BRITAIN IN THE ROMAN POETS 131 



savage than tlie Britons, feeding on human flesh, and 

 enormous eaters.^ 



The Britons dyed themselves blue ^^ or green ^^ with 

 woad. The cultured Cynthia has one thing in common 

 with savage Britons. Propertius loquitur, 



Nunc etiani infectos demens imitare Britannos, 

 Ludis et externo tincta nitore caput. '^ 



(And now you even imitate in your folly the dyed Britons, and 

 play the coquette with an artificial brightness on your hair.) 



The Romans had good reason to remember the wild 



appearance and desperate resistance of the painted Britons 



in their painted cars.^^ But the poets give no idea of the 



extraordinary skill and success with which they managed 



them.^* We hear nothing in Caesar of the scythed chariots 



mentioned by Silius Italicus. 



Caerulus haud aliter, cum dimicat, incola Thules 

 Agmina falcigero circumuenit arta couinno.'' 



(Just in the same way, when he fights, the dweller in Thule sur- 

 rounds with his scythed chariot the close-thronged ranks.) 



The climate of the island was terrible to the Romans. 

 It was a chiUy land of storm and mist,^^ " a land of 

 uncleared forests with a climate which was as yet 

 unmitigated by the organised labours of mankind. . . . 

 The fallen timber obstructed the stream, the rivers were 

 squandered in the reedy morasses, and only the downs and 

 the hilltops rose above the perpetual tracts of wood." ^'' 



9. Strabo, i., 4, 5. 



10. "Caeruleis Britannis," Martial xi., 53. 



11. "Virides Britanni," Ovid, Amores, II., xvi., 39. 



12. Prop. III., ix., 23. 



13. "Picto Britannia curru" (Prop. V., 7, 4), (II, xviiib 1). 



14. Caes. E.G. iv. 33, and v. 16. 



15. Punic. 17, 416. 



16. Tac, Agr. 12, 3. 



17. Elton's Origins of Eng. Hist., page 217, cf. p. 2, svpra. 



