e, if you accept, as I am inclined to do,
the theory of Dr. Latham, that we were always 'Markmen,' men of the
Marches, occupying a narrow frontier between the Slavs and the Roman
Empire; and that Tacitus has included among Germans, from hearsay, many
tribes of the interior of Bohemia, Prussia, and Poland, who were Slavs or
others; and that the numbers and area of our race has been, on Tacitus'
authority, greatly overrated.

What then were the causes of the success of the Teutons? Native courage
and strength?

They had these: but you must recollect what I have told you, that those
very qualities were employed against them; that they were hired, in large
numbers, into the Roman armies, to fight against their own brothers.

Unanimity? Of that, alas! one can say but little. The great Teutonic
army had not only to fight the Romans, but to fight each brigade the
brigade before it, to make them move on; and the brigade behind it
likewise, to prevent their marching over them; while too often two
brigades quarrelled like children, and destroyed each other on the spot.

What, then, was the cause of their success? I think a great deal of it
must be attributed to their admirable military position.

Look at a map of Europe; putting yourself first at the point to be
attacked--at Rome, and looking north, follow the German frontier from the
Euxine up the Danube and down the Rhine. It is a convex arc: but not
nearly as long as the concave arc of the Roman frontier opposed to it.
The Roman frontier overlaps it to the north-west by all Britain, to the
south-west by part of Turkey and the whole of Asia Minor.

That would seem to make it weak, and liable to be outflanked on either
wing. In reality it made it strong.

Both the German wings rested on the sea; one on the Euxine, one on the
North Sea. That in itself would not have given strength; for the Roman
fleets were masters of the seas. But the lands in the rear, on either
flank, were deserts, incapable of supporting an army. What would have
been the fate of a force landed at the mouth of the Weser on the north,
or at the mouth of the Dnieper at the west? Starvation among wild moors,
and bogs, and steppes, if they attempted to leave their base of
operations on the coast. The Romans saw this, and never tried the plan.
To defend the centre of their position was the safest and easiest plan.

Look at this centre. It is complicated. The Roman position is guarded
by the wal