he Batavians also signalized themselves on many occasions,
by the skill with which they swam across several great rivers
without breaking their squadrons ranks. They were amply rewarded
for their military services and hazardous exploits, and were treated
like stanch and valuable allies. But this unequal connection of
a mighty empire with a few petty states must have been fatal to
the liberty of the weaker party. Its first effect was to destroy
all feeling of nationality in a great portion of the population.
The young adventurer of this part of the Low Countries, after
twenty years of service under the imperial eagles, returned to
his native wilds a Roman. The generals of the empire pierced
the forests of the Ardennes with causeways, and founded towns
in the heart of the country. The result of such innovations was
a total amalgamation of the Romans and their new allies; and
little by little the national character of the latter became
entirely obliterated. But to trace now the precise history of
this gradual change would be as impossible as it will be one
day to follow the progress of civilization in the woods of North
America.

But it must be remarked that this metamorphosis affected only
the inhabitants of the high grounds, and the Batavians (who were
in their origin Germans) properly so called. The scanty population
of the rest of the country, endowed with that fidelity to their
ancient customs which characterizes the Saxon race, showed no
tendency to mix with foreigner, rarely figured in their ranks,
and seemed to revolt from the southern refinement which was so
little in harmony with their manners and ways of life. It is
astonishing, at the first view, that those beings, whose whole
existence was a contest against famine or the waves, should show
less inclination than their happier neighbors to receive from
Rome an abundant recompense for their services. But the greater
their difficulty to find subsistence in their native land, the
stronger seemed their attachment; like that of the Switzer to
his barren rocks, or of the mariner to the frail and hazardous
home that bears him afloat on the ocean. This race of patriots
was divided into two separate peoples. Those to the north of
the Rhine were the Frisons; those to the west of the Meuse, the
Menapians, already mentioned.

The Frisons differed little from those early inhabitants of the
coast, who, perched on their high-built huts, fed on fish and
drank the water of