colony, which they so
long maintained in the district of Toxandia, in Brabant, insensibly
multiplied along the banks of the Meuse and Scheld, till their
independent power filled the whole extent of the Second, or Lower
Germany. These facts may be sufficiently justified by historic evidence;
but the foundation of the French monarchy by Pharamond, the conquests,
the laws, and even the existence, of that hero, have been justly
arraigned by the impartial severity of modern criticism. [169]

[Footnote 167: Ausonius (de Claris Urbibus, p. 257-262) celebrates
Bourdeaux with the partial affection of a native. See in Salvian (de
Gubern. Dei, p. 228. Paris, 1608) a florid description of the provinces
of Aquitain and Novempopulania.]

[Footnote 168: Orosius (l. vii. c. 32, p. 550) commends the mildness
and modesty of these Burgundians, who treated their subjects of Gaul
as their Christian brethren. Mascou has illustrated the origin of
their kingdom in the four first annotations at the end of his laborious
History of the Ancient Germans, vol. ii. p. 555-572, of the English
translation.]

[Footnote 169: See Mascou, l. viii. c. 43, 44, 45. Except in a short and
suspicious line of the Chronicle of Prosper, (in tom. i. p. 638,) the
name of Pharamond is never mentioned before the seventh century. The
author of the Gesta Francorum (in tom. ii. p. 543) suggests, probably
enough, that the choice of Pharamond, or at least of a king, was
recommended to the Franks by his father Marcomir, who was an exile in
Tuscany. Note: The first mention of Pharamond is in the Gesta Francorum,
assigned to about the year 720. St. Martin, iv. 469. The modern French
writers in general subscribe to the opinion of Thierry: Faramond fils de
Markomir, quo que son nom soit bien germanique, et son regne possible,
ne figure pas dans les histoires les plus dignes de foi. A. Thierry,
Lettres l'Histoire de France, p. 90.--M.]

The ruin of the opulent provinces of Gaul may be dated from the
establishment of these Barbarians, whose alliance was dangerous and
oppressive, and who were capriciously impelled, by interest or passion,
to violate the public peace. A heavy and partial ransom was imposed on
the surviving provincials, who had escaped the calamities of war; the
fairest and most fertile lands were assigned to the rapacious strangers,
for the use of their families, their slaves, and their cattle; and the
trembling natives relinquished with a sigh the inheritance o