them in the forest. No; I promised to walk so far with you, but I
go no farther. How long will you be there?"

"Two hours at most, I should say."

"The sun is halfway down, Beric; I will wait for you till it touches
that hill over there. Till then you will find me sitting by the
first tree at the spot where we left the forest."

Beric nodded and walked on towards the town. The lad, for he was
not yet sixteen, was the son of Parta, the chieftainess of one of
the divisions of the great tribe of the Iceni, who occupied the
tract of country now known as Suffolk, Norfolk, Cambridge, and
Huntingdon. This tribe had yielded but a nominal allegiance to
Cunobeline, and had held aloof during the struggle between Caractacus
and the Romans, but when the latter had attempted to establish
forts in their country they had taken up arms. Ostorius Scapula,
the Roman proprietor, had marched against them and defeated them
with great slaughter, and they had submitted to the Roman authority.
The Sarci, the division of the tribe to which Beric belonged, had
taken a leading part in the rising, and his father had fallen in
the defence of their intrenchments.

Among the British tribes the women ranked with the men, and even
when married the wife was often the acknowledged chief of the
tribe. Parta had held an equal authority with her husband, and at
his death remained sole head of the subtribe, and in order to ensure
its obedience in the future, Ostorius had insisted that her only
son Beric, at that time a boy of eleven, should be handed over to
them as a hostage.