The British ambassadors carried to him the letter of their countrymen, which was inscribed, "The groans of the Britons." The tenor of the epistle was suitable to its superscription.

"The barbarians," say they, "on the one hand, chase us into the sea; the sea, on the other, throws us back upon the barbarians; and we have only the hard choice left us of perishing by the sword or by the waves."[*] [* Gildas, Bede, lib.i.cap.13.William of Malmesbury, lib.i.cap.1 Alured.Beverl.p.

45.] But AEtius, pressed by the arms of Attila, the most terrible enemy that ever assailed the empire, had no leisure to attend to the complaints of allies, whom generosity alone could induce him to assist.[*] [* Saxon Chron.p.11, edit.

1692.] The Britons, thus rejected, were reduced to despair, deserted their habitations, abandoned tillage, and flying for protection to the forests and mountains, suffered equally from hunger and from the enemy.

The barbarians themselves began to feel the pressures of famine in a country which they had ravaged; and being harassed by the dispersed Britons, who had not dared to resist them in a body, they retreated with their spoils into their own country.[*] [* Alured.