1. We see peculiarities in the natural dispositions of nations, as well as of men. Some evince a disposition to music, another to arms, a third to navigation, a fourth to agriculture, a fifth to commerce, &c. The Germans may have a natural disposition to order, quietude, and politeness. Of this I am by no means sure.
2. What is man, individually or collectively, but the creature of those circumstances in which he is placed?—of the elements around him—of the education impressed on him—of the religion within his breast—of the examples before his eyes? In all the lauded and laudable traits of character delineated by Sir. F. Head, the German has been trained from his infancy—and from these he has neither inducement nor inclination to deviate.
3. The third circumstance I consider to be very operative. The struggles, the collisions, the jealousies—the host of evil and of exciting passions, which agitate a commercial, trading, maritime, and manufacturing country like England, have, comparatively, no field in Germany; where life is far more allied to agricultural and pastoral, than to commercial and manufacturing pursuits. There is as much difference between the Germans and the English, generally, as between the peasantry of Lincolnshire and the mechanics of Birmingham—between the chaw-bacons of Hampshire, and the black and white devils of Merthyr-Tidvill and Sheffield.
4. Government.—I attribute no small share to this class of influential causes in modifying the manners of a nation. In absolute monarchies, where the will of the sovereign is the law of the people, the latter are not likely to be so frisky, boisterous, and turbulent, as under a limited and constitutional government, inclining to democracy, where the vox populi is not seldom the vox Dei—and where—
——Imprisoned factions roar,
And rampant Treason stalks from shore to shore.
On another occasion I shall allude to the minuteness with which the German governments regulate the most trifling concerns of life, when mentioning that a passenger in a public diligence is forbidden to move from the seat allotted to him, to the next vacant one at his side, without permission from the post-master of the first town at which the conveyance stops! In such countries would the Age, the Satirist, or even the Times be long allowed to take liberties with crowned heads, courts, or ministers? No verily! Their tongues would soon be as smooth, and civil and ceremonious, as those of the crowds of spa-drinkers around the Wein-Brunnen of Schwalbach![25]
Whether the state of things on the South side of the Channel be better or worse than that on the North, I presume not to say. Davus sum, non Œdipus. But I think I have proved that, while these differences exist, the manners and habits of Germany are not likely to blend or amalgamate with those of England. Nothing, I think, would produce this fusion of the two people, except some strange geographical revolution that might convert the British Isles into a small appendix to the Continent; without “ships, colonies, or commerce”—without iron mines or coal mines—without cotton or cutlery—without fisheries or factories—without steam-engines or printing-presses—but above all, without that great national or normal school of agitation—the Parliament—where deputies learn to “speak daggers,” and chartists are encouraged to make pikes—where orations are directed not to the ears of the Commons, but to the eyes of the Constituents—where the campaign is opened with a speech recommending concord; carried on with speeches full of discord; and concluded with a speech of gracious accord—finally, where multiplicity of motion in the beginning is synonymous with paucity of action in the end. When all these incentives to turbulence shall have vanished, and also when English stomachs shall prefer sour krout and rancid oil to roast beef and brown stout, then, and not till then, may Sir Francis hope to see his favourite German polish and Gallic varnish lacquering over the rough manners of his native Isle.