But be this as it may, when Cæsar began to collect intelligence concerning Britain from Gallic merchants, he was presented with information largely untrustworthy, and some of which its furnishers must have known to be false. The statement that some of the British tribes practised polyandry may or may not be true--the traders had no obvious motive for deceiving Cæsar on such a point; but they may themselves have depended upon hearsay evidence. But otherwise they appear to have done their best to misinform the proconsul, with the obvious intention of inducing him to abandon any idea of an invasion. Their motive was clearly trade-jealousy. The whole British trade, which appears to have been considerable, was in their hands; they feared--naturally enough--Italian competition. Then, too, they may have been influenced by political motives. Britain was, as things went, an admirable place of refuge for Gallic organizers of revolt and for defeated leaders. So, as far as one can see, Cæsar’s Gallic informants told him as little as possible. On the one hand, they seem to have done their best to overrate the savage ferocity of the people; on the other, they depreciated the wealth of the island. As they could hardly assert that systematic cultivation of cereals was unknown in the island, they explained that this was the case only in the south-east; elsewhere the people lived on milk and flesh, and, having no knowledge of weaving, dressed in skins. It is difficult to know how far Cæsar was deceived. To some extent he certainly was, for he repeats the false statements which were made to him. It may perhaps seem curious that he did not verify them while in Britain, but, of course, he had military business in plenty to occupy him. His statement about the iron bar currency is the strangest of all, since it is certain that gold coins, struck in imitation of Philip of Macedonia’s gold staters, had been in circulation for not less than a century. It is just possible that he means that iron bars took the place of a copper coinage. It seems incredible that he can have marched for more than a hundred miles into Britain without meeting with some of the gold pieces of which so many survive, even if he had not seen them in Gaul. In that part of Britain with which he was personally acquainted he notes that the population was dense, and dwellings, or groups of dwellings, thickly dotted over the country-side. But it is clear that in many respects his information was very imperfect.