Roman Britain and Early England 17 



according to his rank, and none of these strips lay together. 

 The strips were all cultivated in common. The meadows from 

 which hay was got were split up into lots every spring, and these 

 were assigned to the members. When the hay began to grow, 

 the meadows were fenced off, and when it had been mowed and 

 carried home, the fences were removed and the cattle and sheep 

 were allowed to graze in them till the following spring. Beyond 

 the meadow and ploughed land were the common pasture and 

 the woods from which timber and fuel came. 



To understand why the land was held and cultivated in this 

 awkward manner we must go back and look again at the German 

 tribes who were neighbours of the Saxons. It is through Caesar 

 that we first get this view 500 years before they came to Britain. 

 Somewhere near the Rhine one day, when his zeal for conquest 

 had given place to his eagerness for learning, he sat in the midst 

 of his camp, and had the wisest men of the Germans seated round 

 him. Their customs and ideas interested him greatly, par- 

 ticularly their objection to agriculture, and their clumsy methods 

 of pursuing it. They mixed up their fighting and farming so 

 thoroughly that they could turn to both callings with equal 

 ease. One part of a tribe went to war one year, while the other 

 stayed at home and cultivated for themselves and for those who 

 were away fighting. The next year the latter stayed at home, 

 while the former went to the wars. They were farmers one year 

 and soldiers the next. They had no private land, no land separate 

 from that which was held by the tribe as a whole, and they were 

 never allowed to stay longer than one year in the same place. 



Caesar had a great many questions to ask about these customs, 

 but before we look at the German chiefs' replies we must read 

 a later record to see the struggle which was taking place among 

 them. About the year A.D. 80, or earlier, agriculture had taken 

 a firm hold on them. By this time they had learned to make 

 beer from barley. They were great drinkers, and their love of 

 2535-7 B 



