of Stonehenge. (From a photograph.)]

7. =Phoenicians and Greeks.=--The most civilised nations of the
ancient world were those which dwelt round the Mediterranean Sea. It
was long supposed that the Phoenicians came to Britain from the coast
of Syria, or from their colonies at Carthage and in the south of
Spain, for the tin which they needed for the manufacture of bronze.
The peninsula of Devon and Cornwall is the only part of the island
which produces tin, and it has therefore been thought that the
Cassiterides, or tin islands, which the Phoenicians visited, were to
be found in that region. It has, however, been recently shown that the
Cassiterides were most probably off the coast of Galicia, in Spain,
and the belief that Phoenicians visited Britain for tin must therefore
be considered to be very doubtful. The first educated visitor who
reached Britain was Pytheas, a Greek, who was sent by the merchants of
the Greek colony of Massalia (_Marseilles_) about =330= B.C. to make
discoveries which might lead to the opening across Gaul of a
trade-route between Britain and their city. It was probably in
consequence of the information which he carried to Massalia on his
return that there sprang up a trade in British tin. Another Greek,
Posidonius, who came to Britain about two centuries after Pytheas,
found this trade in full working order. The tin was brought by land
from the present Devon or Cornwall to an island called Ictis, which
was only accessible on foot after the tide had ebbed. This island was
probably Thanet, which was in those days cut off from the mainland by
an arm of the sea which could be crossed on foot at low water. From
Thanet the tin was carried into Gaul across the straits, and was then
conveyed in waggons to the Rhone to be floated down to the
Mediterranean.

8. =Gauls and Belgians in Britain.=--During the time when this trade
was being carried on, tribes of Gauls and Belgians landed in Britain.
The Gauls were certainly, and the Belgians probably, of the same
Celtic race as that which already occupied the island. The Gauls
settled on the east coast as far as the Fens and the Wash, whilst the
Belgians occupied the south coast, and pushed northwards towards the
Somerset Avon. Nothing is known of the relations between the
new-comers and the older Celtic inhabitants. Most likely those who
arrived last contented themselves with mastering those whom they
defeated, without attempting to exterminate them. At all