157 



all the glories of a Roman triumph, nothing looked so singularly 

 splendid as a British king led captive in the silver chariot from which 

 he had fought, and the discoloured arms in which he bled. ("Nil tarn 

 conspicuum in triumpho quam rex ipse Bituitus, discoloribus armis 

 argenteoque carpento qualis pugnaverat."*) The painting and carving 

 of the British chariots wrung the admiration of even Propertius, who 

 mentions them " pictoque Britannia curru;"-f- and again, " esseda 

 coelatis siste Britannia jugis •"% to which we may add, that Lucian 

 mentions the Scythians as driving in chariots, and Plutarch numbers§ 

 similar vehicles armed with scythes in the forces of Mithridates. 



Of the boats and transports of the Irish at that time, prejudice has 

 been equally regardless ; but although from the very early emigration 

 of the colony from Scythia, it could not have carried the art of ship- 

 building to that perfection, which the after named Phoenicians became 

 celebrated for, yet subsequent intercourse with that people, and the 

 experience of commerce, as spoken of by Tacitus, would lead to the 

 conclusion of their naval architecture having attained somewhat more 

 excellence, than Caesar discovered in the transport vessels of Britain, || 

 or those Solinus attributes to these stormy seas.** Tigernach speaks 

 of an ancient King of Ireland, with the epithet "of the ships;" and 

 the same historian mentions a great Irish fleet at A. D. 222, and 



* Florus, lib. 3. cited by Mac-Pherson, Introduction, p. 241. 



+ Book 3. Eleg. 3. t Book 2. Eleg. 1. 



§ Plut. Vit. Syllae. 



jl" Naves cujus generis ***** superioribus annis usus Britannife'docuerat : 

 carinae primum ac statumina ex levi materia fiebant, reliquum corpus navium viminibus con- 

 textum coriis integebatur." — De Bell. Civ. lib. 1. c. 54. 



** " Mare, quod Britanniam et Hiberniam interluit, undosum et inquietum, toto in anno 

 non nisi asstivis pauculis diebus est navigabile ; navigant autem vimineis alceis, quos circuni- 

 dant ambitione tergorum bubulinorum." — Solinus, c. 35. p. 166. 



