s. 105. In respect to this last, it is necessary to distinguish between the opinions based on _external_, and the opinions based on _internal_ evidence. To the former class belong the testimonies of cotemporary records, or (wanting these) of records based upon transmitted, but cotemporary, evidence. To the latter belong the inferences drawn from similarity of language, name, and other ethnological _data_. Of such, a portion only will be considered in the present chapter; not that they have no proper place in it, but because the minuter investigation of an important section of these (_i.e._, the subject of the _English dialects_) will be treated as a separate subject elsewhere. s. 106. _The Angles; who were they, and what was their relation to the Saxons?_--The first answer to this question embodies a great fact in the way of internal evidence, _viz._, that they were the people from whom _England_ derives the name it bears=_the Angle-land_, i.e., _land of the Angles_. Our language too is _English_, i.e., _Angle_. Whatever, then, they may have been on the Continent, they were a leading section of the invaders here. Why then has their position in our inquiries been hitherto so subordinate to that of the Saxons? It is because their definitude and preponderance are not so manifest in Germany as we infer (from the terms _England_ and _English_) it to have been in Britain. Nay more, their historical place amongst the nations of Germany, and within the German area, is both insignificant and doubtful; indeed, it will be seen from the sequel, that _in and of themselves_ we know next to nothing about them, knowing them only in their _relations_, _i.e._, to ourselves and to the Saxons. The following, however, are the chief facts that form the foundation for our inferences. s. 107. Although they are the section of the immigration which gave the name to England, and as such, the preponderating element in the eyes of the present _English_, they were not so in the eyes of the original British; who neither knew at the time of the Conquest, nor know now, of any other name for their German enemies but _Saxon_. And _Saxon_ is the {63} name by which the present English are known to the Welsh, Armorican, and Gaelic Celts. Welsh _Saxon_. Armorican _Soson_. Gaelic _Sassenach_. s. 108. Although they are the section of the immigration which gave the name to _England_, &c., they were quite as little Angles as Saxons, in the eyes of foreign cotemporary writers; since the expression _Saxoniae trans-marinae_, occurs as applied to England. s. 109. Although they are the section of the immigration which gave the name to _England_, &c., the material notice of them as Germans of Germany, are limited to the following facts. _Extract from Tacitus._--This merely connects them with certain other tribes, and affirms the existence of certain religious ordinances common to them--