landed. The territory still standing out was North Wales, and that was at once subdued.

According to Tacitus, when the general had completed his conquests, he set to the task of subduing the hearts of the conquered people by assimilating them to the Roman civilisation. The method in which this end was usually accomplished, was a frugal distribution of the municipal privileges proper to incorporated Roman states. We are told that before the third season he had, by the conciliatory wisdom of his administration, given currency among the natives to the Roman dress and literature, and stimulated them to build temples and improved dwellings-and all within two years, a rather brief period for so great an achievement. The assimilation laid still stronger bonds on the natives by infecting them with Roman luxuries and vices. This is said in a spirit that would reveal the heartless cynic, were it not clear that it is a passing hit at the social condition of Rome and the morals of the court of Tiberius.

We do not know where he crossed the border, though an examination of the vestiges of the Roman progress in Scotland renders it likely that he marched along the east coast to the neighbourhood of Edinburgh.'

1 The ordinary editions of Tacitus say that in its third year the expedition found itself among new tribes, and wasted the country as far as the estuary of the Taus. Hence it has been written in history that Agricola in that year devastated Scotland as far as the Firth of Tay. It is probable that the name of the Tay is derived from this Taus of Tacitus. In the search among existing local names for the origin of names used by authors such as Cæsar or Tacitus, the etymological process has sometimes to be suddenly reversed, and it is found that the modern name is derived from that of the classic author. Should it be found that the usual editions of such an author are in error-that from a blunder of an editor or a compositor in an editio princeps the world has missed the name for nearly four hundred years-a grand new ele

The inhabitants were warlike and accustomed to bloody battles, but they had never experienced anything like the relentless pressure of a Roman invasion. If they suffered a defeat one day, they expected to retrieve it by a surprise on the next. Driven before the compact legionary force in the summer, they expected to starve it out in the winter. But they had to deal with an enemy which, when not upon the march, was sheltered by the intrenchments of an impregnable camp; and when the winter came, it found the invading army distributed in strong and comfortable fortresses amply victualled.

The next season was occupied in bringing under subjection the people of the territory occupied by Roman troops. The neck of land between the Firths of Clyde and Forth appears to have been the boundary where the general found that the outer line of Roman acquisition could be most effectually marked; and this

ment of confusion is cast in among the etymological and geographical difficulties. That is exactly what has happened to the Taus Estuarius. Herr Karl Wex edited the Agricola of Tacitus in 1852, comparing the usual text with the best extant manuscripts. Among other corrections, for Taus he reads Tanaus. This opens up questions about the English and Scotch Tynes, and the corrector tries to settle the difficulty he has started by the rather strong supposition that the Scots Tyne had an estuary in the time of Agricola. There will be other questions, however, to adjust with other waters on the east coast, the Touai, the Taoua, and the Tinna of Ptolemy-all already sufficiently perplexing to the geographer. On one point, however, Herr Wex makes satisfactory use of his discovery. By the history of the war, as usually founded on Tacitus, we are perplexed by finding that in the third year of the expedition Agricola fought his way rapidly to the Tay, and that two years afterwards he made his way, as it would seem with much more difficulty, to the Forth. Having commented on this discrepancy, the corrector goes back and comments on his own commentary, saying that those who believe Agricola to have fought a great battle in Aberdeenshire "tamen tertio jam anno Agricolam usque ad Taum progressum putare, quem errorem supra castigavimus."-Wex, Prolegomena, 105,

line is identified by the descriptive remark of Tacitus, that the natives, when crossing it, were driven, as it were, into another island. He drops a reflection on the aptness of such a boundary for the empire, if the bravery of the Roman army, and the far reach of the Roman ambition, could contemplate a boundary. Agricola ran defensive works across this line; and these were the beginning of the fortified rampart, renewed and strengthened from time to time, of which some remnants may still be seen. In the fifth season we are told that the general had several conflicts with the natives, and that he lined the coast opposite to Ireland with troops, not so much for the protection of the British territories, as with a view to further conquests. Ireland was a desirable acquisition, as it lay between Britain and Spain, and would finally round off the Roman empire in the north-west. Even in the possession of barbarians like the British, its harbours were frequented by many traders. Agricola cultivated the acquaintance of a certain Regulus, prince or chief of Ireland, driven forth by political animosities; and the general, probably founding on the information so obtained, often remarked to his son-in-law, that with one legion and a few auxiliaries Ireland might be annexed to the empire.

Meanwhile sinister rumours reached the general about the movements of the Caledonians, as Tacitus calls them;-his is the earliest known use of the name, and he applies it to the dwellers in the land north of the Bodotria or Forth. It was said that they were organising a great confederacy to drive out the invaders. A sixth season-the third of the war in Scotland-was approaching, and the general resolved, that a wiser plan than abiding within the fortified line would be, to

advance northwards, and let the Caledonians feel the weight of the Roman arms in their own strongholds. While he marched northwards, apparently by the east coast, the fleet of transports attended, crossing the firth and creeping along the coast. This gave the barbarians the sight of a new symbol of Roman power. Tacitus gives us a lively picture of camp life, showing how closely the fleet and the army co-operated. The soldiers and mariners would meet together in camp, and tell each other the adventures they had encountered, and the marvels they had seen-the one set discoursing of the forests they had penetrated, the rugged mountains they had scrambled over, the barbarians they had fought; while the others dwelt on the dangers of the deep and their nautical triumphs.

The barbarians were driven nigh to despair, but they still determined to resist. They made a sudden attack on some of the stations, and so shook the confidence of the Roman army that some of the prudent counselled an immediate retreat behind the line of forts stretching from the Forth to the Clyde.

The Roman general broke up his army, and moved it in three divisions. He had doubtless sufficient reasons for this tactic, but they are not made quite clear by his biographer's statement, that he had heard how the enemy were to fall upon him in several separate bodies, and that he looked with some alarm to an attack by overwhelming numbers having a superior knowledge of the ground.

The divisions do not seem to have been far apart; for one night, when the weakest of the three-being the ninth legion-was suddenly attacked, Agricola himself came to the rescue. The affair was memorable,

Roman camp.

since the barbarians fought their way through the guards and ramparts into the sacred precincts of the When day dawned, the barbarians had to fight the ninth legion on the one side, and the reinforcements on the other. The chief struggle was at the gates of the camp, where those who had entered seem to have been forcing their way out. The Romans were the victors; and the historian says that, but for the help which the marshes and forests gave the barbarians in their flight, the affair would have ended the war.

The historian next gives a lively sketch of the effect of this success on the demoralised Roman army. It caused a revulsion from despondency to exultation and bravado so extravagant as to be little consistent with our notion of the disciplined stoicism of the Roman soldier. Those who were the most dubious before were ready for anything, and demanded to be led to the farthest extremity of the island. Still the barbarians were not tamed; and it was known, as the season passed, that they were combining from various quarters to strike a great blow, while they were removing their wives and children to a place of safety. So stood both armies when winter came

on.

The next season was to be the decisive one. The Roman army marched onwards to a spot called the Mons Grampius, and there they found the enemy, upwards of thirty thousand strong, under a leader whom the historian calls Galgacus. They occupied a rising-ground, whence they spread down upon the plain. Agricola, afraid of being outflanked, stretched his line till it became thinner than some of his advisers