Ossian Collection > Thoughts on the origin and descent of the Gael

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" and mangled the runaways; they seized their
" prisoners, and, to be ready for others, butcher-
" ed them on the spot."*
It can admit of no doubt, that fighting in cha-
riots was practised by all the British nations ; a
circumstance which powerfidly indicates their
Gallic extraction.
That the Gauls practised this mode of fight-
ing in their battles against the Romans, in the
earher periods of their history, we have the au-
thority of Propertius, in these lines :
** Claudius a Rheno trajectos arciiit hosles
" Belgica cum vasti panna relata duels
** Virdoniaii ;+ genus hie Rheno jactabat ab ipso
*' Nobiiis ereetis fuudere gesa rotis.
" Illi virgatis jaculantis ab agmiiie braechis
*' Torqnis ab incisa decidit unca gula."|
Virdomarus is here represented as a general
of huge stature, clothed in striped braccha?, or
garment of various colours, flinging his darts
from a lofty chariot.
" Bis avertere Gallicum equitatum iterum Ion-
" gius evectos, et jam inter media equitum agmi-
"^ Murphy's Taeilus.
■\ Virdomarus is a compound of three Gaelic words, /er, </?/,
mor, man, black, large.
I Propert. 4. 2. 3Q.