Early Britain Author:Alfred John Church Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: II. C4LSAR IN BRITAIN. IN the year 55 B.C. Caius Julius Caesar, who had been appointed four years before to a five years' command in Gaul,1 had conquered t... more »he whole of that country. The conquest, indeed, was not as complete as he seems to have imagined. Again and again the people rose against him, and five years more of fighting were required before the work could be said to have been thoroughly done. Still towards the end of the campaigning season in 55 he had carried his arms as far as the Ocean on the west, the Channel on the north, and the Rhine on the east. He had even crossed the Rhine, and ravaged the territory of certain German tribes beyond it. Then, after the manner of conquerors, he looked about for fresh enterprises in which to employ his troops, and it occurred to him to invade the neighbouring island of Britain. One ofC3ESAR PREPARES TO CROSS. 13 1 This command was voted, as the result of a political compact, in 59. In the following year Caesar left Rome for his province, which included Illyricum and the two divisions of Gaul (south and north of the Alps). Illyricum and Cisalpine Gaul were already Roman provinces, as was also, in Transalpine Gaul, the region known as the Provincia, South-eastern France, reaching northwards as far as the Cevennes, and westward to the Upper Garonne. his reasons, as he states it himself in his Commentaries (i.e., Notes on his Campaigns), was that he had found that the natives of Britain were in the habit of assisting the Gaul in their resistance to his armies. JmaYJ-1owpvr-r he do11htedvberhpr this considera- Jojiffi£igliedarrjicjiwithjTirn. W1tn the LhanneTconv manded, as it was, by Roman fleets, the Britons could have given but very little help to their .neighbours across the sea. The summer was nearly over, but he thought ...« less