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CHAP. refuge of weakness or pufillanimity, the legions were encamped on the banks of the great rivers, and along the frontiers of the barbarians. As their stations, for the most part, remained fixed and permanent, we may venture to defcribe the dif tribution of the troops. Three legions were fufficient for Britain. The principal ftrength lay upon the Rhine and Danube, and confifted of fixteen legions, in the following proportions: two in the Lower and three in the Upper Germany; one in Rhætia, one in Noricum, four in Pannonia, three in Mafia, and two in Dacia. The defence of the Euphrates was entrusted to eight legions, fix of whom were planted in Syria, and the other two in Cappadocia. With regard to Egypt, Africa, and Spain, as they were far removed from any important scene of war, a fingle legion maintained the domeftic tranquillity of each of thofe great provinces. Even Italy was not left deftitute of a military force. Above twenty thousand chosen foldiers, diftinguished by the titles of City Cohorts and Prætorian Guards, watched over the fafety of the monarch and the capital. As the authors of almost every revolution that distracted the empire, the Prætorians will, very foon, and very loudly, demand our attention; but in their arms and inftitutions, we cannot find any circumftance which difcriminated them from the legions, unless it were a more fplendid appearance, and a lefs rigid discipline".

Navy!

The navy maintained by the emperors might feem inadequate to their greatness; but it was fully fufficient for every useful purpose of govern

ment. The ambition of the Romans was confined to the land; nor was that warlike people ever actuated by the enterprifing fpirit which had prompted the navigators of Tyre, of Carthage, and even of Marseilles, to enlarge the bounds of the world, and to explore the most remote coafts of the ocean. To the Romans the ocean remained an object of terror rather than of curiofity"; the whole extent of the Mediterranean after the deftruction of Carthage, and the extirpation of the pirates, was included within their provinces. The policy of the emperors was directed only to preferve the peaceful dominion of that fea, and to protect the commerce of their fubjects. With thefe moderate views, Auguftus ftationed two permanent fleets in the moft convenient ports of Italy, the one at Ravenna, on the Adriatic, the other at Mifenum, in the bay of Naples. Experience feems at length to have convinced the ancients, that as foon as their gallies exceeded two, or at the most three ranks of oars, they were fuited rather for vain pomp than for real service. Auguftus himself, in the victory of Actium, had feen the fuperiority of his own light frigates (they were called Liburnians) over the lofty but unwieldy caftles of his rival ". Of these Liburnians he compofed the two fleets of Ravenna and Mifenum, destined to command, the one the eastern, the other the western divifion of the Mediterranean; and to each of the fquadrons he attached a body of feveral thousand marines. Besides these two ports, which may be confidered as the principal feats of

CHAP.
I.

СНАР,

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the Roman navy, a very confiderable force was stationed at Frejus, on the coast of Provence and the Euxine was guarded by forty ships, and three thousand foldiers. To all thefe we add the fleet which preferved the communication between Gaul and Britain, and a great number of veffels conftantly maintained on the Rhine and Danube,, to harass the country, or to intercept the passage of the barbarians ". If we review this general ftate of the Imperial forces; of the cavalry as well as infantry; of the legions, the auxiliaries, the guards, and the navy; the most liberal computation will not allow us to fix the entire Amount of the establishment by fea and by land at more than four hundred and fifty thousand men: a military power, which, however formidable it may feem, was equalled by a monarch of the laft century, whofe kingdom was confined within a fingle province of the Roman empire View of the We have attempted to explain the spirit which provinces of moderated, and the strength which supported, the power of Hadrian and the Antonines. We shall now endeavour, with clearness and precision, to describe the provinces once united under their fway, but, at prefent, divided into fo many independent and hoftile ftates.

whole efta

blishment.

the Roman.

empire.

Spain.

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Spain, the western extremity of the empire, of Europe, and of the ancient world, has, in every age, invariably preferved the fame natural limits; the Pyrenæan mountains, the Mediterranean, and the Atlantic Ocean. That great peninfula, at prefent fo unequally divided between two fovereigns,

I.

was diftributed by Auguftus into three provinces, CHAP. Lufitania, Bætica, and Tarraconenfis. The kingdom of Portugal now fills the place of the warlike country of the Lufitanians; and the lofs fuftained by the former, on the fide of the Eaft, is compenfated by an acceffion of territory towards the North. The confines of Grenada and Andalufia correfpond with thofe of ancient Bætica. The remainder of Spain, Gallicia and the Afturias, Bifcay and Navarre, Leon and the two Caftilles, Murcia, Valencia, Catalonia, and Arragon, all contributed to form the third and most confiderable of the Roman governments, which, from the name of its capital, was styled the province of Tarragona Of the native barbarians, the Celtiberians were the most powerful, as the Cantabrians and Afturians proved the most obftinate. Confident in the ftrength of their mountains, they were the last who fubmitted to the arms of Rome, and the first who threw off the yoke of the Arabs.

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Ancient Gaul, as it contained the whole country between the Pyrenees, the Alps, the Rhine, and the Ocean, was of greater extent than modern France. To the dominions of that powerful monarchy, with its recent acquifitions of Alface and Lorráine, we must add the dutchy of Savoy, the cantons of Switzerland, the four electorates of the Rhine, and the territories of Liege, Luxemburgh, Hainault, Flanders, and Brabant. When Auguftus gave laws to the conquefts of his father, he introduced a divifion of Gaul equally adapted to the progress of the legions, to the course of the rivers, and to the principal national diftinctions,

Gaul.

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CHAP. which had comprehended above an hundred independent states ". The fea - coaft of the Mediterranean, Languedoc, Provence, and Dauphiné, received their provincial appellation from the colony of Narbonne. The government of Aquitaine was extended from the Pyrenees to the Loire. The country between the Loire and the Seine was styled the Celtic Gaul, and foon borrowed a new denomination from the celebrated colony of Lugdunum, or Lyons The Belgic lay beyond the Seine, and in more ancient times had been bounded only by the Rhine; but a little before the age of Cæfar, the Germans, abufing their fuperiority of valour, had occupied a confiderable portion of the Belgic territory. The Roman conquerors very eagerly embraced fo flattering a circumftance, and the Gallic frontier of the Rhine, from Bafil to Leyden, received the pompous names of the Upper and the Lower Germany ". Such, under the reign of the Antonines, were the fix provinces of Gaul; the Narbonnese, Aquitaine, the Celtic, or Lyonnefe, the Belgic, and the two Germanies.

Britain.

We have already had occafion to mention the conqueft of Britain, and to fix the boundary of the Roman province in this island. It comprehended all England, Wales, and the Lowlands of Scotland, as far as the Friths of Dunbarton and Edinburgh. Before Britain loft her freedom, the country was irregularly divided between thirty tribes of barbarians, of whom the most confiderable were the Belge in the Weft, the Brigantes in the North, the Silures in South Wales, and