" At that time Arthur fought against them (the Sax ons) ; for lie was the leader of the wars.
" The first battle was at the mouth of the river, which is called Glcni : the second, third, fourth, and fifth, on another river, which is called Duglas the sixth, on a river which is named Bassas. The seventh was in the wood of Celydon, that is, Cath coed Celydon. The eighth was at Castle Guinion ; in which Arthur carried an effigy of the blessed Mary, always virgin, on his shoulders : and the Pagans were put to flight on that day, and many fell; and there was a great slaughter of them through the strength of our Lord Jesus Christ, and through the strength of the blessed Virgin Mary his mother. The ninth battle was fought at the city of the Legion. He fought the tenth battle on the shore of the river which is called Tribuit. The eleventh battle took place on the mountain which is denominated Assuet, otherwise Catregomon. The twelfth battle was on mount Badon ; in which fell, in one day, nine hundred'and sixty men, by one onset of Arthur.
" And none overthrew them (the Saxons) except him self alone ; and in all his wars he was victorious. And the barbarians, while they were overthrown in all the battles, sought assistance from Germany, and were mul tiplied by continual reinforcements." By none of these original and genuine authorities is Arthur held up as a prodigy, going forth in his might to trample the affrighted nations under his feet. They mention his name, and recount his exploits, in terms of just admiration ; but at the same time, in that strain of sober probability, which became the recorders of re cent events. In our verbal translation of Nennius, we have obviated a most gross, though hitherto universal, misconception of his meaning. His words do not neces sarily imply, what seems, from the common punctuation, and the inveterate tradition, to be their import ; that Arthur, single-handed, slew near a thousand men, and that none else assisted him ! They merely state, by a common figure, that the general, in one attack, destroyed nine hundred and sixty of the enemy, who were en trenched ; and that of all the British chiefs, who in these clays engaged the Saxons, Arthur alone was victorious : Corruerunt-de nno inipetu .3rthuri, (not UNIUS in/f/COZ .irthuri). Et ncmo prostravit cos nisi ijisie Bolus; et in omnibus brills, victor extitit.
We must not, however, conceal from our readers, that neither the earlier Saxon annals, nor the history of Gildas, a cotemporary writer, make any mention of king Arthur. The Saxon annals arc, as might be ex
pected, confused and partial, totally suppressing several events disgraceful to their own nation. Thus, the great defeat at Mount Batton is not even hinted at in these writings ; yet that event is established, not only by the respectable evidence which we have already adduced, but by the unsuspected testimony of Gildas. This au thor omits the name of the general ; hut as Nennius and Taliessin are positive in assigning the exploit to our hero, and as no other leader of note flourished at the same period, Ambrosius and Natanleod being dead long before, it were a rash conclusion to affirm, that the silence of Gildas, in an incidental allusion to the battle, is fatal to the reality of Arthur. It were disingenuous to quote fables as authorities ; but were it certain, as the old traditions pretend, that Arthur had killed Hoel, the brother of Gildas, in battle, and driven that author him sell out of the island, we then see a reason on the part of Giiaas, for suppressing all mention of Arthur, and for those dolorous eitusions vented by that miserable rhetorician against the British princes, from his residence in Armorica.
Arthur, according to the most probable accounts, was the hereditary prince of the proper Silures in South Wales. In the earlier annals of that country, he is also denominated king of Gwent, that city, the Venta Silurum of the Romans, acing the capital of his dominions. Be this nowever as it may, the valour of the Britons was never more conspicuously displayed, nor more success fully exerted, than unuer the conduct of this " head of the kings." At his accession to the command, his countrymen were sunk to the lowest pitch of depravity, the natural consequence of their long subjection to the Romans ; and they accoroingly presented but a cowardly and feeble opposition to the encroachments of the Sax ons. Novices in the art of war, and commanded by chieftains, whom Gildas represents as the most bar barous and treacherous of mankind, the Britons were constantly beaten and disheartened, the flower of their armies cut to pieces, and tneir hopes of independence totally extinguished. Besides all these deplorable cir cumstances, their partial successes, obtained by despair rather than courage, were rendered of no avail, by the incredible swarms which arrived to reinforce the enemy ; some of whose continental dominions were, for this pur pose, divested of their entire population.