11.
These things being known [to him], Caesar orders the
legions and cavalry to be recalled and to cease from their march; he himself
returns to the ships: he sees clearly before him almost the same things which he
had heard of from the messengers and by letter, so that, about forty ships being
lost, the remainder seemed capable of being repaired with much labor. Therefore
he selects workmen from the legions, and orders others to be sent for from the
continent; he writes to Labienus to build as many ships
as he could with those legions which were with him. He himself, though the
matter was one of great difficulty and labor, yet thought it to be most
expedient for all the ships to be brought up on shore and joined with the camp
by one fortification. In these matters he employed about ten days, the labor of
the soldiers being unremitting even during the hours of night. The ships having
been brought up on shore and the camp strongly fortified, he left the same
forces as he did before as a guard for the ships; he sets out in person for the
same place that he had returned from. When he had come thither, greater forces
of the Britons had already assembled at that place, the chief
command and management of the war having been intrusted to
Cassivellaunus, whose territories a river, which is called the
Thames,
separates, from the maritime states at about eighty miles from the sea. At an
earlier period perpetual wars had taken place between him and the other states;
but, greatly alarmed by our arrival, the Britons had placed him
over the whole war and the conduct of it.
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