORATIONS, AND SETTLEMENTS A.D. 860 (?) Norsemen discover Iceland. 985 Norsemen discover Greenland. 1000 Norsemen land on shore of North America. 1271-1295 Marco Polo's travels in Asia and life in China. 1320-1340 Europe begins use of gunpowder. 1350-1450 Paper becomes common. 1419 Prince Henry begins his explorations. 1435 Cape Bojador is passed. 1445-1454 Printing with movable type. 1472 First sailors' almanac is published, showing height of sun and stars at different times in various places. 1480 Astrolabe used at sea for finding latitudes. 1487 Diaz rounds the Cape of Good Hope. 1492 Columbus discovers America. 1497 Da Gama sails to India. Cabot discovers North America. 1513 Balboa discovers the Pacific Ocean. 1519-1521 Cortez conquers Mexico. 1519^1522 Magellan's ship sails around the world. 1531-1533 Pizarro conquers Peru. 1534 Cartier discovers the St. Lawrence River. 1541 De Soto discovers the Mississippi River. 1543 Copernicus publishes a book giving a new theory of astronomy. 1564 Coligny sends a Huguenot colony to Florida. 1565 Spanish found St. Augustine in Florida. Huguenot settlement destroyed by Spaniards. 1577-1580 Drake sails around the world. 1582 Hakluyt publishes first book of voyages. 1583 Sir Humphrey Gilbert's last voyage. 1585 Raleigh's company makes first English settle- ment in America. 1603-1608 Champlain makes voyages to Canada. 1607 Jamestown founded by England. 1608 Quebec founded by France. 1609 Galileo perfects telescope. Hudson discovers the Hudson River. 1614 Dutch trading posts on the Hudson. 1615 French as far west as Lake Huron. 1620 Plymouth founded by England. 1623 New Amsterdam founded by Holland. FURTHER READING There is no escape from the fact that a teacher cannot give what she does not possess nor communicate interest she does not feel. No textbook can give more than a child's introduction. If the teacher, desires to awaken intelligent curiosity, answer eager questioning, estab- lish permanent interest, make the study truly vital, she must know a great deal more about the subject than any textbook can tell. How can the teacher of elementary grades, always pressed for time, seldom trained to find her way in the serious study of history, discover quickly the best material? A convenient procedure for the teacher who knows little about the subject is to use first the references in a more advanced textbook prepared by scholarly writers ; for example, Out- lines of European History, Part I, by J. H. Robinson and James Breasted (Ginn & Company, 1914, $1.60), covering the period from man's beginnings to Louis XIV, contains lists of books by chapters. A Bibliography of History for Schools, by Andrews, Gambrill, and Tall (Longmans, 1910, 60f^) contains classified lists of titles for all periods and countries (including stories for children). Excellent bibliographies on special topics are appended to articles in the Encyclopaedia Britannica. Longer and more numerous extracts from the old writers, with informa- tion about their complete works, may be obtained from such collections as Readings in Ancient History, by W. S. Davis (Allyn & Bacon, 2 vol.), A Source Book of Medieval History, by F. A. Ogg (American Book Company), and Readings in European History, by J. H. Robinson (Ginn & Company, 2 vol.). The University of Pennsylvania (Philadelphia) publishes a number of Translations and Repr'nts from the Original Sources of European History, sold for 15 to 25 cents. Many of the old writers are available in complete form, well printed, with helpful introductions and notes, in Everyman's Library (Dutton, 35 £). Others can be found in the Bohn Libraries (The Macmillan Company, usually $1.00 or $1.50). The Teaching of History, by Henry Johnson (The Macmillan Com- pany, 1915, $1.00), the latest work on the subject, discusses the use of "sources" in schools, while F. M. Fling, in Historical Method (Ains- worth, 50 ff), shows briefly and simply how a critical scholar uses the sources to construct historical narrative. It is believed that many teachers would be glad to have a brief, carefully chosen, topically arranged list of books especially fitting into the scheme and matter of this textbook. Such Reading Lists have been prepared, with descriptive and critical comments on the various titles, and lists of the best books for children. They have been included in a small Manual along with suggestions to the teacher for making the work more interesting and vital. This little pamphlet will be fur- nished without cost to teachers whose classes use the textbook. 422 INDEX Pronunciation according to Webster's New International Dictionary. Key : a, as in ale ; a, as in am ; a, as in fi'-nal ; a, as in arm ; a, as in ask ; a, as in so'-fd ; e, as in eve ; e, as in e-vent' ; e", as in end ; 2, as in no'-vgl ; e, as in ev'-er ; g, as in go ; i, as in ice ; I, as in 111 ; 6, as in old ; 6, as in to"-bac'co ; 6, as in lord ; o, as in not ; 0, as in ctfn-nect' ; do, as in food ; oo, as in foot; th, as in thin ; u, as in use ; u, as in u-nite' ; u, as in urn or her; ti, as in up ; u, as in cir'-cus ; n, as in French boN. Acropolis (d-krop'-6-lis), 38-40. Adolf (a'-dolf), 147-148. Adrianople (ad'-ri-dn-o'-p'l), 145. iEgina (e-ji'-nd), 38. ^schylus (es'-ki-lus), quoted, 58-59. Africa, Greeks visit, 12, 18, 43 ; Romans conquer, 1 14, 325 ; Moors conquer, 326, 379; map of, 343; Portuguese voyages around coast, 349-360, 374, 377, 381-382, 393. Agricola (d-grik'-6-ld), 120-121, 122. Agriculture, German, 142 ; medieval, 250-253. Alaric (al'-d-rik), 146-147. Alexander, 62-69. Alexandria, 69-70, 128, 341, 344. Alfred, 187-192. Alva (al'-va), duke of, 390, 391. America, voyages to, 159, 367, 369, 37 *> 375 5 Spaniards in, 379-3^5 5 Huguenots in, 387-388; Dutch in, 393; English in, 394-400, 408- 415- Angelo (5,n'-je"-lo), Michael, 273. Angles, 181-184. Anglo-Saxons, 181-192, 199-200. Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, quoted, 182- 184, 194-196, i97-!98. Aphrodite (af-ro-dl'-te"), 27, 28. Apollo (d-pol'-o), 2i. Apphianus (ap-fi-a'-nus), 132-133. Apprentice (d-pren'-tls), 265. Arabia, 43, 286, 322-323. Argonauts (ar'-go-ndts), 3-4, 14. Aristotle (ar'-Is-tot'-'J), 67. Armada (ar-ma'-dd), 401-405. Armor, Greek, picture, 58 ; Roman, 106-107; German, 143; Norman, pictures, 194-196; medieval, 231- 232 ; pictures, 213, 220, 225, 226, 229, 237, 238, 248, 279, 280; later, 335, 352, 386, 389, 395. Army, Persian, 56; Roman, 84, 86, 105-110; Charlemagne's, 153-154. Artemis Car'-te-mis), 21. Arthur, King, 239. « Assembly, 51, 154, 185-187. Asser,' quoted, 187-188, 190, 191-192. Assyria (d-sir'-i-d), pictures, 2, 3. Astrolabe (as'-tro-lab), 344. Athene (d-the'-ne), 21, 23, 24 ; pic- ture, 37. Athens, 23, 38-45, 51-52, 59-61, 159, 271. Augur (6'-gwr), 82. Augustine, 297. Augustus, 129. Azores (d-zorz'), 355. Balboa (bal-b5'-a), 379. Ball, John, 259-262. Banquet, 244 ; picture, 246. Baptistry, 273 ; pictures, 269, 274. Baths, 119, 121. Battering ram, 102, 227 ; pictures, 104, 226. 423 424 INDEX Bavaria, 164. Bede (b§d), quoted, 297. Behaim (ba'-him), maps, 357, 362. Belgium, 118, 150. Benedict (b6n'-£-dikt), 302-303 ; rule of, 303-307, 312. Beowulf (ba'-S-woolf), 181-182. Bergen (bur'-gen), 285. Bishop, 299. Black Sea, 4, 14, 16, 43, 128, 329. Bojador (boj-d-dor') , Cape, 353. Boniface (bon'-i-fas), 298. Books, 308-311 ; pictures, 46-47, 122. Brazil, 369, 370, 385- Britain (brit'-'n), 8, 17, 43, 120-122, 128, 181-184. Bruges (brod'jez), 285. Cabot, John, 368. Csesar (se'zdr), Julius, 99-110, 115, 118, 120. California, 399, 415 ; picture, 314. Calvin, John, 338, 387. Camp, Roman, 107-109. Canada, 368. Cannae (kan'-6), 94. Cape of Good Hope, 356, 359, 370, 374. Capetians (kd-pe'-shdnz), 175. Carthage, 8, 90-96, 98, 105. Cartier (kar'tya'), 377, 385, 388. Castle, 163, 217-227. Catapult (kat'-d-pult), 101-102, 227 ; picture, 104. Cathedral, picture, 301. Chalcis (k&l'-sis), 38. Charlemagne ( shar'-le"-man ) , 1 5 1-1 5 7, 163-164. Charles V, 385, 388 ; picture, 386. Charter, Great, 207-212. Chartered companies, 411-412. Charters, 204, 207-212. Chaucer (ch6'-s§r), quoted, 233. China, 74, 287, 288, 328, 341, 346, 347" 349i 355> 36o, 361, 365*411- Chivalry, time of, 247-248. Christianity, beginning of, 128-135. Chronicles, 182, 311-312. Church councils, 300, 340. Cicero (sis'-er-5), quoted, 114. City, Greek, 38 ; Roman, 78 ; Eng- lish, 202-204 ; pictures, 269, 331. Clovis (^klo'-vis), 149-151. Coligny (ko'-len'-ye'), 387. Colonies, Greek, 13-19; in America, 380-385, 409-415- Columbus, 360-368, 369, 385. Compass, 342. Constantine (kon'-stdn-tin), 134-135, 145, 325- Constantinople, 145, 290, 325, 331, 332, 337* 346. Consuls, 84. Copernicus (ko-pur'-m-kws), 406. Corinth (kor'-inth), 38, 98, 130. Cortez (kor'-tez), 379. Costume, Assyrian, pictures, 2, 3 ; Greek, pictures, 20, 24, 33, 35, 37, 41, 46, 47; Persian, pictures, 53, 55, 56, 66 ; Roman, 78 ; pictures, 80, 81, 83, 85, 134; German, 141- 142; pictures, 143, 150; Saxon, 182; medieval, 156, 244-245; pic- tures, 178, 202, 203, 206, 2ii, 259, 261, 266, 270, 272, 279, 289, 292, 294, 309 ; religious, pictures, 165, 296, 299, 304, 305, 306, 308, 313, 320 ; later, 347, 348, 358, 364, 397, 407, frontispiece. See also Armor. Counts, 153, 154, 174. Crossbow, 234. Croyland, monastery of, 313. Crusades, 329-333. Da Gama, see Gama. Danes, 190-192, 298. Darien (da'-ri-en'), 379, 398. Delian (de'-H-dn), Confederacy, 59- 61. Demeter(de"-me'-ter), 21 ; picture, 20. Denmark, 157, 158, 281, 339. De Soto, 380. Diaz (di'as), 356. Dionysus (dl'-o-nl'-SMs), 21, 39. Doge (d5j), 291-293. Domain, 249. Doomsday Book, 197-198. INDEX 425 Drake, Francis, 396-400, 402,409, 415. Dukes, 163, 173, 174. Dutch, the, see Netherlands. Eannes, Gil, 353. East, the, 286-287 ; Rome's conquest of, 96-98 ; Portuguese empire in, 359. 393- Egbert, 185. Egypt, 18, 43> 69, 97, 128. Einhard (In'-hart), quoted, 156. Elizabeth, Queen, 336, 396, 398, 400, 401, 404, 408, 409, 411, 412; pic- tures, frontispiece, 407. Emperor, Roman, 115, 117; Holy Roman, 152, 162, 164-173. England, 181-212, 258, 392-412. Eratosthenes (er'-d-tos'-th^-nez), 69. Etruria (e-trod'-rl-d), 76, 77, 88. Eusebius (u-se'-bi-ws), quoted, 132- 133, 134-135- Excommunication (6ks'-ko-mu-ni- ka'-shwn), 170. Exploration, Greek, 3-1 1 ; Viking, 159; Portuguese, 349-360, 369; Spanish, 360-368, 369-375* 379~38o; English, 368, 398-400; French, 377, 412-413; Dutch, 393. Factories (trading), Greek, 12-13; Hanseatic, 285 ; Venetian, 290. Fairs, 288-290. Ferdinand, King, 363, 385. Feudalism (fu'-ddl-iz'm), 214-217. Florence, 269-277, 290, 295. Florida, 380, 387, 409, 413. Fort Caroline, 387. Forum (fo'-rum), Roman, 79-80. France, 173-180, 375, 377, 385-388. Francis I, King, 377, 385. Francis, Saint, 316-317. Frankland, East, 161-163. Frankland, West, 162, 173-174. Franks, 141, 148-15 1. Frederick II, 168-172, 281, 293. Froissart (froi'-sart), 237; quoted, 258-262. Funeral, Roman, 86. Galileo (gal'-Ue'-o), 408. Gama, Vasco da, 356-359. Gauls, 12, 17; Caesar's war with, 99-110; civilization of, 1 18-120; Goths conquer, 148; Franks con- quer, 149-150, 162. Genoa (j6n'-6-d), 290, 361. Germans, 128, 141 -144; missionaries among, 298. Germany, 163-173, 281, 284, 298. Gilbert, Sir Humphrey, 409. Gild merchant, 263-264. Gilds, craft, 265-268; emblems of, 275-276 ; changes in, 294-295 ; en- tertain pilgrims, 319. Golden Fleece, 3, 4, 14. Golden Hinde, 400. Goncalves (gdn-sal'-vesh), 353-354. Goths, 141, 144-148. Greece, 2-73; Rome conquers, 97, 98, no, 128, 130, 136, 137-138. Greenland, 159. Guinea (gin'-i), 361. Gulf of Mexico, 380. Gunpowder, 247. Hakluyt (hak'-loot), 408-409; quoted, 401-402, 404. Hamilcar (ha-mil'-kar), 92. Hannibal, 92-95. Hanseatic League (han'-se"-at'-ik leg), 281-285, 288-289, 393. Hapsburgs, 385. Harold, King, 194 ; picture, 195. Hastings, battle of, 194. Hawking, 240-241. Helleston, 204. Hengist, 182, 183. Henry II, of England, 200-202. Henry the Navigator, 350-355. Hephaestus (heVfeV-tws), 21. Herakles, 4. Hermes (hur'-mez), 21, 28-29; pic- tures, 28, 35. Herodotus, quoted, 8, n, 12, 55, 59, 74-75- Hestia (heV-tl-d), 42. Holland, 150, 160, 392, 393, 401, 412. 426 INDEX Horatius, 88. Horsa, 182. House, Greek, 40, 42 ; Roman, 78 ; German, 142; medieval, 256, 264- 265. Hudson, Henry, 393. Huguenots (hu'-ge-nSts), 387, 415. Huns, 145, 161. Hunting, 239-240. Iceland, 159. India, 128, 286, 288, 355, 356-360. Inquisition, 339-340, 384-385, 3^8, 390, 394. Isabella, Queen, 363. Italy, Greek colonization of, 12, 16; Rome conquers, 74-77 ; Hannibal enters, 93-95; Goths plunder, 147; Lombards in, 152, 171- 172; Flor- ence, 269 ; war over, 385. Jamestown, 411, 413. Jason, 3-4. Jerusalem, 321-322, 330 ; picture, 331. Jesuit (jez'-u-Tt), 339, 340. Jesus, 129. John, King, 205-212. Joinville (zhw&N'-vel'), quoted, 176- 177, 178. Justinian, 138. Knighting, 236-239. Kublai Khan (kod'-bli kan'), 347. Ladrone Islands (la-dr5n'), 373. Langland, William, 257. Langton, Stephen, 207. Latins, 12, 76. Launcelot (lan'-se"-lot), 230, 232. Leonidas (le"-6n'-i-das), 57. Leyden (H' -den), siege of, 391.' Libraries, in Alexandria, 69 ; Charle- magne's, 156; of monasteries, 311. Lombards, 141, 152, 171-172. London, 285. Lorraine (lo-ran'), 164. Louis IX, 176-179, 317, 320. Luther, Martin, 338. Macedon (mas'-e'-d5n), 19, 62, 97, 98, 130. Magellan (ma-jel'-an), 369-375. Magna Grsecia (mag'-nd gre'-slri-d), 17, 61, 77. Malory, quoted, 230, 232, 236, 238. Manor, 249-258. Maps, making of, 69, 343~344- Marathon, 54-55. Market-place, Greek, 42-43 ; Roman, 78-79 ; English, 203 ; Florentine, 270-271. Mars, 81. Marseilles (mar-salz'), 17. Martyrs, Christian, 132-134. Massilia, 17. Menendez (ma-nen'-dath), 387-388. Mexico, 379, 380. Miletus (im-le'-tws), 14. Mines, 103, 227. Minstrels, 241-242. Missionaries, 130, 153, 187, 296- 298. Mississippi River, 380, 413. Mohammed (mo-ham'-ed), 323-324. Monasteries, 300-316. Montauban, siege of (mdn'-t6-baN), 224-227. Moors, 328, 351, 363. Moots, Anglo-Saxon, 185-187. Movable tower, 102-103. Mucius (mu'-shus), Caius (ka/yws), National states, 334-336. Neco (ne'k5), 354. Negroes, 354, 381-382, 384. Netherlands, 388-393. Newfoundland, 409. Non (non), Cape, 351, 353. Normandy, 192-193. Normans, 192-200. Northmen or Norsemen, 157-160, 161. Norway, 157, 158, 159, 281, 284, 288, 339- Novgorod (ndv'-g6-r6t), 285, 288, 289, 290, 291. INDEX 427 Odess'a, 14. Odysseus (o-dls'-Gs), 4-5. Olympia, 29-34. Olympus, 20. Ostia (6s'-tya), 98. Pacific Ocean, Balboa discovers, 379. Page, 234-235. Palestine (p&l'-Ss-tin) , 129, 326, 330. Pan, 21. Paris, France, 175, 176, 177. Paris, Matthew, quoted, 169, 172, 178. Parliament (par'-li-ment), 187; pic- ture, 186. Parthenon (par'-the-non), 23-25, 38; picture, 22. Patricians (pa-trish'-anz), 84. Paul, 130, 297. Peddlers, 277-278. Pericles (per'-i-klez), 59-61 ; quoted, 5 1 - Persia, war with Greece, 53-59 ; Alexander conquers, 62-69 > Mo- hammedans conquer, 326. Peru, 379. Phidias (fid'-i-as), 24, 30. Philip of Macedon, 62. Philip II, of Spain, 388-390, 392. Philippines, 373. Phoenicians (fe"-n!sh'-anz), 8, II, 73, 354. Picts, 181. Pigafetta (pe-ga-fet'-ta), quoted, 371- 375- Pilgrims, 318-322. Pindar, quoted, 32, 34. Piraeus (pl-re'-ws), 43-44, 159. Pirates, Rome conquers, 97, 98-99 ; Vikings, 157-160 ; Angles and Sax- ons, 181 ; medieval, 281. Pizarro (pi-zar'-ro), 379. Platsea (pld-te'-a), 59. Plato (pla'-to), quoted, 45-46. Plebeians (ple"-be'-yanz), 84. Plowing, 250, 252. Plutarch (ploo'-tark), quoted, 37, 55, 64-67- . ; Plymouth, 413. Pnyx (niks), 51. Poles, 281. Polo, Marco, 347~349, 35°- Pompey, 98-99, III. Ponce de Leon (pon'-tha da hi-on'V 387. Pope, crowns Charlemagne, 152; struggle with emperors, 164-173; ruler of church, 300. Portugal, explorers of, 349-360, 361, 369, 370, 375 ; slave trade of, 382 ; loses Eastern empire, 393. Poseidon (po-si'-don), 21 ; picture, 2or Praxiteles (prak-sit'-e-lez), 28-29. Printing, 336-337- Privateers, 396. Propontis (pro-pon'-tis), 3, 16.. Protestantism (prot'-es-tdnt-Iz'-m) , 337-339, 340. Provinces, Roman, 114, 11 8- 122. Ptolemy (tol'-e"-mi), 350 ; map, 341. Punic wars (pu'-nik), 90-96. Quebec, 413. Raleigh (r6MI), 409-410; picture, 395- Renaud (re-no'), 224-227. Revolt, Great, 258-262. Richard I, 205, 333. Roads, Roman, 121, 122-125 > ra edie- val, 253, 277 ; Chinese, 349. Roanoke (ro'-a-nok'), 410. Roger of Wendover, quoted, 206-209. Rolf the Ganger (gang'-er), 192, 193. Romans, 12, 73, 74-139, H , 14*1 142, 145-H8. Romulus, 79. Runnymede, 209. Russia, 281, 288. Saewulf, quoted, 322. Sailing directions, 342-343. Saint Augustine, Fla., 388, 413, 414. Saint Gall (sS,n gal'), monastery, 316; plan, 315. ; Saint Julian's Bay, 371, 398. 428 INDEX Saint Lawrence River, 377, 388, 412, 413- Saints, 316-318. Salamis (sal'-d-mis), 58-59. Santa F6, 413. Santa Maria, 363 ; picture, 366. Saracens (s&r'-d-senz), 322-333. Saxons, 141, 151, 153, 181-184. Schools, Greek, 45-47; Charlemagne's, 156; monastery, 308, 383. Science, Greek, 47-48, 69-70; later, 406, 408. Scythians (sith'-i-dnz), 11, 14. Senate, Roman, 84, 112. Shakespeare, 408. Ships, Greek, 10-11 ; Roman, 91, 92 ; Viking, 157; picture, 158; Nor- man, pictures, 193, 198; medieval, 280-281 ; picture, 321 ; later, 345- 346 ; pictures, 366, 371, 374, 403, 405. Shops, medieval, 264-265 ; picture, 266. See also Market-place. Sicily (sis'-i-H), 8, 16-17, 91, 92, 94, 95, 96, 114, 128, 168, 169, 173, 328. Slaves, 16, 113, 354, 381-382. Socrates (sok'-ra-tez), 48-51. Spain, Greek settlements and trade, 8, 12, 17, 43; Carthaginians in, 90, 92, 93; Rome rules, 96, 114, 120, 128; Goths conquer, 148; Vikings visit, 159; Saracens rule, 326, 328 ; picture, 327 ; explorers of, 363- 368, 369-377 ; colonies in America, 379-385» 4i 3, 4H ; enemies of, 385- 408. Sparta, 36-37, 57, 61. Spice, 278, 286, 349. Squire, 235-236. Sweden, 157, 158, 281, 298, 339. Syria, 97, 98, 326. Tacitus (taV-I-tws), quoted, 120- 121, 141-144. Tarik (ta'-rik), 326. Thebes (thebz), 61. Themistocles (th&-mls'-t6-klez), 55- 56, 57-58. Thermopylae (ther-mSp'-Me) , 57, 98. Thor, 150. Thorold, 313. Thucydides (thii-sld'-l-dez), quoted, 60-61. Tortoise (t&r'-tus), 103-105. Tournament (toor'-nd-ment), 229- 230 ; picture, 237. Trade, Greek, 12-18, 43; Roman, 127-128; medieval, 277-293 ; later, 336, 393-39-; Trading posts, Greek, 12-13 ; Han seatic, 285; Venetian, 290-291. Travel, Greek, 3-6 ; Roman, 124-127 ; medieval, 277, 278-279, 312, 318- 322. Triumph, Roman, 86-87, ll1 - Troubadours (troo'-ba-doorz), 243-247. Turks, 329, 331, 346. Vandals, 141. Vassal, 214-217, 249-250, 254-256. Vellum, 308-310. Venice, 290-293. Venus, 28 ; picture, 27. Verrazano (ver-rat-sa'-n5), 377, 385. Vespucius (ves-pii'-shws), 369. Vesta (ves'-td), 80. Vestals, 80, 82. Vikings (vi'-kingz), 157-160, 161, 182, 190-191, 192. Villain, 250-263. Virginia, 409, 410, 413. Washington, state of, 399. West Indies, Columbus discovers, 365-367, 369 ; Spaniards in, 380-384. William the Conqueror, 192-200. William of Malmesbury (mamz'- bSr-i), quoted, 199-200. William of Orange, 390-392. Witenagemot (wlt'-e-nd-ge-mof) , 187. Woden, 150, 185. Xenophon (zen'-fc-fon), quoted, 49~5 Xerxes (zurk'-zez), 55-58. Zeus (zus), 21, 30-31, 40 ; picture, 20 17 YB 30255 5624 DIM UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY ;: a !H! mm m in :t u III! !i!i ill if mm I if iifiu I flill I Ml 11 ! II II Hip !il'i ! iiiiiifi III! $ifi|ii||fi{iiiii ill mm mm H HM ! ![•! 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