A. D. 14. f37 



writer now extant. [P/h. Hijl. nat. L. ii, c. 75.] It is reafonable to 

 fuppofe that this town, the refidence of CunobeUn, was better built 

 than the fenced colledions of huts, defcribed by Caefar as the towns of 

 the Britons : for we find, that their architeftural (kill was even equal to 

 the tafk of building a bridge over the Thames. [Dion. L. Ix.] But the 

 improvements, which the Britons may be fuppofed to have made in 

 building, were unknown to Strabo, the geographer of this age, whofe 

 defcription of their houfes appears to be copied from Caefar's. 



Ireland was fometimes vifited by navigators from Gaul, and they 

 knew, that there were other iflands adjacent to Britain ; but we have 

 no account of their tranfadions or dealings. Strabo acknowleges his 

 ignorance of Ireland, the people of which, be bad beard, were very 

 favage, ate human flefh, &c. the character ufually given to the moil 

 remote and unknown nations, which he judicioufly cenfures as un- 

 worthy of credit *. [Strabo, L. iv, p. 307.] 



The nations to the northward of Gaul were as yet but little known 

 to the Romans. The Bruderi were defeated by Drufus in a naval battle 

 on the River Amafia (Ems), whence it appears that the people of thofe 

 coafts poilelled fome kind of veffels, probably no other than the long- 

 canoes made of fingle trees, and capable of carrying thirty men each, 

 defcribed by Pliny [/.. xvi, c. 40] as ufed by the pirates of Germany. 

 In the following age the Suiones, a nation occupying an ifland in the 

 Baltic fea, according to Tacitus, [Germania} were powerful by their 

 fleets, and fenfible of the advantages of opulence. He adds, that the 

 ufe of arms was not general among them, as among the other German 

 nations, becaufe tbey were defended from Jiidden invnfions by tbe furrounding 

 ocean. It is probable, that at this time their circumftances were nearly 

 the fame, and that their opulence was as much the produce of rapine 

 as of induftry. We have very little pofitive authority for any com- 

 mercial tranfadions of the Germans, except in two articles. The 

 feathers of the German geefe were preferred to all others at Rome : and 

 amber was bought up for the Romans with fuch avidity from the yEftii, 

 a nation in the modern Pruffia, whofe language refembled that of the 

 Britons, that they were utterly afloniftied at the prices, which they re- 

 ceived for an article of no real utility, which they had been accuftom- 

 ed to leave unnoticed on the beach, where the fea threw it up on the 

 coafl of Auftravia, an ifland (or perhaps now a peninfula, the Abalus 

 or Baltia of Pytheas) called Gleflarium by the Romans from the great 

 abundance of amber, the genuine name of which, according to Pliny 



* The charadler of the natives of Ireland, given that the manners of the people were totally iin- 



by Strabo as a ftory unworthy of credit, has been known to them. For cannibalifm, promifcuous 



carelefsly or malicioufly brought forward by fome concubinage, and fuch enormities, have in all ages 



modern writers, in order to prove that the an- been the charafterillics afcribed by ignorance to 



ceflors of the Iridi were the vileft favages in the unknown nations ; and they have been gradually 



world; whereas it only proves, that the Gallic removed farther an J farther, as difcovcry advanced, 

 flrangcrs had fo little intercourfe with tlie country, 



Vol. I. ' S 



