and masculine in form. The tones of her voice were harsh, and she had
the countenance of a savage. Her hair was yellow. It might have been
beautiful if it had been neatly arranged, and had shaded a face which
possessed the gentle expression that belongs properly to woman. It
would then have been called golden. As it was, hanging loosely below
her waist and streaming in the wind, it made the wearer only look the
more frightful. Still, Boadicea was not by any means indifferent to
the appearance she made in the eyes of beholders. She evinced her
desire to make a favorable impression upon others, in her own
peculiar way, it is true, but in one which must have been effective,
considering what sort of beholders they were in whose eyes she
figured. She was dressed in a gaudy coat, wrought of various colors,
with a sort of mantle buttoned over it. She wore a great gold chain
about her neck, and held an ornamented spear in her hand. Thus
equipped, she appeared at the head of an army of a hundred thousand
men, and gathering them around her, she ascended a mound of earth and
harangued them--that is, as many as could stand within reach of her
voice--arousing them to sentiments of revenge against their hated
oppressors, and urging them to the highest pitch of determination and
courage for the approaching struggle. Boadicea had reason to deem the
Romans her implacable foes. They had robbed her of her treasures,
deprived her of her kingdom, imprisoned her, scourged her, and
inflicted the worst possible injuries upon her daughters. These things
had driven the wretched mother to a perfect phrensy of hate, and
aroused her to this desperate struggle for redress and revenge. But
all was in vain. In encountering the spears of Roman soldiery, she was
encountering the very hardest and sharpest steel that a cruel world
could furnish. Her army was conquered, and she killed herself by
taking poison in her despair.