CHAP. VEE. CÆSAR'S SECOND INVASION. Remember, Sir, my liege, The Kings your ancestors; together with The natural bravery of your isle, which stands As Neptune's park, ribbed and paled in With rocks unscaleable, and roaring waters; With sands that will not bear your enemies' boats, But suck them up to the top mast. A kind of conquest Cæsar made here; but made not here his brag SHAKESPERE ISPERATED at the ill success of his first Cantian campaign, Cæsar, immediately after his return to Gaul, directed his lieutenants to prepare a new armament for another expedition into Britain. He ordered the vessels to be constructed in a peculiar form, better adapted for conveying horses than those he had previously employed. We also gather from his details that in consequence of troubles in Kent, Mandac, or Mandubratius, the [eldest] son of Imanuentius, the cean of the Trinobantes, had been banished from his country, and revengefully sacrificing his patriotism, sought service as a spy or guide, in the Roman ranks. All arrangements being com 6 pleted Cæsar in August the 18th, embarked at the Portus Itius with a force of thirty-two thousand men, 6 "In the Gent's. Mag. for September 1816, is an account of "A Visit to the Portus Itius," from which we extract the following:Witsand in medieval Latin is written "Guitsand." "Je trouve," says M. de Walckenaer, "qu'en 1100, Henry 1er, écrivant à Anselme, archévêque de Cantorbéry, qui était en Normandie, lui recommande de venir par Guitsande, et lui apprend qu'il l'attendra à Douvres." He refers to Ducange for ample proof that Witsand was habitually the point of embarkation for Dover between the years 529 and 1327, a period which sufficiently accounts for the Saxon appellation, and for other circumstances connected with the place. The Bay of Wissant is a solitary expanse, a curve of some seven or eight miles; the dreary sandhills take away all view inland, and the sea to us, was relieved by scarcely a single sail on the horizon. The impresssions of the naked feet of two human beings, à la Robinson Crusoe, and a group of dismal looking gulls, were all we saw, until about the centre of the bay, when a fishing boat or two, and a few idlers gave intimation of the neighbouring village. But this is exactly the sort of shore that would have been selected by the antients; it is somewhat sheltered by Cape Grisnez, and well adapted to the practice of hauling up vessels. Such a spot never failed to attract the early Greek and Roman mariner, and such I have often stopped to examine along the coasts of the Mediterranean. Such is Cuma, where the poetical ancestor of Jul. Cæsar drew up his fleet, and first set foot on his promised land, while his unlucky pilot was washed upon a precisely similiar beach at Velia. Turning through the sandhills by an aperture made by a little brook, in about a bundred yards we found ourselves at the humble straggling hamlet of Wissant. The old entrenchment is situated five minutes' walk further on; we went there immediately, and passing though a few clover and wheat fields, resounding with the liquid notes of the quail, we ascended the mound, and stood upon the "Camp de César.”These earth-works are, however, assigned to the Saxons, because they bear a strong resemblance to the Saxon portion of the entrenchments at Dover Castle. But Cæsar's Camp, was in all probability on the site of the present village, that being the most convenient situation in the valley. in eight hundred vessels, after having been wind-bound for twenty-five days." About sunset he weighed anchor and advancing with a gentle wind, continued his course till midnight, when he found himself becalmed; but the tide still urging him on, at day-break he saw Britain on his left. Again following the return of the tide, he energetically rowed to reach that part of the island he had ascertained the preceding year to be the most convenient for landing; and, on this occasion, he commends exceedingly the diligence of the soldiers, who labouring incessantly at the oar, enabled the transports to proceed as swiftly as the gallies. About noon, at the appearance of this amazing armament off the coast, the Britons, who had assembled in considerable force withdrew from the strand into the interior. Cæsar, having arrived off the same spot (Lympne) where he had encamped the preceding year, uninterruptedly disembarked his forces. 8 Becoming acquainted with the place whither "the Britons had retired," through some prisoners he had captured' [?] but, what is more probable, informed by the [8] ? This wind was called CORUS, and blew from the north-west. To win the trophies of immortal fame, Pennie. How curious! "a littore discesserant, ac se in superiora loca abdiderant;" no battle is fought, and yet, Cæsar prevaricatingly endeavours to make it appear, that there had, in which, too, he had been victorious, for, although, he says, the Britons "had retired from the shore, and hid themselves behind the mountains ;"-yet in the first line of the next section he speaks of his prisoners, "ubi ex captivis." traitor Mandubratius of the situation of Dour whern,not only the largest town near the coast, but which, from being the site of a "celebrated sanctuary" was a spot almost certain to be protected or defended ;– about midnight, the active and indefatigable Cæsar departed in that direction in quest of the enemy, after leaving Q. Atrius with ten cohorts and three hundred horsemen to guard his ships, which rode at anchor off a smooth and open beach, apparently secure from any danger of surprise. After a fatiguing night march of twelve hours, Cæsar "came in sight of the British army, posted behind" the river Stour, near Chartham, "from which strong position they attacked the foe," who, desperately defended the passage of the river; " repulsed, however, by the Roman cavalry, they retired towards some woods, into a place strongly fortified by nature and art," the adits being blocked up with an abbatis of trees, which Cæsar imagined had been prepared before, on occasion of some internal civil war; for all the avenues were secured by strong barricades of felled trees piled upon one another." Strong as this fortress was, the soldiers of the seventh legion raised an earth-work, and advancing under cover of their shields, carried the position and drove the Britons away. Cæsar forbad pursuit, the day (August 20,) being too far gone, and employed his men in rendering the entrenchment subservient to his use. 66 Early next morning, Cæsar prepared to assume the offensive, and having divided his army into three divisions, sent them in search of the enemy. Scarcely had the eagles approached within sight of the Britons, than a messenger arrived from the camp on the shore, with the untoward intelligence that during the night a terrific tempest had arisen, and totally wrecked the fleet. Recalling his troops, Cæsar returned to the sea coast with his legions. The misfortune he beheld there, was great indeed; forty vessels irretrievably lost, and the remainder so injured that they appeared useless. With his characteristic energy, he set all his carpenters to work, and sent despatches to Labienus, ordering him to build in Gaul as many ships as possible. Determined, however, to suffer no more losses through his fleet continuing exposed to the action of the tides,10 he resolved, that all the ships should be drawn upon dry land, and enclosed within a naval camp. This laborious and difficult achievement, was accomplished in ten days and nights, by the vigorous and incessant toil of the whole army. 1 It is not our intention to follow Cæsar step by step, from the moment he landed upon the Kentish shore, 10 The Romans knew nothing of tidal irregularities;-and Byron truthfully says of the Mediterranean, that "There shrinks no ebb in that tideless sea, Which changeless rolls eternally, So that wildest of waves, in their angriest mood, Scarce break on the bounds of the land for a rood; And the powerless moon beholds them flow, Heedless if she come or go: Calm or high, in main or bay, On their course she hath no sway. The rock unworn its base doth bare, And looks o'er the surf, but it comes not there; A smooth short space of yellow sand Siege of Corinth. 1 Cæsar says, § 9, "Ten days (dies x consumit) were spent in the service, during which the soldiers had no intermission of fatigue, not even in the night." |