20. Now so far I have described a brave, honourable, and on the whole a just nation (allowing for the universal feeling about war at that time), and which really did great good in the world; but there were some things about them which were very terrible, and wrought great harm and misery.

Slaves.

21. The first is, that they had immense numbers of slaves. These clever, rich, and elegant gentlemen and ladies were waited on by innumerable slaves. We must remember that in the old and warlike times, with which most histories begin, if the conquerors did not kill the conquered they always made slaves of them; that was sometimes from mercy and pity, and sometimes for convenience. So that in all old histories, in our own too, we shall find there was a large class of slaves. We think very little of them; but we ought, in comparing old times with ours (which we often do, to the disparagement of our own), to remember this poor dumb class, who toiled and suffered to give leisure and ease to their masters, of whose grand deeds and thoughts we love to read.

22. A slave could be bought for about three shillings, when an ox cost tenpence; and what with buying and conquering, and the slaves themselves multiplying, the Romans had at this time a vast number of them; one single family possessed 400. Among these, strange as it may sound to us, there were some very well-educated and superior people. Some were doctors, some were tutors to the children, some were artists. Most likely this class of slaves were generally treated with great kindness and respect, but the lower ones were often used very cruelly. When they got old and useless the masters used constantly to put them on an island in the river, and leave them to perish. The ladies would sometimes tear their faces, or pierce their flesh with the long pins of their brooches. One slave was crucified for killing and eating a favourite tame bird. If a master was murdered there was a law that all the slaves in the house, unless in chains or quite helpless through illness, should be put to death. Still we must hope that these great cruelties were the exception, and not the rule. We all remember the "centurion's servant (or slave) who was dear to him;" but where such things were even possible, we are sure that they must have been a very oppressed and down-trodden race.

The philosophers took the part of the slaves; and still more so, in after times, did Christianity, which taught that "there is neither bond nor free," and that all men have a Master in heaven.

23. As for the amusements of the Romans, it is almost incredible how horrible they were. One of their great delights was to see wild beasts tear each other to pieces. Amusements.

They would have bears and bulls; but also elephants, tigers, giraffes, even crocodiles and serpents. Three or four hundred bears might be killed in a single day; or they would have 400 tigers fighting with bulls and elephants. On one very great occasion no less than 5000 animals perished.

It is easy to imagine how brutalizing all these ferocious sights must have been, but there were others still worse than these. Sometimes they would have men, poor slaves, brought from foreign lands to fight with the wild beasts. They would dress criminals in the skins of animals, and throw them to bulls, which were maddened by red-hot irons. Even women would sometimes fight, and one is said to have killed a lion. Some of the great theatres where these dreadful "games" took place are still existing. There may be seen the places where the grand people sate, enjoying the sight; and the seats rising up behind them where the common people sate, enjoying it too; and down below the dens where the poor beasts, and the cells where the poor slaves were kept. The largest of these theatres is called the Coliseum, at Rome, and would hold more than 80,000 people. 24. At other times, instead of wild beasts, they would have men fighting with one another. These men were called "Gladi66 or Swordsmen." There were many thousands of them, who were trained very carefully to kill one another for the pleasure of the lookers-on. Lord Byron wrote these tender and indignant lines about a dying gladiator, which fill our hearts with a pity the Romans never felt.

ators

"I see before me the Gladiator lie;

He leans upon his hand-his manly brow
Consents to death, but conquers agony,
And his droop'd head sinks gradually low-

And through his side the last drops, ebbing slow
From the red gash, fall heavy one by one,

Like the first of a thunder-shower; and now

The arena swims around him-he is gone;

Ere ceased the inhuman shout which hail'd the wretch who won.

"He heard it, but he heeded not-his eyes

Were with his heart, and that was far away:
He reck'd not of the life he lost, nor prize,
But where his rude hut by the Danube lay,
There were his young barbarians all at play,
There was their Dacian mother-he, their sire,
Butcher'd to make a Roman holiday!"

C

25. If it makes us shudder to hear of these dreadful and piteous scenes, what can have been the effect on those who looked at them; those who sate safe on their raised seats, shouting with delight, while the poor victims were struggling and sinking for their amusement? How it must have hardened their hearts and killed their sympathy! And how wise is Solomon's counsel: "Say not thou, What is the cause that the former days were better than these for thou dost not enquire wisely concerning this."

LECTURE III.-THE BRITONS.

The ancient Britons-their language, religion, education, commerce, and arts-their relations on the Continent-their connection with the great Aryan family-their descendants in the present day.

BC 55. Julius

1. Ir was about fifty-five years before the birth of Christ that Julius Cæsar, one of the greatest of the Roman generals, was in France, or Gaul, as it was then called, with an army. He was one of the most famous of the Romans; not only a victorious soldier, but also in other ways a wonderful man. Some time afterwards he was killed in Rome, as we may read in Shakespeare's play; but we have nothing to do with that now. What most concerns

Cæsar.

us is that he himself wrote long and very interesting histories of his own wars, of which we will read some extracts. You will observe he always speaks of himself in the third person; so he does generally in Shakespeare's play.

Gaul and

Britain.

2. The people of Gaul, though conquered, were not very submissive, and often gave the Romans trouble. When they were rebelling they used to get help from some neighbours, who were even fiercer and more turbulent than themselves. These neighbours came from over the sea; but in some parts the strip of sea was so narrow that the Romans could look across from Gaul to the land opposite, from whence they came, as we can now look from Calais to Dover. Now these Romans, being great fighters, great travellers, very fond of geography, and very fond of exploring, must have found it a great temptation to see that land dimly in the distance. Was it an island? was it part of the Continent? who lived there? what grew there? At any rate these troublesome barbarians must be put down.

3. Before this time there had been sometimes merchants coming and going. There was one thing to be got in Britain which was very rare everywhere else, and, indeed, is so stilltin. Nearly all the tin in Europe until quite lately came from Cornwall and the isles of Scilly, though a great deal is now brought from Banca, in India. It is almost certain that the "bronze

people, who lived not only in England, but also were scattered over great part of Europe, got the tin to mix with their copper from Cornwall. Most probably, also, the Phoenicians, who were the great traders of old, knew something of the southern parts of Britain, for though the Romans were afraid of passing the "pillars of Hercules," the Phoenicians had founded a colony at Cadiz, on the shores of the Atlantic Ocean; and, as they were good sailors, those colonists might easily have found their way to Cornwall.

4. But by this time the trade in tin, and perhaps in skins also, was carried on between the ports of Gaul and Britain. What sort of people were living here at this, which we may call the beginning of the historical period, though not yet of the history of England?

5. The last people we heard of were those who made bronze implements. The inhabitants of Britain had now learnt to use iron. That is far more difficult to work than copper The Britons. and tin; so they must have improved greatly in skill, or they must have been another race of people. We will leave that question for the present, and find out what we can of the people, the Britons themselves.

6. We learn this not from any writings of their own, but from what the Romans tell us. They, it would seem, took as much interest in the matter as we do in Fi-ji, or any of the remote islands and countries we have annexed. Just as Captain Cook wrote accounts of the Sandwich Islands, so did the Romans about Britannia. And, as we have several of their books, or parts of them, remaining, we, at least, know what they can tell us.

7. We soon find out that the people were very brave, fierce, and quarrelsome; though Julius Cæsar says that those who lived in Kent were the most civilized. As they were the Dwellings. nearest to France, they had perhaps learnt politeness from the French. He tells us that the island was well peopled, and full of houses, built after the manner of the Gauls. We learn from another Roman, Strabo, what sort of houses the Gauls had. They were constructed of poles and wattled or hurdle-work; round, and with lofty, tapering, and pointed roofs. They do not seem to have had any windows or chimneys, and must have looked rather like huge bee-hives. A very delightful old English writer, Fuller, who tells the history of Christianity in our island, describes the difference between a common house and a palace. The "palace," though also built of hurdle-work,