This fence shall bid thee scorn the winds and showers;
The Tyrian lawn pretends no equal powers.
Elphinston's Translation.
In the following epigram of Martial (vi. 11.), addressed to his friend Marcus, we observe a similar opposition between the fine and fashionable cloth of Tyre, and the thick coarse "sagum" produced in Gaul.
Proud Tyrian thine, gross Gaulish mine array:
In purple thee can e'er I love in gray?
Juvenal gives exactly the same account of the woollen manufactures of Gaul. In the following passage the needy dependant of a rich man is speaking of the lacernas from that country, which were sometimes presented to him by his patron.
Some coarse brown cloaks perhaps I chance to get,
Of Gallic fabric, as a fence from wet.
Satir. ix. v. 30.—Owen's Translation.
To the same effect are several passages in the Epistles of Sidonius Apollinaris, who was Bishop of Clermont in Auvergne in the fifth century. He mentions, for example, that the attendants on Prince Sigismer at his marriage wore green Saga with red borders, and he describes a friend of his own as wearing the Endromis[1]. Also in an account of his own villa he speaks of the pipe with seven holes, as the instrument of the shepherds and herdsmen, who used to entertain themselves during the night with musical contests, while their cattle were grazing with bells upon their necks.
All these passages are confirmed and illustrated by the testimony of Strabo. According to him Gaul produced cattle of all kinds[2]. The Belgæ, who occupied the most northern part, opposite to Britain, excelled the rest of the Gauls in their manufactures. Nevertheless their wool was coarse, and was spun and woven by them into the thick Saga, which were both worn by the natives of the country and exported in great quantities to Rome and other parts of Italy. The Roman settlers, indeed,
