The moral effect of this contrast was that the people, once so famous for their bravery, lost, with their liberty, their energy and their courage.

One of the Batavian chieftains, named Civilis, formed an exception to this degeneracy, and, about the year 70 of our era, bravely took up arms for the expulsion of the Romans.

He effected prodigies of valor and perseverance, and boldly met and defeated the enemy both by land and sea.

Reverses followed his first success, and he finally concluded an honorable treaty, by which his countrymen once more became the allies of Rome.

But after this expiring effort of valor, the Batavians, even though chosen from all nations for the bodyguards of the Roman emperors, became rapidly degenerate; and when Tacitus wrote, ninety years after Christ, they were already looked on as less brave than the Frisons and the other peoples beyond the Rhine.