Page:Ashorthistoryofwales.djvu/33

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ROME
11

states.The hush of this peace did not last, but the memory of it remained inthe life of every nation that felt it. Unity and law temperedfreedom and change.

The name of Rome was made known, and made terrible, through Wales bya great battle fought on the eastern slopes of the Berwyn. TheRomans had conquered the lands beyond the Severn, and had placedthemselves firmly near the banks of that river at Glevum andUriconium. Glevum is our Gloucester, and its streets are still asthe Roman architect planned them. Uriconium is the burnt and buriedcity beyond Shrewsbury; the skulls found in it, and its implements ofindustry, and the toys of its children, you can see in the ShrewsburyMuseum.

The British leader in the great battle was Caratacus, the general whohad fought the Romans step by step until he had come to the bordersof Wales, to summon the warlike Silures to save their country. We donot know the site of the great battle, though the Roman historianTacitus gives a graphic description of it. The Britons were on ahill side sloping down to a river, and the Romans could only attackthem in front. The enemy waded the river, however, and scaled thewall on its further bank; and in the fierce lance