9. +English a Low-German Speech.+-- Our English tongue is the +lowest of all Low-German dialects+. Low German is the German spoken in the lowlands of Germany. As we descend the rivers, we come to the lowest level of all-- the level of the sea. Our English speech, once a mere dialect, came down to that, crossed the German Ocean, and settled in Britain, to which it gave in time the name of Angla-land or England. The Low German spoken in the Netherlands is called +Dutch+; the Low German spoken in Friesland-- a prosperous province of Holland-- is called +Frisian+; and the Low German spoken in Great Britain is called +English+. These three languages are extremely like one another; but the Continental language that is likest the English is the Dutch or Hollandish dialect called _Frisian_. We even possess a couplet, every word of which is both English and Frisian. It runs thus-- Good butter and good cheese Is good English and good Fries. 10. +Dutch and Welsh-- a Contrast.+-- When the Teuton conquerors came to this country, they called the Britons foreigners, just as the Greeks called all other peoples besides themselves _barbarians_. By this they did not at first mean that they were uncivilised, but only that they were _not_ Greeks. Now, the Teutonic or Saxon or English name for foreigners was +Wealhas+, a word afterwards contracted into +Welsh+. To this day the modern Teuts or Teutons (or _Germans_, as _we_ call them) call all Frenchmen and Italians _Welshmen_; and, when a German, peasant crosses the border into France, he says: “I am going into Welshland.” 11. +The Spread of English over Britain.+-- The Jutes, who came from Juteland or Jylland-- now called Jutland-- settled in Kent and in the Isle of Wight. The Saxons settled in the south and western parts of England, and gave their names to those kingdoms-- now counties-- whose names came to end in +sex+. There was the kingdom of the East Saxons, or +Essex+; the kingdom of the West Saxons, or +Wessex+; the kingdom of the Middle Saxons, or +Middlesex+; and the kingdom of the South Saxons, or +Sussex+. The Angles settled chiefly on the east coast. The kingdom of +East Anglia+ was divided into the regions of the +North Folk+ and the +South Folk+, words which are still perpetuated in the names _Norfolk_ and _Suffolk_. These three sets of Teutons all spoke different dialects of the same Teutonic speech; and these dialects, with their differences, peculiarities, and odd habits, took root in English soil, and lived an independent life, apart from each other, uninfluenced by each other, for several hundreds of years. But, in the slow course of time, they joined together to make up our beautiful English language-- a language which, however, still bears in itself the traces of dialectic forms, and is in no respect of one kind or of one fibre all through. CHAPTER I. THE PERIODS OF ENGLISH.