It appears therefore, that before our æra, sheep, and probably goats, were bred extensively in England, their milk and flesh being used for food, and their skins with the wool or hair upon them for clothing; and that the people of Kent, who were of Belgic origin, and more refined than the original Britons, had attained to the arts of spinning and weaving, although their productions were only of the coarsest description. Eumenius, the Rhetorician, who was a native of Augustodunum, now called Autun, delivered his Panegyric in praise of the Emperors Constantius and Constantine in the city of Treves about A. D. 310. In the following passage he congratulates Britain on its various productions, and also on the circumstance, that Constantine had been recently declared Emperor at York on the death of his father: O fortunate Britain, now the happiest country upon earth; for thou hast been the first to see Constantine made Emperor. It was fit that on thee Nature should bestow every blessing of climate and of soil. Suffering neither from the excessive severity of winter, nor the heat of summer, thy harvests are so fruitful as to supply all the gifts both of Ceres and of Bacchus; thy woods contain no savage beasts, thy land no noxious serpents, but an innumerable multitude of tame cattle, distended with milk, and loaded with fleeces[359]. [359] Panegyrici Veteres, ed. Cellarii, Halæ Magd. 1703. pp. 147, 148. The improvements in sheep-breeding which were first introduced into England by the Belgians, appear to have been advanced still further by the Saxons. The only country, which now remains to be surveyed in relation to the production of sheep’s wool, is Spain; and, as this kingdom retains its pre-eminence at the present day,[360] so we find none, in which sheep-breeding was carried to a greater extent in ancient times. [360] For accounts of the state of sheep-breeding in modern Spain, including the annual migration of the flocks, which is conducted there as in Italy, the reader is referred to “Travels through Portugal and Spain in 1772, 1773, by R. Twiss,” pp. 72-82; and to De la Borde’s View of Spain, vol. iv. pp. 45-61, English Translation. London, 1809.