14/40 But they were all of an inactive character. The victory obtained by Paulinus had disabled the Britons from any new attempt. Content, therefore, with recovering the Roman province, these generals compounded, as it were, with the enemy for the rest of the island. They caressed the troops; they indulged them in their licentiousness; and not being of a character to repress the seditions that continually arose, they submitted to preserve their ease and some shadow of authority by sacrificing the most material parts of it. And thus they continued, soldiers and commanders, by a sort of compact, in a common neglect of all duty on the frontiers of the Empire, in the face of a bold and incensed enemy. |