CLASSES AND BREEDS OF BRITISH HORSES. 507 



the cavalry and charioteers of the Britons rushing to and 

 fro with loud noise. They rushed, he tells us, in their armed 

 chariots at full speed, and mixed in battle with the infantry. 

 Their first impression struck terror, but their career was 

 soon checked by the thick ranks of their enemies and by the 

 inequalities of the ground, and, crowding upon one another, 

 they were thrown into disorder. Chariots without a guide, 

 and horses without a rider, broke away in wild confusion, and 

 trampled upon the ranks. The horses of the country, it is 

 certain, must have been numerous when they formed the 

 strength of an army in a country so wild and mountainous. 



Whatever was the character of these early Horses with 

 respect to size, strength, and other properties, it is probable 

 that for many ages they underwent little change. Previous 

 to the fall of the Roman Empire, northern pirates had ravaged 

 the coasts of Britain, and fixed themselves in some of the 

 remoter Islands. But it was not till the fifth century that 

 Gothic hordes began those regular invasions which termi- 

 nated in the subjection of nearly all the Island, and the im- 

 position of a new language and new customs on the people. 

 They seem first to have landed in numbers on the shores of 

 the Firth of Forth, although history usually refers their first 

 permanent settlement to 'an invitation of the Romanized Bri- 

 tons of the south for protection from the ravages of the 

 northern tribes. However this be, it is certain that about 

 the year 449, when the falling Empire could no longer pro- 

 tect the distant provinces, the Saxons, a Gothic people from 

 the countries of the Elbe, landed in South Britain, and being 

 followed by successive swarms of Saxons, Jutes, and Angles, 

 their countrymen, continually disembarking on the country 

 from the Forth to the shores of Kent, established a domi- 

 nion which, by creating a new nation, may be said to have 

 affected the whole condition of societies throughout the civi- 

 lized world. 



The supremacy of the Saxons in England lasted for more 

 than 600 years, when it was overthrown by the Normans, a 



