century which saw Italy conquered, and Rome sacked, by Visigoth, by
Ostrogoth, by Vandal, till nothing was left save fever-haunted ruins.
Then the ignorant and greedy child, who had been grasping so long
after the fair apples of Sodom, clutched them once and for all, and
found them turn to ashes in his hands.

Yes--it is thus that I wish you to look at the Invasion of the
Barbarians, Immigration of the Teutons, or whatsoever name you may
call it. Before looking at questions of migration, of ethnology, of
laws, and of classes, look first at the thing itself; and see with
sacred pity--and awe, one of the saddest and grandest tragedies ever
performed on earth. Poor souls! And they were so simple withal.
One pities them, as one pities a child who steals apples, and makes
himself sick with them after all. It is not the enormous loss of
life which is to me the most tragic part of the story; it is that
very simplicity of the Teutons. Bloodshed is a bad thing, certainly;
but after all nature is prodigal of human life--killing her twenty
thousand and her fifty thousand by a single earthquake; and as for
death in battle--I sometimes am tempted to think, having sat by many
death beds, that our old forefathers may have been right, and that
death in battle may be a not unenviable method of passing out of this
troublesome world. Besides, we have no right to blame those old
Teutons, while we are killing every year more of her Majesty's
subjects by preventible disease, than ever they killed in their
bloodiest battle. Let us think of that, and mend that, ere we blame
the old German heroes. No, there are more pitiful tragedies than any
battlefield can shew; and first among them, surely, is the
disappointment of young hopes, the degradation of young souls.

One pities them, I say. And they pitied themselves. Remorse, shame,