Therefore, not only was the material for letter-writing (_i.e._, paper) of foreign manufacture, but also the handwriting bore close resemblance to foreign styles. This may have resulted from the original Anglo-Saxon element in the nationality of the people, aided by the constant immigration of merchants from the Low Countries, who came over to England during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, and established various branches of trade, chiefly in linen or woollen goods. They naturally introduced also the fashions and customs of their own nations. Added to this was the marriage of the King, Richard II., with the German Princess Anne of Bohemia, followed closely by the religious zeal of the Reformers, bringing Germans and German ideas strongly to the fore in English politics. The earliest printers were German, and about the time of this invention the small letter e written backwards first came into use. Family deeds are usually only legal matter, but here and there are found among them old letters and papers of value. Lifelong imprisonment was often the result of a thoughtless committal of ideas into tangible form. Letters were dangerous witnesses, and as such were destroyed as soon as read. The posts and messengers were not safe from inspection; spies were employed freely on all sides, and men, not afraid to suffer for their opinions, nevertheless did not care to risk their necks by needless imprudence. The earliest newspapers had a blank column left to be filled by the sender with the latest intelligence or local news. These were fitly called ‘News letters.’ The phraseology of a seventeenth-century letter seems to us strange on account of the conjugation of the verbs, the use of ‘hath’ in place of ‘has,’ and the absence of all unnecessary adverbs; the sentences, too, are longer. The commencing words and the final winding up of letters have both changed in the past two hundred years. With the eighteenth century we see these changes gradually settling down and altering into the modern forms. The old English y^e for ‘the,’ and the abbreviated & for ‘and,’ and the (symbol) (d) written in its antiquated shape, still remain, but the German letters by degrees are given up. The writing of each generation is most distinctly marked; the dates from it may be approximately fixed without any difficulty, as well as the age and character of the writer.