But with the reign of Charlemagne the criticism changes. The _Saxon_ history, even in Germany, becomes _Anglo_-Saxon, as well as _Old_-Saxon, and it may be that the events are pretty equally distributed between the two divisions. The reason is clear. The arms of Southern and Middle Europe have penetrated to the parts beyond the Weser, and it only requires the _Angles_ to be described under their own proper name (instead of that of Saxon) for us to have the materials of an average history. It is a sickening and revolting history, and a history that few nations but the English can afford. Throughout the whole length and breadth of Germany there is not one village, hamlet, or family which can shew definite signs of descent from the continental ancestors of the Angles of England. There is not a man, woman, or child who can say, _I have pure Angle blood in my veins_. In no nook or corner can dialect or sub-dialect of the most provincial form of the German speech be found which shall have a similar pedigree with the English. The Angles of the Continent are either exterminated or undistinguishably mixed up with the other Germans in proportions more or less large, and in combinations more or less heterogeneous. And the history of the Conquest and Conversion of the Saxons by Charlemagne is the history of this extinction. It is this that makes it so impossible to argue backwards from the present state of the Angles of Germany to an earlier one, and so to reconstruct their history. They have _no_ present state. Neither have the _Old_-Saxons--their next of kin. Of the Frisians only, the next nearest, there are still fragments; for, although the enemy of the Old-Saxons and the Anglo-Saxons was the enemy of the Frisians also, he was not equally their exterminator. They may or may not have been braver than the Angles and Old-Saxons. They certainly occupied a more impracticable country. To this period--the period of their reduction--the Angli and Werini of Thuringia are attributed. They may, indeed, have got there as they did to Sleswick, by conquest, and at an earlier period. If so, there was an alliance. They were, however, more probably transplanted. FOOTNOTES: [22] Saxons in England, i. 24. CHAPTER XI. RECAPITULATIONS AND ILLUSTRATIONS.--PROPOSITIONS RESPECTING THE KELTIC CHARACTER OF THE ORIGINAL OCCUPANTS OF BRITAIN, ETC.--THE RELATIONS BETWEEN THE ANCIENT BRITONS AND THE ANCIENT GAULS, ETC.--THE SCOTCH GAELS.--THE PICTS.--THE DATE OF THE GERMANIC INVASIONS.--THE NAMES ANGLE AND SAXON.