prowess or their valour; for he held them up to the admiration
of his hearers. "No wonder Rome is great and powerful," he said,
"when its people evince so deep a love of country, so resolute
a determination in the face of their enemies, so unconquerable a
spirit when misfortune weighs upon them."

To the men he addressed all this was new. It was true that a few
princes and chiefs had visited Rome, occasionally as travellers
desiring to see the centre of her greatness, more often as exiles
driven from Britain by defeat in civil strife, but these had only
brought back great tales of Rome's magnificence, and the Britons
knew nothing of the history of the invaders, and eagerly listened
to the stories that Beric had learned from their books in the course
of his studies. The report of his stories spread so far that visits
were paid to the village of Parta by chiefs and leading men from
other sections of the Iceni to listen to them.

Oratory was among the Britons, as among most primitive tribes,
highly prized and much cultivated. Oral tradition among such peoples
takes the place of books among civilized nations. Story and legend
are handed down from father to son, and the wandering bard is a
most welcome guest. Next only to valour oratory sways and influences
the minds of the people, and a Ulysses had greater influence than
an Ajax. From his earliest childhood Beric had listened to the
stories and legends told by bards in the rough palace of his father,
and his sole schooling before he went to Camalodunum had been
to learn these by heart, and to repeat them with due emphasis and
appropriate gesture. His father had been one of the most eloquent
and influential of the chiefs of the Iceni, and had early impressed
upon him the importance of cultivating the power of speech.