There cannot be the least doubt that many of them were usurpations, gradual developments of an old and simple principle; and it is only in periods of advanced civilization that we find them alluded to. Nevertheless we must admit that even at the earliest recorded time in our history, the kings were not only wealthy but powerful far beyond any of their fellow-countrymen. All intercourse with foreign nations, whether warlike or peaceful, tends to this result, because treaties and grave affairs of state can best be negotiated and managed by single persons: a popular council may be very properly consulted as to the final acceptance or rejection of terms; but the settlement of them can obviously not be beneficially conducted by so unwieldy a multitude. Moreover contracting parties on either side will prefer having to do with as small a number of negotiators as possible, if it be only for the greater dispatch of business. Accordingly Tacitus shows us, on more than one occasion, the Senate in communication with the princes, not the populations of Germany[286]: and this must naturally be the case where the aristocracy, to whose body the king belongs, have the right of taking the initiative in public business[287]. Footnote 286: “Adgandestrii, principis Cattorum, lectas in Senatu literas.” Annal. ii. 88. “Maroboduum ... per dona et legationes petivisse foedus.” Annal. ii. 45. “Misitque legatos ad Tiberium oraturos auxilia.” Ibid. Footnote 287: “De minoribus rebus principes consultant; de maioribus omnes: ita tamen, ut ea quoque, quorum penes plebem arbitrium est, apud principes pertractentur.... Mox rex vel princeps, prout aetas cuique, prout nobilitas, prout decus bellorum, prout facundia est, audiuntur, auctoritate suadendi magis quam iubendi potestate.” Mor. Germ. xi. ----- But although we find a great difference in the social position, wealth and power of the king, and those of the noble and freeman, we are not to imagine that he could at any time exercise his royal prerogatives entirely at his royal pleasure[288]: held in check by the universal love of liberty, by the rights of his fellow nobles, and the defensive alliances of the freemen[289], he enjoyed indeed a rank, a splendour and an influence which placed him at the head of his people,—a limited monarchy, but happier than a capricious autocracy: and the historian who had groaned over the vices and tyranny of Tiberius, Nero and Domitian, could give the noble boon of his testimony to the eternal memory of the _barbarous_ Arminius. ----- Footnote 288: “Nec regibus infinita, nec libera potestas.” Mor. Germ. vii. “Auctore Verrito et Malorige, qui nationem eam regebant, in quantum Germani regnantur.” Tac. Annal. xiii. 54. Footnote 289: “Ceterum Arminius, abscedentibus Romanis et pulso Maroboduo, regnum adfectans, libertatem popularium adversam habuit, petitusque armis, cum varia fortuna certaret, dolo propinquorum cecidit.” Tac. Annal. ii. 88. -----