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I.

THEIR houses, chiefly formed of reeds or wood, were very numerous, like those of the Gauls, and were usually seated in the midst of woods, perhaps for better defence, as those of the New Zealanders are, for the same reason, placed on fortified hills. The wars of fierce and rude men, unacquainted with military discipline, or disdaining to submit to it, usually consist of attempts to surprise and ravage; and therefore precautions against sudden aggressions are the most essential parts of their defensive skill. The Britons seem to have cleared a space in the wood, on which they built their huts and folded their cattle; and they fenced the avenues by ditches and barriers of trees. Such a collection of houses formed one of their towns.12

THEY had great quantities of cattle.18 Some of the British tribes are said not to have had the art of making cheese, though they had abundance of milk; others knew nothing of either agriculture or gardening. They housed their corn in the ear, in subterraneous places, and threshed out no more than served them for the day.15 The little money which they had, was of the Spartan kind; it was either copper, or iron rings, of a definite weight.16

tendency. They are worn now but as a petty ornament, not as in his time for fastidious pomp.

12 Strabo, lib. iv. p. 306. Cæsar, lib. v. c. 17. Diod. Sic. lib. v. p. 301.

13 Cæsar, lib. v. c. 10.

14 Strabo, lib. iv. p. 305.

15 Diod. lib. v. p. 301. Pliny notices that they used a species of lime as a manure, which he calls white chalk, lib. xvii. c. 4. 16 Cæsar, lib. v. c. 10. It is supposed that Cunobelin, the successor of Cassivellaun, first coined money in Britain. “About fifty of his coins, with own his name, have come down to the

V.

They thought it a crime to eat hares, geese, or hens, CHAP. though they bred them for pleasure. One of their most extraordinary and pernicious customs was, that community of women among ten or twelve men, who chose to form such an association, which reminds us of the Arreoys of Otaheite. The British Arreoys, however, seem not to have destroyed their children; as these were agreed to be considered as the offspring of the man who had married the mother.17

IN battle their chief strength was in their infantry.18 But they fought also on horses, and more especially in chariots, with scythes at the axles.19 In these they rode, throwing darts on every side; and, by the dread of the horses, and the noise of the wheels, they often disordered their opponents. When they had broken in among the horse, they leaped from the cars, and fought on foot. The drivers retired a little out of the battle, but so stationed themselves, as to be ready to receive the combatants if pressed by the enemy. Thus, to the activity of cavalry, they united the steadiness of infantry. By daily use and practice, they were so expert, that they could stop their horses at full speed down a declivity, could guide and turn them, run along the beam, stand on the yoke, and from thence, with rapidity, dart into their chariots.20 Diodorus,

present age. Some of them exhibit a plane surface, but most a small convexity." Whit. Manch. book i. c. 9. One of them represents a bard with his harp, ibid. c. 7. sect. 5.

17 Cæsar, lib. v. c. 10.

18 Tacitus.

19 Mela, lib. iii. c. 6.

20 Cæsar, lib. iv. c. 29.

I.

BOOK in mentioning the British war-chariots, recalls to our mind, that the heroes of the Trojan war used them likewise; there was however this difference, that among the Britons the driver was the superior person.

Their re

ligion

21

THE honorable testimony of Diodorus to their superiority to the Romans in some of those moral virtues, in which the nomadic nations excelled the civilised, must not be omitted. "There is a simplicity in their manners, which is very different from that craft and wickedness which mankind now exhibit. They are satisfied with a frugal sustenance, and avoid the luxuries of wealth." 22

THE religion of the Britons was of a fierce and sanguinary nature. It resembled that of the Gauls, which is thus described. They who were afflicted with severe disease, or involved in dangers or battles, sacrificed men for victims, or vowed that they would do so. The Druids administered at these gloomy rites. They thought that the life of a man was to be redeemed by a man's life; and that there was no other mode of conciliating their gods. Some made images of wicker work of an immense size, and filled them with living men, whom they burned alive. Thieves and robbers, or other criminals, were usually made the victims; but if there were a deficiency of these, the guiltless were sacrificed.23 At some of their sacred rites the British women went naked, but stained dark, like Ethiopians, by a vegetable juice. That they consulted their gods

21 Diod. lib. v. p. 301.
nant, Tacit. Vit. Agr.
22 Diod.
p. 301.

23 Cæsar, lib. vi. c. 15.

24 Pliny, lib. xxii. c. 2.

Honestior auriga; clientes propug

V.

on futurity, by inspecting the quivering flesh of CHAP. their human victims, and that they had prophetic women, has been already mentioned. 25

THEIR superstitious fancies deemed the misseltoe sacred, if it vegetated from the oak. They selected groves of oaks, and thought every thing sent from heaven which grew on this tree. On the sixth day of the moon, which was the beginning of their months and years, and of their period of thirty years, they came to the oak on which they observed any of the parasitical plant (which they called all-healing), prepared a sacrifice and a feast under this venerated tree, and brought thither two white bulls, whose horns were then first tied. The officiating Druid, in a white garment, climbed the tree, and, with a golden knife, pruned off the misseltoe, which was received in a white woollen cloth below. They then sacrificed the victims, and addressed their gods to make the misseltoe prosperous to those to whom it was given; for they believed that it caused fecundity, and was an amulet against poison. They performed no ceremonies without the leaves of the oak. 26

THE ancient world, including the most enlightened nations, even Greece and Rome, were universally impressed with a belief of the powers of magic. But the expressions of Pliny induce us to

25 See before, p. 43. That the Kelts sacrificed human victims to a deity, whom the Greeks called Kronos, and the Latins Saturn, we learn from Dionysius Halic. lib. i. p. 30.

26 Pliny, lib. xvi. c. 95. As derw is British for an oak, and derwydd is the term for a Druid in the same language, it is probable that this class of persons was named from the tree they venerated. Maximus Tyrius calls the oak, the Keltic image of the Deity. Dissert.

I.

BOOK imagine, that this mischievous imposture was peculiarly cultivated by the British Druids. He says, "Britain now celebrates it so astonishingly, and with so many ceremonies, that she might even be thought to have given it to the Persians." 27 The Druids were indeed so superior in knowledge and intellect to the rest of the nation, that their magical frauds must have been easily invented and securely practised.

Their
Druids.

THE Druidical system began in Britain, and from thence was introduced into Gaul. In Cæsar's time, they who wished to know it more diligently, for the most part visited Britain, for the sake of learning it. The Druids were present at all religious rites; they administered at public and private sacrifices; and they interpreted divinations. They were so honoured, that they decided almost all public and private controversies, and all causes, whether of homicide, inheritance, or boundaries. They appointed the remunerations, and the punishments. Whoever disobeyed their decree, was interdicted from their sacrifices, which with them was the severest punishment. An interdicted person was deemed both impious and wicked; all fled from him, and avoided his presence and conversation, lest they should be contaminated by the intercourse. He was allowed no legal rights. He participated in no honours.

THE Druids obeyed one chief, who had supreme

27 Pliny, lib. xxx. c. 4. The Welsh term for right-hand, seems to have some reference to the ancient superstitions of the Britons. It is deheulaw, or the south-hand; an expression which can only be true, when we look at the east. The circles at Stonehenge appear to have a reference to the rising of the sun at the solstice.

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