After this victory the Roman general returned to his own country. Caradoc and the other prisoners were carried on board the vessels of the conquerors; and after a voyage of many days they landed upon the strange, unknown shores of Italy.
The Roman people were delighted to hear that the wild, savage island of Britain had at last been subdued, and when the victorious general reached the city they resolved to give him a public triumph.
The emperor and empress sat on thrones in front of their palace while the general was drawn through the streets in a chariot decked with flowers and garlands. All the citizens came out to see him, and the balconies and even the roofs of the houses were crowded with people who shouted and hurrahed and threw up their caps as the conqueror passed by.
Behind the chariot came the troops who had taken part in the victory. The soldiers marched past in fighting array; their helmets and spears garlanded with flowers and with wreaths of laurel, and they looked round them proudly in response to the shouts of their countrymen.
But these were not the only people who took part in the procession.
Immediately behind the general followed the captives whom he had taken in the war; Caradoc with his wife and daughter and the other prisoners who had helped him in his nine years' struggle with the Romans.
As these poor captives passed, loaded with chains, the people in the streets jeered at them and shouted out unkind speeches. Most of the prisoners walked with downcast eyes and sad faces, but Caradoc marched along with so proud a bearing that the spectators wondered at the courage shown by this savage chief. He did not seem to feel the dust and glare, or to be abashed by the hard, unfeeling gaze of the thousands of people who had come out to stare at him.
As he passed he looked at the fine buildings, at the triumphal arches, and the marble palaces, and at the gaily dressed people who thronged the streets. Sometimes he looked up into the sunny Italian sky; and he was evidently thinking deeply. Some one asked him what he was thinking about.
'I was wondering,' said Caradoc, 'how these people could envy me my mud cottage and my few fields so far away in our poor, cold, northern Britain?'
The spectators, who had flocked from all parts of Italy to see the famous chief, began to think it was a pity that so brave a man should be put to death.