Who first founded Malmeshury ? 63 



combat used a heavy double-edged sword. Virgil was not only a 

 Poet but an Archaeologist of the highest order, and we are assured 

 by his commentator Servius that he was " curiosissimus totius 

 Italiae," that is, he had minutely studied every department of 

 Italian Antiquity, which is indeed obvious from his writings. Yet 

 I can hardly reconcile such descriptions as these with those of 

 Caesar, three centuries after Brennus, but Caesar is very difficult to 

 reconcile with himself. He states that he made two campaigns in 

 Britain, the second lasting six months, that he fought a succession 

 of pitched battles, that at the end of these six months he had failed 

 to force his way beyond our modern St. Albans, i.e., 70 miles from 

 the coast, that the Britons twice attempted to carry his camp by 

 storm, that he everywhere found agriculture in a flourishing state, 

 being able to supply his army with corn from the fields wherever 

 he marched ; that the British King Cassibelaunus kept under his own 

 command, independent of cavalry and infantry, a force of 4000 

 chariots with which he so successfully harassed the Roman Army, 

 that his (Caesar's) cavalry could not move except under the protection 

 of his heavy-armed legionaries, yet he tells us that these Britons 

 whenever they came into action stripped to fight, and this being 

 their custom, they ingrained their skins with all kinds of devices of 

 a bright blue color. It is quite true that every British school-boy 

 still strips to fight, so invariably do our sailors in action, and every 

 one that has seen a man-of-war's crew at their guns has really seen 

 what Caesar describes as the Picti Britanni, the Blue or painted 

 Britons, for I need not say that sailors keep up this aboriginal cus- 

 tom of puncturing their bodies blue, or of tattooing themselves, with 

 no less fidelity than ingenuity. In this usage they may like our 

 ancestors be called perhaps barbarians, but it must be admitted 

 barbarians of a very formidable character, such as Italians in any 

 age might hesitate to encounter. Taking Caesar's own statement, 

 we must believe that these " Blue Britons " fought him, the first 

 commander of the first Military Empire of Antiquity, at the head of 

 the army which subsequently conquered the World and Rome itself, 

 with such success in a series of engagements that he was glad to con- 

 clude a peace before winter set in, withdrawing every Roman soldier 



