_b._ _Considered in relation to the ancient population that it {22} comprised._--The country of the Saxons of Ptolemy; the Angli of Tacitus; the Langobardi of Tacitus; the Angrivarii; the Dulgubini; the Ampsivarii (?); the Bructeri Minores (?); the Fosi, and Cherusci; and probably part of the Cauci. Of populations mentioned by the later writers (_i.e._ of those between the seventh and eleventh centuries), the following belong to this area--the Stormarii, Thietmarsi, Hotsati (=the Nordalbingii, or Nordleudi), the Ostfali, (Osterluidi), Westfali, Angarii, and Eald-Seaxan (Old Saxons). _c._ _Considered in relation to its modern population._--Here it coincides most closely with the kingdom of Hanover, _plus_ parts of the Dutchies of Holstein and Oldenburg, and parts of Altmark? Brunswick? and Westphalia, and _minus_ the Frisian portion of East Friesland, and the Slavonic part of Luneburg. d. _River system._--By extending the Saxons of Westphalia as far as Cleves (which has been done by competent judges) we carry the western limit to the neighbourhood of the Rhine. This, however, is as far as it can safely be carried. In the respect to the Upper Ems, it was probably Saxon, the lower part being Frisian. The Weser is pre-eminently the river of the Saxons, with the water-system of which their area coincides more closely than with any other physical division. The Elbe was much in the same relation to the Germans and Slavonians, as the Rhine was to the Germans and the Gauls. Roughly speaking, it is the frontier--the _Cis_-Albian Slaves (the Linones and the Slavonians of Altmark) being quite as numerous as the _Trans_-Albian Germans, (the people of Stormar, Ditmarsh, and Holstein). The Eyder was perhaps equally Danish, Frisian, and Saxon. _e._ _Mountains._--The watershed of the Weser on the one side, and of the Ruhr and Lippe on the other, is the chief high land _contained_ within the Saxon area, and is noticed as being the line most likely to form a subdivision of the Saxon population, either in the way of dialect or political relations--_in case such a subdivision exists_, a point which will be considered in the next chapter. * * * * * {23} CHAPTER III. OF THE DIALECTS OF THE SAXON AREA, AND OF THE SO-CALLED, OLD SAXON. s. 52. The area occupied by the Saxons of Germany has been investigated; and it now remains to ask, how far the language of the occupants was absolutely identical throughout, or how far it fell into dialects or sub-dialects. In doing this, it may as well be asked, First, what we expect, _[`a] priori_; Second, what we really find. s. 53. To the Saxon area in Germany, there are five philological frontiers, the Slavonic, the Frisian, the Batavian, the Frank, and the Thuringian, to which may probably be added the Hessian; in each of which, except the Slavonic, we may expect that the philological phenomenon of intermixture and transition will occur. Thus--