They had been the means of preventing armies from fighting when on the very verge of battle, and were especially intrusted with the judgment of cases involving human life.

According to Strabo, they and their fellow-countrymen held that souls and the universe were immortal, but that fire and water would sometime prevail.

Sacrifices were never made, Strabo says, without the intervention of the Druids.

Pomponius Mela says that in his time (c.

44 A.D.), though the ancient savagery was no more, and the Gauls abstained from human sacrifices, some traces of their former practices still remained, notably in their habit of cutting a portion of the flesh of those condemned to death after bringing them to the altars.