ce of archery and horsemanship; their arm
was strong; their aim was sure; and in the most rapid career, they were
taught to throw themselves backwards, and to shoot a volley of arrows
into the air. In open combat, in secret ambush, in flight, or pursuit,
they were equally formidable; an appearance of order was maintained
in the foremost ranks, but their charge was driven forwards by the
impatient pressure of succeeding crowds. They pursued, headlong and
rash, with loosened reins and horrific outcries; but, if they fled, with
real or dissembled fear, the ardor of a pursuing foe was checked and
chastised by the same habits of irregular speed and sudden evolution.
In the abuse of victory, they astonished Europe, yet smarting from the
wounds of the Saracen and the Dane: mercy they rarely asked, and more
rarely bestowed: both sexes were accused is equally inaccessible to
pity, and their appetite for raw flesh might countenance the popular
tale, that they drank the blood, and feasted on the hearts of the slain.
Yet the Hungarians were not devoid of those principles of justice and
humanity, which nature has implanted in every bosom. The license of
public and private injuries was restrained by laws and punishments; and
in the security of an open camp, theft is the most tempting and
most dangerous offence. Among the Barbarians there were many, whose
spontaneous virtue supplied their laws and corrected their manners, who
performed the duties, and sympathized with the affections, of social
life.

After a long pilgrimage of flight or victory, the Turkish hordes
approached the common limits of the French and Byzantine empires. Their
first conquests and final settlements extended on either side of the
Danube above Vienna, below Belgrade, and beyond the measure of the Roman
province of Pannonia, or the modern kingdom of Hungary. That ample and
fertile land was loosely occupied by the Moravians, a Sclavonian name
and tribe, which were driven by the invaders into the compass of a
narrow province. Charlemagne had stretched a vague and nominal empire
as far as the edge of Transylvania; but, after the failure of his
legitimate line, the dukes of Moravia forgot their obedience and tribute
to the monarchs of Oriental France. The bastard Arnulph was provoked to
invite the arms of the Turks: they rushed through the real or figurative
wall, which his indiscretion had thrown open; and the king of Germany
has been justly reproached as a traitor t