[220] Kobelt, Reiseerinnerungen aus Algerien und Tunis, p. 223.
[221] Blunt, op. cit. ii. 204 sq.
[222] Burckhardt, Bedouins and Wahábys, p. 90.
[223] Kovalewsky, Coutume contemporaine, p. 343.
Similar views prevailed among the ancient Teutons. “Robberies,” says Caesar, “which are committed beyond the boundaries of each state bear no infamy, and they avow that these are committed for the purpose of disciplining their youth and of preventing sloth.”[224] The same was the case with the Highlanders of Scotland until they were brought into subjection after the rebellion of 1745.[225] “Regarding every Lowlander as an alien, and his cattle as fair spoil of war,” says Major-General Stewart, “they considered no law for his protection as binding…. Yet, except against the Lowlanders or a hostile clan, these freebooters maintained, in general, the strictest honesty towards one another, and inspired confidence in their integrity…. In the interior of their own society all property was safe, without the usual security of bolts, bars, and locks.”[226] In the Commentary to the Irish Senchus Mór it is stated that, whilst an ordinary thief loses his full honour-price at once, committing theft in another territory deprives a person of only half his honour-price, until it is committed the third time.[227] Throughout the Middle Ages all Europe seems to have tacitly agreed that foreigners were created for the purpose of being robbed.[228] In the thirteenth century there were still several places in France in which a stranger who fixed his residence for a year and a day became the serf of the lord of the manor.[229] In England, till upwards of two centuries after the Conquest, foreign merchants were considered only as sojourners coming to a fair or market, and were obliged to employ their landlords as brokers to buy and sell their commodities; and one stranger was often arrested for the debt, or punished for the misdemeanour, of another.[230] In a later age the old habit of oppression was still so strong that, when the State suddenly wanted a sum of money, it seemed quite natural that foreigners should be called upon to provide a part of it.[231] The custom of seizing the goods of persons who had been shipwrecked, and of confiscating them as the property of the lord on whose manor they were thrown, seems to have been universal;[232] and in some European countries the laws even permitted the inhabitants of maritime provinces to reduce to servitude people who were shipwrecked on their coast.[233] The sea laws of Oléron, which probably date from the twelfth century, tell us that in many places shipwrecked sailors meet with people more inhuman, barbarous, and cruel than mad dogs, who slaughter those unhappy mariners in order to obtain possession of their money, clothes, and other property.[234] In the latter part of the Middle Ages attempts were incessantly made by sovereigns and councils to abolish this ancient right, so far as Christian sailors were concerned,[235] whereas the robbing of shipwrecked infidels was not prohibited.[236] But for a long time these endeavours were far from being successful;[237] and it was even argued that, as shipwrecks were punishments sent by God, it was impious to be merciful to the victims.[238]
[224] Caesar, De bello Gallico, vi. 23.
[225] Tylor, in Contemporary Review, xxi. 716.
[226] Stewart, Sketches of the Character, &c., of the Highlanders of Scotland, p. 42 sq.
[227] Ancient Laws of Ireland, i. 57.
[228] Cf. Marshall, International Vanities, p. 285.