This cavalry force was to embark at a separate port, about eighty miles distant from the one from which the infantry were to sail.
[Sidenote: Embarkation of the troops.] At length a suitable day for the embarkation arrived; the troops were put on board the ships, and orders were given to sail.

The day could not be fixed beforehand, as the time for attempting to make the passage must necessarily depend upon the state of the wind and weather.

Accordingly, when the favorable opportunity arrived, and the main body of the army began to embark it took some time to send the orders to the port where the cavalry had rendezvoused; and there were, besides, other causes of delay which occurred to detain this corps, so that it turned out, as we shall presently see, that the foot soldiers had to act alone in the first attempt at landing on the British shore.
[Sidenote: Sailing of the fleet.] [Sidenote: Preparations of the Britons.] It was one o'clock in the morning when the fleet set sail.

The Britons had, in the mean time, obtained intelligence of Caesar's threatened invasion, and they had assembled in great force, with troops, and horsemen, and carriages of war, and were all ready to guard the shore.
The coast, at the point where Caesar was approaching, consists of a line of chalky cliffs, with valley-like openings here and there between them, communicating with the shore, and sometimes narrow beaches below.

When the Roman fleet approached the land, Caesar found the cliffs every where lined with troops of Britons, and every accessible point below carefully guarded.