_Translated from a German Work, in the Foreign Review, No. 8._


Pope Ganganelli compared the Italians with the fire, the French with the
air, the English with the water, and us Germans with the earth, _omne
simile claudicat_. The German is not so nimble, brisk, and witty as the
Frenchman; the latter gallops _ventre à terre_, whilst the German at the
utmost trots, but holds out longer. The German is not so proud,
humoursome, and dry as the Englishman; not so indolent, bigoted, and
niggardly as the Italian; but a plain, faithful, modest fellow,
indefatigable, staid, quiet, intelligent and brave, yet almost always
misknown, purely from his constitution. The words of Tacitus still are
true: "_nullos mortalium armis aut fide ante Germanos_." Should you
class the four most cultivated nations of Europe, according to the
temperaments, the German would be Phlegma; and as such, I, a German, in
German modesty, which foreign countries should duly acknowledge, can
assign it only the fourth rank. Among the English, whims are mixed in
every thing; amongst the French, gallantry; among the Spaniards,
bigotry; among the Germans, when things can go halfway, _eating_,
_drinking_, and _smoking_; and the last is the true support of Phlegma.
Genius with the Germans, tends to the root, with the French to the
blossom, with the British to the fruit. The Italians are imagination;
the French, wit; the English, understanding; the Germans, memory. In
colonies, Spaniards commence by building a church and cloister;
Englishmen a tavern; Frenchmen a fort, where, however, the dancing-floor
must not be wanting; the Germans by grubbing the field. A riding-master
distinguished them even by their modes of riding; the English hop, the
French ride like tailors, the Italian sits on his steed like a frog in
the air-pump, the Spaniards sleep there, the Russians wind the upper