midday and midnight, in the third watch, that is between midnight and three o’clock, he started with his five legions and seventeen hundred horse, as he asserts, to seek out the enemy.  Something, we may be sure, more pressing than an attack upon a barbarian foe there was no hurry to meet, must have forced Caesar to march his army sleepless now for two nights, one of which had been spent upon an unusual and anxious adventure at sea, out of camp, in the small hours, into an unknown and roadless country in search of an enemy which had taken to its native hills.  The necessity that forced Caesar to this dangerous course was probably a lack of fresh water.  He was seeking a considerable river, for the smaller streams, as he probably found, could not suffice after a long drought for so great a force as he had landed.

He himself asserts that he advanced “by night” across that roadless and unknown country a distance of twelve miles.  We know of course of what the armies of Caesar were capable in the way of marching; there have never been troops carrying anything like their weight of equipment which have done better than they; but to march something like fifteen thousand men and seventeen hundred horse twelve miles in about three hours into the unknown and the dark, is an impossible proceeding.  That march of “about twelve miles” cannot have occupied less than from six to eight hours, one would think, and the greater part of it must have been accomplished by daylight, which would break about half-past three o’clock.  As we have good reason to think, Caesar’s march, however long a time it may have occupied, was in search of fresh water, and it is significant that when the Britons were at last seen, they “were advancing to the river with their cavalry and chariots from the higher ground.”  In other words, Caesar’s march had brought him into the valley of the Great Stour, where he not only found the water he sought, but also the enemy, who had probably followed his march from the great woods all the way.

[Illustration:  ON THE STOUR NEAR CANTERBURY]

The spot at which Caesar struck the valley was, as we may be sure, that above which the great earthwork stands, opposite Thannington.  Here upon the height was fought the first real battle of Rome upon our soil.  It was opened by the Britons who “began to annoy the Romans and to give battle.”  But the Roman cavalry repulsed them so that they again sought refuge in the woods where was their camp, “a place admirably fortified by nature and by art ... all entrance to it being shut by a great number of felled trees.”  But like all barbarians, the Britons were undisciplined and preferred to fight in detached parties, and as seemed good to each.  Every now and then some of them rushed out of the woods and fell upon the Romans, who continually were prevented from storming the fort and forcing an entry.  Much time was thus wasted until the soldiers of the Seventh Legion, having formed a testudo and