o supply the place of true
history, ought entirely to be disregarded; or if any exception be
admitted to this general rule, it can only be in favor of the ancient
Grecian fictions, which are so celebrated and so agreeable, that they
will ever be the objects of the attention of mankind. Neglecting,
therefore, all traditions, or rather tales, concerning the more early
history of Britain, we shall only consider the state of the inhabitants
as it appeared to the Romans on their invasion of this country: we shall
briefly run over the events which attended the conquest made by that
empire, as belonging more to Roman than British story: we shall hasten
through the obscure and uninteresting period of Saxon annals; and shall
reserve a more full narration for those times, when the truth is both
so well ascertained, and so complete, as to promise entertainment and
instruction to the reader.

All ancient writers agree in representing the first inhabitants of
Britain as a tribe of the Gauls or Celtae, who peopled that island from
the neighboring continent. Their language was the same, their manners,
their government, their superstition; varied only by those small
differences which time or a communication with the bordering nations
must necessarily introduce. The inhabitants of Gaul, especially in those
parts which lie contiguous to Italy, had acquired, from a commerce with
their southern neighbors, some refinement in the arts, which gradually
diffused themselves northwards, and spread but a very faint light over
this island. The Greek and Roman navigators or merchants (for there
were scarcely any other travellers in those ages) brought back the most
shocking accounts of the ferocity of the people, which they magnified,
as usual, in order to excite the admiration of their countrymen. The
south-east parts, however, of Britain had already, before the age
of Caesar, made the first and most requisite step towards a civil
settlement; and the Britons, by tillage and agriculture, had there
increased to a great multitude.[*]

[* Caesar, lib. iv.]

The other inhabitants of the island still maintained themselves by
pasture: they were clothed with skins of beasts: they dwelt in huts,
which they reared in the forests and marshes, with which the country was
covered: they shifted easily their habitation, when actuated either by
the hopes of plunder or the fear of an enemy: the convenience of feeding
their cattle was even a sufficient motiv