Serfdom was not yet abolished, but was moderated in various ways. The direct and indirect influence of the Reformation on the condition of the peasantry has been already mentioned. Mild reforms were introduced in the dominions of various German sovereigns. Certain liberties were granted to rural communes, and the number of free tenants slowly but uninterruptedly increased. The conditions of villeinage on private estates began to be regulated by the respective governments; and absolute serfdom was slowly dying out. The prosperity of Germany increased proportionally with the emancipation, though but partial, of rural labor, and the freedom of the soil. On an average, those regions were most prosperous which contained the greatest number of emancipated rural communities, or where the villeinage was reduced, systematized, and made more and more free from the arbitrary exactions of the master. The peculiar political organization of Germany prevented any unity of action in the extinction of rural servitude. Many of its features--some relating to the person, but principally to the soil--survived even to the present century in certain parts of the smaller German states; and in Austria, Bohemia and Hungary, there is still room for infinite improvement in the condition of the peasantry. But the mortal disorder exists no more: the fundamental rights of man are recognized. Governmental maladministration, injustice, oppressive taxation, exactions by officials and landlords, are unhappily common; but all these are in flagrant violation of established laws. And, bad though they are, they cannot for a moment compare with the blighting influences of chattel slavery. For long centuries, and with persistent pertinacity, have slavery and the oppression of man and his labor gnawed at the German vitals; and centuries must elapse before the recovery of a normal condition. But the Germans of the present day--moralists, statesmen, savants and professional men, as well as artisans, mechanics and agriculturists--are unanimous in condemning human bondage, whatever may be the race enslaved. Few, indeed, are there of the great German race whose minds are inaccessible to the nobler promptings of freedom and humanity. FOOTNOTES: [Footnote 17: See "America and Europe," by the present writer.] XVII. LONGOBARDS--ITALIANS. AUTHORITIES: _Leges Longobardorum, Cantu, Troya, Karl Hegel, etc._