Roumania, which still preserves in its name the memory of this old Roman conquest, and then would be thrust back again by the pressure of the barbarians. And in the far East the boundary line was never unalterably fixed-it varied with the varying fortunes of the Roman and Persian or Parthian arms.

But, roughly, the confines of the Empire, and consequently the divisions of the map, remained such as we have seen them. Throughout the whole of this vast region of the Roman world ran splendid roads, along which were established a most elaborate system of post-houses; and connecting which, where they might be sundered by seas or straits, was a very complete service of ferryboats. So that I very much doubt whether, in spite of all our vaunted improvements in the art of travel, a tour through Europe is so easy a matter now as it was then-Europe, that is to say, south of our dividing line. Imagine a journey undertaken from the northwest to the south-east extremity of the Empire in those days of its greatness—say, from the Wall of Antonine, in the north of Britain, to Jerusalem. We should, of course, do the journey more quickly now; but in the course of it we should have to pass the frontiers of many different nations undergoing all the inconveniences of customhouse inspection, and of changes of language and coin; moreover, the difficulties of land travel in Asiatic Turkey would certainly impel us to make the latter part at least of such a journey by sea. Whereas in the second century it could have been done in its entire length without ever stepping off a Roman high-road, except for a few hours into a government ferry-boat, and done, I believe, with greater safety than a journey from York to London two centuries ago. These would have been the principal stages of such a journey, and their distances, as given by Gibbon-to York 200 miles, York to London 210, London to Sandwich 62, Sandwich to Boulogne 42, Boulogne to Rheims 160, Rheims to Lyons 310, Lyons to Milan 305, Milan to Rome 390, Rome to Brindisi 330, Brindisi to Durazzo (Dyrrachium) 36, Durazzo to Constantinople (Byzantium) 650, Constantinople to Ancyra 260, Ancyra to Tarsus 275, Tarsus to Antioch 130, Antioch to Tyre 230, Tyre to Jerusalem 154-3,744 miles in all. Along the whole of this route services of posts were established; post-houses were erected every six miles, and every posthouse was provided with forty horses. The posts were instituted indeed only for government service; but they were occasionally used in cases of urgency by private individuals, and when the government postal service was used very rapid progress might be made. Thus, in the reign of Theodosius, Cæsarius, a magistrate of

high rank, posts from Antioch to Constantinople, and does the whole distance, 665 miles, at the rate of about 130 miles a day; at the same rate he would have accomplished the journey from the Scotch border to Jerusalem in a month.

But the mention of Theodosius reminds us that our next look at the map should be taken at the date of his death, 395, for then another permanent division enters into it. No longer is it sufficient to mark off the Roman Empire from the lands beyond it; but now another dividing line must be run through the Empire itself, marking off from each other the Eastern and Western portions, which henceforth are separate Empires, each with its own emperor and its distinct government. It is true that there had been earlier divisions than this one; Diocletian, just a century earlier, had divided the Empire into four great prefectures, and attempted to found a system of partnership amongst four emperors; but in theory the Empire was still one, with its central government, and after Diocletian's death the whole scheme collapsed. Early in the fourth century Constantine, who did so much to pave the way for future division by the foundation of a rival capital, was sole emperor; there was temporary division again under his sons, but Constantius reigned alone in 353. Again there was division at the accession of Valentinian I.

(364); but Theodosius is sole emperor in 394. But the next year the partition which had thus, so to speak, been in the air for a century, took shape finally. It is still a very simple division that we have to make; for, the northern boundary remaining as it was, if we draw a line due south from the junction of the Danube with the Drave right away into the heart of Africa, we shall mark fairly accurately the division between the sons of Theodosius-all to the east of that line was the Empire of Arcadius, all to the west that of Honorius. That is to say, the Western Roman Empire embraced, in the phraseology of modern Europe, all of Italy, Spain, and Portugal, France and Switzerland, Belgium and Holland, England, such parts of the Austrian Empire as are south and west of the Danube, and such parts of the German Empire as are west of the Rhine; while the Eastern Empire embraced the whole of modern Servia, Bulgaria, Roumelia, Turkey in Europe, and Greece, together with the vast promontory of Asia Minor and Syria; the boundary to the east being subject to constant variation, as in the case of the undivided Empire. Our line divides the Mediterranean about equally between the two Empires, all the Greek islands falling to the East, all the Italian and Spanish islands to the West; in Africa, Mauretania and Tripolis are parts of the Western Empire, Libya

and Egypt of the Eastern; the boundary to the south, like that to the east, being very indefinite. Such was the map at the beginning of the fifth century; more complicated divisions must, however, be introduced almost immediately, for the Western Empire began to fall to pieces as soon as Theodosius died. But henceforth East and West went on their diverse ways, never again to be united, except for a moment under Justinian. For the West, the whole of the fifth century is one of turmoil, invasion, and loss. During the preceding centuries, indeed, the terror of barbarian invasion had lain heavily on the heart of many a Roman emperor. Over and over again the boundary line had been broken through, but after a time, at whatever cost and with whatever difficulty, it had been restored, and such barbarians as had established themselves on the southern side of the line had been incorporated amongst the Roman subjects. But in the fifth century all this is changed-the flood of barbaric invasion rushes over the frontiers of the Empire, never again to be forced back; Teutonic tribes of Goths and Vandals, Burgundians, and Franks press in one after the other; and, most terrible of all, because a non-Aryan race, but of little importance geographically because effecting no permanent settlement-the Hun. But such was the magic of the Roman name that for the greater part of the century conquering barbarians delighted to fancy themselves, and to call themselves, Roman generals, and a phantom Empire still existed until the deposition of Romulus Augustus or Augustulus (what concentrated satire in his name), by Odoacer in 476. It is not, however, until quite the end of the century, in the time of the great Theodoric, that anything like definite or permanent new divisions begin to emerge from the flood; then we find a great kingdom of the East Goths established in Italy, embracing all that we now mean by that name, except the island of Sardinia, and running north and east as far as to what we saw just now were the bounds of the Western Empire. Balancing this, to the west was the kingdom of the West Goths, embracing nearly all Spain, and running up into France as far as the Loire. While all the north of France (except Brittany), with the territory up to the Rhine, formed the third great kingdom-that of the Franks. Wedged in amongst these three, and bordering upon them all, was the kingdom of the Burgundians (the first of the many and various Burgundies which were to be), including Switzerland and extensive territories on either side of the Rhone, but not reaching quite to the sea on the south; besides these, there was a small kingdom of the Sueves in the north-west corner of Spain, another Teutonic people whose name remains in a very different VOL. CCLXXXII. NO. 1997.

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part of the map; and in the north-west corner of France there was the Celtic kingdom of Armorica, really part of Britain, though now for Britain itself the Celtic Briton was fighting with the Teutonic Englishman. One more great kingdom must be mentioned-that of the Vandals; driven slowly through Spain by the Goth, the Vandal had early in the century crossed over into Africa at the invitation, in the first instance, of the unhappy Boniface, Count of Africa, to avenge the wrongs he had suffered, or supposed himself to have suffered, at the hands of the Imperial Court; Boniface found to his consternation that he had called up a devil whom he could not lay. By the middle of the century all of Africa which had belonged to the Western Empire, together with Sardinia, Corsica, and the Balearic Islands, had fallen to the Vandal, and in the time of Theodoric formed the Vandal kingdom which was so soon to disappear again. One step in the course of the Vandal invasion of Africa is memorable for all time; it was in the third month of the siege of Hippo that its great bishop, "the light and pillar of the Catholic Church, was gently released by death from the actual and impending calamities of his country."

Meanwhile, the Eastern Empire as far as its geography is concerned had suffered but little change. Barbarian hosts had swept across it; the Hun had even penetrated to the gates of Constantinople itself; but no permanent kingdom was established within its borders. The dominion of the emperors of the East was still of vast extent, "bounded," as Gibbon says, "by the Adriatic and the Tigris, and comprehending within its limits the whole interval of twenty-five days' navigation, which separated the extreme cold of Scythia from the torrid zone of Ethiopia." We have followed the stages of a land journey from one extremity of the undivided Empire to the other; now let us glance at the stages of a water journey from the extreme north to the extreme south of the Empire of the East— from the Crimea to Assouan.

From Cherson (Sebastopol) to Constantinople would be some 400 miles, and with a fair wind would have taken a Roman ship about four days; from Constantinople to Rhodes, between 600 and 700 miles, taking about a week; from Rhodes to Alexandria was considered a four days' sail in good weather-400 miles; and ten days were allowed for the navigation of the Nile from Alexandria to the first Cataract, a distance of over 800 miles. But the north wind must have blown with much greater persistency in Egypt then than it does now, if the time allowed for this last part of the journey was really the usual time taken in doing it.

Such was the map of Europe at the beginning of the sixth century. That century saw many and various changes pass over its face; the most striking in the eyes of the men of the time must have been the extension of the borders of the Eastern Empire, at the expense of Vandal and Goth, over all Italy and Africa and part of Spain-in fact, for the time the Mediterranean was again a Roman lake; but this course of Roman reconquest depended upon the military genius of two men-Belisarius and Narses-and receded again, after their disappearance from the scene, as rapidly as it had advanced. Far more important in its lasting effect upon the map was the steady growth of the Frankish power, which during this century swallowed up the Burgundian kingdom and the East Gothic land north of the Alps. Between Frank and Roman the East Gothic kingdom disappeared altogether, like that of the Vandal. The West Goth was driven back to the Pyrenees, while to the east the Frankish Empire extended itself to the Elbe, triumphing over its heathen and barbarous neighbours; though at the mouth of the Elbe the Saxon still maintained his independence. But it is very difficult to fix any date for a steady survey of the map of Europe, either in this century or in the two following, so shifting are the dividing lines. Two or three new peoples, however, have to be noticed in this (the sixth) century, as makers of some definite and more or less lasting impression upon the map. The Lombards and Avars-the first a Teutonic, the latter a Turanian people-after devouring between them the neighbouring people of the Gepida (a Gothic tribe), turned their attention upon the Roman Empire about the year 570. The Lombards poured into Italy, and became practically masters of the Italian mainland for two centuries; while the Avars spread themselves, as Gibbon says, "over the fair countries of Walachia, Moldavia, Transylvania, and the parts of Hungary beyond the Danube, and established the Dacian Empire of the Chagans (so their king was called), which subsisted with splendour above 230 years." This seems somewhat too long a term of florescence to assign to the Avar Empire, yet it certainly did exist for many generations, though even so the lasting interest of the Avar, as far as the map of Europe is concerned, is that he was the earliest forerunner, to make any definite mark upon it at all, of his terrible kinsman the Turk, whose mark is so vividly set upon it to this day; for, of the other forerunners of the Turk, the earlier Hun, as we have seen, made no permanent impression; while the Bulgarians, originally a Turanian people like Hun, Avar, and Turk, and whose inroads into Southern Europe were about contemporaneous with those of the