I propose in the following remarks to note briefly the leading events, as far as they are known to us, in the history of South Africa, adding in an appendix a chronological table of dates.

This sketch can make no pretensions to throwing any new light, from original documents, on the transactions noticed. It is simply a popular summary of events without some knowledge of which no fair judgment can be formed on questions affecting South Africa.

Whether, in deciding to uphold the old faith in Germany, the Emperor Charles V. and his brother Ferdinand I. missed a great opportunity of establishing the House they represented in a position of permanent predominance in that country, is a question to which I shall only refer as forming the historical starting-point of this paper. It has been argued with great ability by Schiller, and Schiller—certainly not under-estimating the enormous difficulties which would have beset the House of Habsburg had its representative cast in his lot with the Reformation—apparently leans to the conclusion that the actual decision arrived at by that representative was, in reality, a lost opportunity. ‘It is hard to say’ he observes towards the close of his argument, ‘what would have become of the Reformation, what of the liberties of the German Empire, if the dreaded House of Austria had not decided against the former. This much, however, seems proved, that the Austrian princes in no way so barred their way to universal monarchy, as by engaging in stubborn conflict against the new doctrines. Under no other circumstances and in no other eventuality would the weaker princes have been able to force their Order to make the extraordinary efforts which gave them strength to withstand the House of Austria. Under no other circumstances and in no other eventuality would the minor States have combined against one common enemy.’

The eighteenth article of the Treaty of Versailles between England and France contained a provision that commissioners should be appointed on either side to draw up new arrangements of commerce between the two nations on the basis of reciprocity and of mutual convenience, and that these arrangements should be completed within the space of two years, dating from January 1, 1784. The insertion of this article had not been effected without difficulty. The views of France and England as to foreign trade were divergent. The French were what in modern language would be called free traders. Vergennes and his advisers had learnt from the physiocrats that the wealth of a country consisted not so much in the amount of gold and silver which happened to be within its borders at any particular time, as in the natural products of the country itself. The English ministers were to a great extent under the dominion of the mercantile system, which taught that the balance for or against the wealth of one country compared with another lay in the larger amount of cash which one of the countries possessed. Thus, in arranging the conditions of peace, while the French ministers wished for a fresh treaty of commerce with England, the English ministers only desired the renewal of the treaty of commerce of 1713, made at the Peace of Utrecht. This treaty, which never came into complete effect, placed France and England reciprocally on the footing of the most favoured nation, but it was deeply affected by the Methuen treaty between England and Portugal, which gave Portugal a special position towards England superior to that of any nation, how-ever favoured.

It would be difficult to find a subject illustrating the benefits and drawbacks of religious controversy to historical inquiry more completely than the Early British Church. The zeal and vigour with which the struggle on either side was fought out at the Reformation had the effect of focussing a fierce light upon all available evidence referring to primitive times; and of spurring the diligence of controversialists. Every by-way of history was explored for some fresh matter with which to point the arguments of that critical warfare. To this we owe such monuments of industry as Archbishop Ussher's ‘Primordia,’ the works of Stillingfleet, Father Parsons, and others. Since they wrote, the interest in the subject has continued most lively; and while new materials have not been forthcoming in any great number, the old ones have been sifted and resifted with a care and perseverance which prove that something beyond the facts has been at issue, and that a fight of principles was going on behind the screen. This has not been a mere empty parade to the historian. For him it has done the most useful of all work, and that which has been most neglected till late years, namely, passing through the crucible of criticism the raw ore of evidence, and by repeated refinement extracting the pure metal which is alone likely to live. So long as the battle was fought on the old lines, little more than this was done, and the evidence, even when sifted out, has been used on either side with that distorted leaning, that want of balance, which marks the conclusion of the partisan rather than of the impartial judge.

I have deliberately called this paper notes only upon the wide subject of which it treats. It deals with some evidence; not all evidence available, yet enough, I think, to warrant some conclusions.

Progressive change and growth of opinions, or decay of opinions and their modification, are more powerful factors in bringing about political and social changes than wars or acts of government, but receive less attention than is their due from the difficulty of tracing them clearly.

In the following paper the term ‘Ancient Briton’ is applied to the whole of the mixed races which inhabited this island prior to the Teutonic irruption. They consisted of the two Celtic families (the Gaels and the Brythons, or Cymri), and the pre-Celtic races. On the divisions of the latter anthropology has not yet decidedly pronounced, though it seems probable that they were not homogeneous. In any case the principal pre-Celtic type at present discovered, which may generically be termed Iberian, and which appears to correspond with that of the original neolithic inhabitants, was dark, small, and short, the average stature being only sixty-three inches. The pure Celt, on the other hand, was extremely tall, the average stature being sixty-nine inches, and that of the Saxon sixty-seven. This agrees with the statements of Polybius, Strabo, and Ammianus Marcellinus as to the height of the Celt, and at the same time accounts for the Britons being spoken of as short and thick-set. For in this country the Celt was found mixed to a large extent with the short pre-Celtic race or races. The people, therefore, that the Saxons had to contend with were, on an average, of shorter stature than themselves. They varied, no doubt, in different parts of the country, but probably the purest Iberian blood, and consequently the shortest stature, would be at the bottom of the social scale. If any pure Celtic blood remained in the country it would be chiefly in the east; and it is to the permanence of this, rather than to the superior stature of the Angles over the rest of the invaders, that I attribute the height of the present inhabitants of the Anglian districts. The prevailing physiognomy of East Anglia also supports this view; the tall stature, brown hair, grey eye, and arched nose of the pure Celt is not uncommon there.

By way of introduction to a sketch of Persian history prepared for the new volume of the ‘Encyclopædia Britannica,’ I recently wrote as follows:—

Oriental history, as told by Oriental historians, is for the majority of readers in Europe a study of little attraction. Its genealogies and oft-repeated names are wearisome; its stories of battle, murder, and rapine are monotonous and cast in one mould; the mind cannot readily impart life to the dry bones of the more prominent dramatis personæ, by conceiving for them any flesh-and-blood individuality. The court-chronicler of an Eastern potentate writes to order, and in accordance with a precedent which fetters style and expression; and even the painter of state-portraits strives rather to turn out a conventional and model monarch than the likeness of an original human being. In the palace of Kirich, near Tehran, is a picture of Fath Ali Sháh and his sons. There may be a certain waxwork beauty in some of the faces, but they give no more signs of innate character or mental idiosyncrasy that do the kings and knaves of a pack of cards.

Intorzetta was one of the first to give us a clear insight into the metaphysical writings of Confucius, whose Chinese name was Kung-Tzu (meaning Dr. Kung), and to show us that at all times, amongst all sages, philosophers, and teachers, the impressions of nature and the attempt to solve the destiny of man, as a being endowed with self-conscious intellect, produced analogous moral and philosophical results.

I Must preface this paper with a remark which, in the case of most, if not all, of my hearers will be, I presume, needless: but which is far from needless for those whose studies have not been in the early history of this country. The remark is this, that it is erroneous to draw in our historical consciousness a strong black line at the event of the 14th or 22nd October 1066.

This word is a combination of mahá, great, and bhárata, supporter. Bhárata is the ancient name of northern Hindustan, and was derived from a celebrated early monarch. This ‘great supporter’ poem extends in length to about 215,000 longlines, as Professor Monier Williams of Oxford has observed. Milton's ‘Paradise Lost’ only contains about 10,600. Even the voluminous Spenser's ‘Fairy Queen’ has not more than some 30,000. It is ascribed to a celebrated ancient Sage, who is also recorded to have compiled the Vedas (i.e, books of knowledge), and to have written thePuranas (i.e. ‘ancient’ books of the Hindu religions), which belong to phases of religious thought subsequent to the Vedic but professing to be associated with the Vedas. As his name simply means ‘collector or compiler,’ it is suggestive of his being mythical. Introductory recitals, in the poem itself, assign it to Vyasa, just as Washington Irving ascribes his ‘History of New York’ to Knickerbocker. Vaisampayana is said to have recited it to a king, and may have been the author. Modern commentators of late years seem generally to have assigned it to several authors. Comparing it, however, with the Waverley novels, as the work of one man, it does not seem beyond the capacity of a single author. Fifteen years’ labour, about the time bestowed by Gibbon on his ‘History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire,’ would complete the work at the rate of some fifty lines per diem, allowing for holy days. It is written in what is styled the classical Sanscrit.

William Pitt the younger became prime minister in December 1783, just at the moment when a satisfactory peace had concluded a long and disastrous war. The struggle with the American colonies had left England without allies in Europe. The cause of the revolted patriots had been supported first by France, then by Spain, and lastly by Holland, while the armed neutrality of 1780, originated by Russia perhaps at the instigation of Frederick the Great, had been joined by most of the European powers. This was a direct defiance of the naval supremacy of England, made at a time when the strength of the country was scarcely sufficient to support its claims. When peace was concluded England swept the field of Europe to find an ally.

John Eliot, long known as ‘the apostle of the North-American Red Men,’ and other Englishmen early in the seventeenth century, laboured to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ to the heathen natives of New England in their own Indian language, and in doing so, found it necessary to carry on civilisation with religion, and to instruct them in some of the arts of life. Their writings, and more particularly some of the tracts known as the ‘Eliot Tracts,’ aroused so much interest in London that the needs of the Indians of New England were brought before Parliament, and on July 27, 1649, an Act or Ordinance was passed with this title :—‘A Corporation for the Promoting and Propagating the Gospel of Jesus Christ in New England.’

The mutual influence of the Danish raids upon the policy of the Empire of the Franks, and vice versa, was a natural consequence, although one not sufficiently appreciated. Thus the internecine struggle of the three sons of Louis the Pious, which we have described in an earlier paper, and which culminated in the battle of Fontenay, was immediately followed by Osker's attack on the Seine, and by the capture of Nantes by the pirates. These terrible disasters drew the brothers together for a while, and on the earnest pressure of the grandees of the various parts of the empire a solemn assembly was convened. ‘At Coblentz,’ says Palgrave, ‘the three envious brothers, the three grudging and hostile kings, were convened in stately congress, their nobles, their prelates, and 110 delegates or commissioners, a special parliament. They held their sessions in that edifice still appearing as the principal feature in the sunny and cheerful city, the twin-towered church of St. Castor. A long discussion took place between the envoys on either side, and eventually special commissioners were appointed to ascertain the value and revenues of the various bishoprics, abbeys, counties, and royal domains; and it was agreed that the congress should be adjourned over the winter and meet the following year at Verdun.’ They accordingly met at Verdun, July 15, 843, and the three brothers having come together and undertaken to ratify the decision of their envoys, the treaty was duly signed in August 843, and is known as the Treaty of Verdun.