Easterling

& a. [Eng. east; -er; -ling.] A. As substantive: 1. Gen .: A name given to a native of any country lying to the east of another; a neighbor on the east. ( Spenser : F. Q., II. x. 63.) 2. Spec.: A trader or native of Norway, Denmark, and other countries about the Baltic. "Certain merchants of Norwaie, Denmarke, and of others those parties, called Ostomanni, or (as in our vulgar language we tear me them) Easterlings ." - Holinshed : Hist. of Ireland (an. 430). 3. A piece of English money coined in the reign of Richard II. [STERLING.] 4. A species of water-fowl. eastward Eastern hemisphere, s. The Old World (q. v.). Eastern question, s. Politics & Hist.: The question as to the distribution of political power in Eastern Europe and the Asiatic continent. The vast relative extent of the Ru ian Empire on the map of Europe, or of the World, and the knowledge that for some generations back it has steadily increased, raise the question whether the liberties of Europe and mankind are endangered by the preponderance of the power just mentioned, with its semi-barbarous hordes. The majority of minds, at least in England, in France, and in Italy, answer that some danger does exist, and with them the "Eastern Question" is simply this: How is the further progre of Ru ia toward Southern and Western Europe, in one direction, and toward India in the other, to be most effectively resisted? Of old, the stereotyped answer to the inquiry was, By maintaining the integrity of the Ottoman Empire. In support of this view the Crime an war was carried on from 185 to 1856, both the great parties in France and England concurring as to its nece ity, the only di entients being a small minority of the British people led. however, by Cobden, Bright, Milner Gibson, and others. Easterlings, or North German traders.