148
GEOFFREY'S BRITISH HISTORY.
[BOOK IV.
following spring returned into Gaul.[1] At length he assembled all his forces, and marched towards Rome against Pompey.
Chap. XI.—Tenuantius is made king of Britain after Cassibellaun.
After seven years had expired, Cassibellaun died and was buried at York. He was succeeded by Tenuantius, duke of Cornwall, and brother of Androgeus: for Androgeus was gone to Rome with Cæsar. Tenuantius therefore, now wearing the crown, governed the kingdom with diligence. He was a warlike man, and a strict observer of justice. After him Kymbelinus his son was advanced to the throne, being a great soldier, and brought up by Augustus Cæsar. He had contracted so great a friendship with the Romans, that he freely paid them tribute when he might have very
- ↑ "Cæsar's expedition against the Britons was of singular boldness; for he was the first who proceeded with a fleet to the Western Ocean, and sailed over the Atlantic Sea, conducting an army to war; and being desirous of possessing an island, for its size hardly believed in, and giving occasion for much controvery to various writers, as if a name and a tale had been invented of a place which never had been nor was yet in existence, he advanced the dominion of the Romans beyond the limits of the known world; and having twice sailed over to the island from the opposite coast of Gaul, and having rather worsted his enemies in many battles, than advantaged his own soldiers, for there was nothing worth taking from men who had a bare subsistence and were poor, he terminated the war not in the way he wished; but taking hostages from the king, and appointing tributes, he departed from the island."—PLUTARCH. This is the language of a writer favourable to the reputation of Cæsar, and may teach us how worthless are the old British or rather Welsh legends in comparison with the classic historians.But the classic historians deal sometimes in fables. Witness the following quotation from Polyænus:"Cæsar attempting to pass a large river in Britain, Cassoiaulus, king of the Britons, obstructed him with many horsemen and chariots. Cæsar had in his train a very large elephant, an animal hitherto unseen by the Britons. Having armed him with scales of iron, and put a large tower upon him, and placed therein archers and slingers, he ordered them to enter the stream. The Britons were amazed at beholding a beast till then unseen, and of an extraordinary nature. As to the horses, what need to write of them? since even among the Greeks, horses fly on seeing elephants even without harness, but this towered and armed, and casting darts and slinging, they could not endure even to look upon the sight. The Britons therefore fled with their horses and chariots. Thus the Romans passed the river without molestation, having terrified the enemy by a single animal."
