Burgundian Aosta and the Seven German Communes--if these last still keep
their Teutonic language,--fall under the rule that there are some things
too small for laws to pay heed to.

But it must not be forgotten that all this simply means that in the
lands of which we have just been speaking the process of adoption has
been carried out on the largest scale. Nations, with languages as their
rough practical test, have been formed; but they have been formed with
very little regard to physical purity of blood. In short, throughout
Western Europe assimilation has been the rule. That is to say, in any of
the great divisions of Western Europe, though the land may have been
settled and conquered over and over again, yet the mass of the people of
the land have been drawn to some one national type. Either some one
among the races inhabiting the land has taught the others to put on its
likeness, or else a new national type has arisen which has elements
drawn from several of those races. Thus the modern Frenchman may be
defined as produced by the union of blood which is mainly Celtic with a
speech which is mainly Latin, and with an historical polity which is
mainly Teutonic. That is, he is neither Gaul, Roman, nor Frank, but a
fourth type which has drawn important elements from all three. Within
modern France this new national type has so far assimilated all others
as to make every thing else merely exceptional. The Fleming of one
corner, the Basque of another, even the far more important Breton of a
third corner, have all in this way become mere exceptions to the general
type of the country. If we pass into our own islands, we shall find that
the same process has been at work. If we look to Great Britain only, we
shall find that, though the means have not been the same, yet the end
has been gained hardly less thoroughly than in France. For all real
political purposes, for every thing which concerns a nation in the face
of other nations, Great Britain is as thoroughly united as France is.