tely taking off the mask, they formed an alliance with the Picts
and Scots, and proceeded to open hostility against the Britons.

The Britons, impelled by these violent extremities, ana roused to
indignation against their treacherous auxiliaries, were necessitated to
take arms; and having deposed Vortigern, who had become odious from his
vices, and from the bad event of his rash counsels, they put themselves
under the Command of his son, Vortimer. They fought many battles with
their enemies; and though the victories in these actions be disputed
between the British and Saxon annalists, the progress still made by the
Saxons proves that the advantage was commonly on their side.

[* Chron. Sax. p. 12. W. Malms, p. 11. Hunting,
lib. U. p. 309. Ethelwerd, Brompton, p. 728.]

[** Chron. Sax. p. 12. Alured. Beverl. p. 49.]

[*** Bede, lib. i cap. 15. Nennius, cap. 35. Gildas,
sect 2d.]

In one battle, however, fought at Faglesford, now Ailsford, Horsa, the
Saxon general, was slain and left the sole command over his countrymen
in the hands of Hengist. This active general, continually reenforced
oy fresh numbers from Germany, carried devastation into the most remote
corners of Britain; and being chiefly anxious to spread the terror of
his arms, he spared neither age, nor sex, nor condition, wherever he
marched with his victorious forces. The private and public edifices of
the Britons were reduced to ashes; the priests were slaughtered on the
altars by those idolatrous ravagers; the bishops and nobility shared
the fate of the vulgar; the people, flying to the mountains and deserts,
were intercepted and butchered in heaps: some were glad to accept of
life and servitude under their victors: others, deserting their
native country, took shelter in the province of Armorica; where, being
charitably received by a people of the same language and manners, they
settled in great numbers, and gave the country the name of Brittany.[*]

The British writers assign one cause which facilitated the entrance of
the Saxons into this island--the love with which Vortigern was at
first seized for Rovena, the daughter of Hengist, and which that artful
warrior made use of to blind the eyes of the imprudent monarch.[**]
The same historians add, that Vortimer died; and that Vortigern,
being restored to the throne, accepted of a banquet from Hengist, at
Stonehenge, where three hundred of his nobility were treacherously
slaughte