In course of telling this greatest of all stories I have thought it worth to turn aside now and again from the direct narrative in order to attempt a brief sketch of the peoples that have played a leading part in it. The tough tenacity of the Jews, the subtle intellectual curiosity of the Greeks, the determination and {154} directness of purpose of the Romans have been such important moving forces in the history of the world that they claim to be considered. No less consideration is due at this point to the national character of the French. It is largely because of that character that the Revolution took place at all. It was a Revolution not only in the government of France, but in the thoughts of men all over the world. And it was largely because of the French national character that Napoleon's empire, rising out of the ruin wrought by the Revolution, had force to extend itself even more widely than that of Charlemagne. We are able to realise something of the qualities of the national character which had such remarkable results; but I think we are obliged to confess ourselves unable to give a very perfect account of the causes which made it such as it was. For the French nation, after all, as its very name implies, is the nation of the Franks; and the Franks were but one of the many Gothic tribes which came breaking through the weakened defences of the later Roman Empire. Then, having so broken through, they found themselves in contact with the settlers already in possession of the land; and no doubt this contact modified more than a little the national character which they brought with them. Probably most of the settlers whom they would find, and by whose influence they would be affected, would be of the Latin race; and therefore the blend would be in the main a Franco-Latin blend. But this Franco-Latin is really nothing more, as we have just said, than a Gothic-Latin--or Germano-Latin, if you like--and the other Gothic or German tribes coming in would be subject to just the same blend, so far as we can see, and therefore we should naturally expect to find the same characteristics in them all. But certainly we do not. Certainly the Batavians, {155} who settled to the northward of the Franks, and the Burgundians who settled to their westward, did not show the same blend. We have seen how the subtlety of Louis XI. proved too much at last for the audacity of his great Burgundian vassal, Charles the Bold, and after Burgundy had become part of the French kingdom its national characteristics do seem gradually to have blended nearly into identity with those of the French. The Visigoths passing on into Spain became subject to other influences. They do not come into the comparison.