The next year (54 B.C.), a little earlier in the season, Caesar made a second invasion with a much larger force, and penetrated the country a short distance north of the Thames.  Before the September gales set in, he reembarked for the Continent, never to return.

The total results of his two expeditions were a number of natives carried as hostages to Rome, a long train of captives destined to be sold in the slave markets, and some promises of tribute which the Britons never fulfilled.  Tacitus, the Roman historian, says Caesar “did not conquer Britain; he only showed it to the Romans.”

20.  The Third Invasion of Britain by the Romans, 43 A.D.

For nearly a hundred years the Romans made no further attempt on Britain, but in 43 A.D. the Emperor Claudius invaded the island.  After nine years’ fighting, he overcame Caractacus, the leader of the Britons, and carried him in chains to Rome.  The brave chief refused to beg for life or liberty.  “Can it be possible,” said he, as he was led through the streets, “that men who live in such places as these envy us our wretched hovels!” “It was the dignity of the man, even in ruins,” says the Roman historian, “which saved him.”  The Emperor, struck with his bearing and his speech, ordered him to be set free.

21.  The Romans plant a Colony in Britain, Llyn-din.

Meanwhile the armies of the Empire had established a strong colony at Colchester in the southeast of Britain. (See map facing p. 14.) There they built a temple and set up the statue of the Emperor Claudius, which the soldiers worshiped, both as a protecting god and as the representative of the Roman Empire.

The army had also conquered other places.  One of these was a little native settlement on a bend in the Thames where the river broadened slightly.  It consisted of a few miserable huts and a row of intrenched cattle pens.  It was called in the British tongue Llyn-din or the Fort-on-the-pool.  This name, which was pronounced with difficulty by Roman lips, eventually became known wherever ships sail, trade reaches, or history is read,—­London.

22.  Expedition against the Druids.

But in order to complete the conquest of the country, the Roman generals resolved to crush the power of the Druids (S3), since these priests exhorted the Britons to refuse to surrender.  The island of Anglesey, off the northwest coast of Wales, was the stronghold to which the Druids had retreated. (See map facing p. 14.) As the Roman soldiers approached to attack them, they beheld the priests and women standing on the shore, with uplifted hands, uttering “dreadful prayers and imprecations.”

For a moment the Roman troops hesitated; then they rushed upon the Druids, cut them to pieces, and cast their bodies into their own sacred fires.  From this blow Druidism as an organized faith never recovered, though traces of its religious rites still survive in the use of the mistletoe at Christman and in May-day festivals.