coast--i.e., the settlers maintained a connection with the
mainland; but the Angles, the Saxons, and the Jutes did not
colonize, they migrated; they left no trace of their occupancy in
the lands they vacated. Each separate invasion was the settlement
of a district; each leader aspired to sovereignty, and was supreme
in his own domains; each claimed descent from Woden, and, like
Romulus or Alexander, sought affinity with the gods. Each member of
the Heptarchy was independent of, and owed no allegiance to, the
other members; and marriage or conquest united them ultimately into
one kingdom.

The primary institutions were moulded by time and circumstance, and
the state of things in the eleventh century was as different from
that of the fifth as those of our own time differ from the rule of
Richard II. Yet one was as much an outgrowth of its predecessor as
the other.

Attempts have been made, with considerable ingenuity, to connect
races with each other by peculiar characteristics, but human
society has the same necessities, and we find great similarity in
various divisions of society. At all times, and in all nations,
society resolved itself into the upper, middle, and lower classes.
Rome had its Nobles, Plebeians, and Slaves; Germany its Edhilingi,
Frilingi, and Lazzi; England its Eaorls, Thanes, and Ceorls. It
would be equally cogent to argue that, because Rome had three
classes and England had three classes, the latter was derived from
the former, as to conclude that, because Germany had three classes,
therefore English institutions were Teutonic. If the invasion of
the fifth century were Teutonic we should look for similar
nomenclature, but there is as great a dissimilarity between the