The herald-advance. (Milbank, S.D.) 1890-1922, 1911-10-20

raised the Eagle of his legion, and
then jumped into the water.
Follow me my comrades" he cried.
IF you would not see your Eagle
taken by the enemy. II l die | shall
have done my duty to Rome. and to
my general" So the old story goes.
familiar to every %schoolboy, and re-
membered, perhaps, by that soldier
who stood at the salute in Kensington
Gardens.
But whatever stories we may weave
about the boat that has been dug up
from the London mud after nineteen
hundred years OF SO, at least 1t has
come to us as a reminder of the civili-
cation which was enthroned upon the
Thames at London, which carved
great roads through the forest lands,
which built temples and palaces,
baths and terraced gardens, fortified
camps and strong walls, north and
south, east and west, in his island OF
ours. before England" had a name
in history. They did their work well.
those Romans. and though fifteen hun-
dred years have passed since the last
OF them went away into the ghost
world. leaving Britain a prey to savage
hordes, leaving their temples and
their terraces to be the hiding places
of wolves until the stones fell among
the tangled weeds, England has still
many memorials of their rule. Our
motor cars speed upon the highways
down which the Roman legions
marched. Straight from London to
Chester goes Waiting street, and the
Fosse way from Bath to Lincoln. Err
mine street is still a high road from
London to York. and the Via Mariti-
ma" (the seaside road still winds it's
way along the sea coast Of Wales to
Pembrokeshire.
Hardly a year passes but a plow
turns up a pot full of coins which bear
the image and the supersoription OF
Claudius or Constantine, or some
great emperor whose edicts carried as
far as this misty isle. The peasants
spade unearths a tesselated pavement
which formed the floor of a Roman
gentleman's villa, or a stone rudely
carved by a Roman soldier who in
scribed his homage to Mars or Diana
and the old gods in whose worship he
found courage and beauty. Britain
was no mere outpost OF empire held
precariously by a little garrison
among hostile tribes. 1t was a Roman
province, where for nearly -four nun
dred years the Roman law ruled, and
a civilization noble and strong and
hn1ntifnl In ito uyoIlordorol .1
was raised among a conquered people.
who yielded. after the first struggle.
gladly to their ~conquerors. 1t is O
difficult to reconstruct that Roman
civilization in Britain. to coniure IN
h picture Of that civil life in such
cities as Bath, and York. st. Adams
ann Lincoln, where stones of Roman
buildings are found in the walls OF
Norman churches and English battle
ments The officers of Vespasian and
Sever,ls, Titus and Constantine. were
gentlemen of Roman dignity and valor.
and their life In Britain reflected the
splendOr, the. luxury and the beauty
that they had known in the imperial
city.
Most OF us have forgotten those
things. Yet they have a nora for a
race which has founded an empire
greater than that Of Rome, and. like
the Romans. has given its law to many
far colonies. The Roman empire has
persisted. for after strength came
weakness, and the seeds OF vice and
luxury were reaped In a harvest or de.
structiOn. How is II with ,e In ~
perial London? There are some who
hear the distant rumbling OF new
world forces beating against the fan.
ric OF our imperial system. The world.
changes. and no man may foretell the
things that are to come. But always
we may look back and learn the ora
OF the past. and listen to the voices
that speak from old graves.
PHILIP cieea.