och. Here was evidently
the base of operations, with accommodation, if need arose, for the entire
Roman army in Scotland.

Having thus viewed the land and pegged out his claim by means of forts,
Agricola returned to winter quarters. In the following summer--the
summer of 81 A.D., he made no forward movement. But he was meditating a
great enterprise--no less an enterprise than to penetrate beyond the Tay
and break the power of the Caledonians in their remote fastnesses. It
behoved him to be cautious, so he constructed the chain of forts which
afterwards became the Wall of Antonine--from Borrowstonness, on the
Forth, to Old Kilpatrick, on the Clyde. Meantime he was laying his plans
with admirable foresight. He entrusted the forts in Strathearn to the
courage of their slender garrisons, and the issue proved that he could do
so safely. But there was unexplored territory westward and eastward.
Nobody knew what dangers might be lurking there, ready to assail him in
rear the moment he left the security of his fortified place. So we find
him in the summer of 82 A.D., in Argyll and Kintyre, with a small force,
not fighting so much, as simply exploring, at one point feasting his
Roman eyes, greedy for conquest, upon the coast of Ireland, seen dimly in
the distance, and perhaps scheming in his heart and head to add it also
at a fitting time to the Roman domains.

Returning from the west country, Agricola entered upon the campaign of
three years' duration, which issued in the Battle of Mons Grampus, the
crowning glory of his arms in Scotland, and the immediate occasion of his
recall. He chose the alternative route this time. From his chain of
forts he could see the broad expanse of the Firth of Forth, the coast of
Fife, the central Lomonds, and the distant hill-country, whose
acquaintance he had already made. That distant point was the goal of his
endeavour, and the shortest way to it was across the Firth of Forth,
through the western division of Fife, and on by one of the Ochil
passes--Glendevon, or some other further east into Strathearn. There was
no time to lose. For, while he was engaged in the subjugation of Fife,
the fleet, after exploring the harbours, had doubled the East Neuk,
passed safely through St Andrews Bay, and entered the Firth of Tay. Its
unexpected appearance caused the greatest consternation among the
Caledonians. The immediate result was to greatly increase the peril in
which the devoted garris