Page:History of Manchester (1771), Volume 1, by John Whitaker.djvu/260

 Chap. VII. OF MANCHESTER. 229 the former were ftill worne by the generality of the Britons. The former muft have been retained by the chiefs of the coun- try and by the amba&on both of city and country. That this muft have been really the cafe, appears evident from the conduct WF the Gauls, who retained their Virgata Sagula and communi- cated them afterwards to the Franks ,<s. That this was a&ually the cafe, appears more evident from the condudt of the Britons, who muft have equally retained their Saga to the laft as they equally communicated them to the Saxons afterwards ,7. And the plaided drapery of the Britons muft have ftill difplayed its lober variety of colours and its multiplicity of little dies in the ftreets of Mancunium, and have formed a pleaiing contrail to the drefs of the chief, the uniformly darldome mantle of the Italian climes ", The Romans therefore appear plainly not to have foftered any prejudices in the Britons againft the habits of their fathers, or to have endeavoured, with the* policy of the Tartar conquerors of China, to aflimilate the natives to themfelves in the diftinguiih- ing exteriors of drefs. The general drefs of the nation was aftually Britifli, improved only with fome additions from the- -Roman wardrobe* The Britilh chiefs, like the Gallic, certainly retained their antic nt ornament of chains l9 . The Britons in general "muft afl'uredly not have adopted the icanty protection of the Pilcus or the fpreading umbrella of the Pctaius as a covering for their heads, but muft have continued their own. fcappan Hata or Boined in ufe, as they have tranfmitted the fame co- verings to us under the fame appellations tQ. The Ekitans muft have retained the tunic of their ancestors, the long-fleeved waift- coat having remained among us nearly to the prefent period the general £ Aroawica aad Wdk* ;uid-