ch is not over yet. Charles also had no sense of
humour, or he would have made friends with the Slavs instead of fighting
them. Men with a "mission in life" rarely have the "saving gift," and so
they cause endless trouble; Charles did.

He hammered the Saxons into Christianity: they were Teutons and could
stand it. He tried the same on the Slavs, but force was not the right
method in their case. Charles could not see this, and went on killing
Slavs, handing over their property to Teuton knights. This method, and
especially its results, appealed strongly to Charles's successor, who
continued to hack the way of Christianity through Slavonic tribes until
eventually the latter were completely subjugated in all the
German-speaking countries of to-day. It took a long time to do this, for
there is a deal of resilience in the Slav, and his soul remains his own
even under much persecution. The Slavs were heavily handicapped too;
they were broken up into numerous little tribes and clans, and seldom
became united under the leadership of a strong man of their own race.
They had no spiritual head who would take responsibility for any crime
as long as it was atoned for by a corresponding number of heathen
converted or killed. The pagan Slav would not just push his bit of piety
on to the priest before dashing into the fray; he had to propitiate
various jealous deities in person, not by proxy. This must have been
anxious work and a waste of time to boot. Then again, both sides were
capable and frequently guilty of abominable treachery, with the
difference that the Christian Teuton betrayed his enemy only, which was
counted unto him for righteousness, whereas the Slav was inclined to
sell his own cause, only to be "let down" by the Teuton in the end. The
Slavs were also prone to fight among themselves in their spare time;
there has been no marked improvement on either side for the last ten
centuries or so; however, the history of other nations and races tends
to prove that neither Slav nor Teuton are unique in this respect.

Anyway, the "Holy Roman Empire," describing itself as of German
nationality, spread out over Central Europe, absorbing one Slavonic
tribe after another until there remained as the most western of them
only the Czechs of Bohemia as a coherent body, their national life
centred on Prague.

* * * * *

However, we are still on the way to Prague up the valley of the Elbe, an
interesting