185 



western boundary of this their first Province (or Britannia 

 Prima). During the latter half of the first century, as Tacitus 

 tells us, a legion was planted in the heart of the country of the 

 Silures, to bridle them more effectually. We know from the 

 hundreds of remains dug up there, that the spot so designated 

 was Caerleon, and that the legion was the second, called the 

 Augustan. Where had this second legion been stationed before its 

 removal ? Certainly at Gloucester, the key of the Severn, and 

 (then) boundary of the Empire westward. Its move was in 

 reality a pushing that boundary to the JJsJc instead of the Severn. 

 This will account for the identity in character of the masonry 

 at Gloucester and Caerwent, and in the Wall of Hadrian where 

 the second legion was employed. I omit comparison with the 

 wall of Caerleon itself, because I am not sure that the small 

 portion of it which I have as yet been able to examine may not 

 be of a later date. In its shape, Caerleon is a precise repeat of 

 Gloucester, with a Castle outside, in the same relative position 

 on the TJsk as that at Gloucester had on the Severn. The area of 

 Gloucester was about 2,022,000 square feet, and that of Caerleon, 

 as per Coxe's map, about 1,956,000 feet. A Camp on Salisbury 

 Plain, called by the Ordnance Surveyors "Vespasian's Camp," 

 has an area of about 2,060,000 feet, and another, some miles 

 from it, which, from its name, Casterley, must have been Roman, 

 measures 1,951,000 feet. I give these measures subject to 

 correction, as I take them from maps. 



Hadrian on ascending the throne found the Empire weakened 

 by its very extension; for almost all the Emperors, including 

 Trajan, had been constantly adding to it ; and he very wisely 

 reversed the policy of his predecessor by devoting himself 

 to consolidating and strengthening it; in some instances by 

 withdrawing the boundary to points well defined and easily 

 defensible. He relied more upon the trowel than the sword ; 

 and he attached a special corps of masons to every legion. 



On his arrival in Britain (about a.d. 120) he withdrew the 

 north boundary from the hazardous mountains conquered by 

 Agricola in Caledonia, and built the stupendous wall from one 

 sea to the other, — 74 miles in length and 25 feet in height, of 



