If we attend closely to the terms by which foreigners seek to hit off the impression which we and the Germans make upon them, we shall detect in these terms a difference which makes, I think, in favour of the notion I am propounding. Nations in hitting off one another’s characters are apt, we all know, to seize the unflattering side rather than the flattering; the mass of mankind always do this, and indeed they really see what is novel, and not their own, in a disfiguring light. Thus we ourselves, for instance, popularly say ‘the phlegmatic Dutchman’ rather than ‘the sensible Dutchman,’ or ‘the grimacing Frenchman’ rather than ‘the polite Frenchman.’ Therefore neither we nor the Germans should exactly accept the description strangers give of us, but it is enough for my purpose that strangers, in characterising us with a certain shade of difference, do at any rate make it clear that there appears this shade of difference, though the character itself, which they give us both, may be a caricature rather than a faithful picture of us. Now it is to be noticed that those sharp observers, the French,—who have a double turn for sharp observation, for they have both the quick perception of the Celt and the Latin’s gift for coming plump upon the fact,—it is to be noticed, I say, that the French put a curious distinction in their popular, depreciating, we will hope inadequate, way of hitting off us and the Germans. While they talk of the ‘_bêtise_ allemande,’ they talk of the ‘_gaucherie_ anglaise;’ while they talk of the ‘Allemand _balourd_,’ they talk of the ‘Anglais _empêtré_;’ while they call the German ‘_niais_,’ they call the Englishman ‘_mélancolique_.’ The difference between the epithets _balourd_ and _empêtré_ exactly gives the difference in character I wish to seize; _balourd_ means heavy and dull, _empêtré_ means hampered and embarrassed. This points to a certain mixture and strife of elements in the Englishman; to the clashing of a Celtic quickness of perception with a Germanic instinct for going steadily along close to the ground. The Celt, as we have seen, has not at all, in spite of his quick perception, the Latin talent for dealing with the fact, dexterously managing it and making himself master of it; Latin or Latinised people have felt contempt for him on this account, have treated him as a poor creature, just as the German, who arrives at fact in a different way from the Latins, but who arrives at it, has treated him. The couplet of Chrestien of Troyes about the Welsh:— . . . Gallois sont tous, par nature, Plus fous que bêtes en pâsture—