Julius Cæsar's two invasions of Britain could not have made much difference in the mode of life of the inhabitants of the country. They paid their tribute, and were left alone; and after a time even the tribute seems to have been forgotten. All that remained of his conquest was the graphic, though incomplete, account which Cæsar left of Britain in his "Gallic War," and the lingering memory of this remote outpost of the Empire, a memory which awakened into life at a later date and inspired ambitious emperors and generals with a desire for conquest. After the final departure of Cæsar it was well-nigh a hundred years before the Romans again interfered with the Britons. The period between 54 B.C. and A.D. 43 is obscure in the annals of the island. No doubt commercial intercourse with Gaul was constant, and Roman culture must have percolated slowly {24} into the country by that channel. The names of some of the British kings who ruled have come down to us, and among them Shakespeare's Cymbeline. It was in the year A.D. 43, during the reign of the emperor Claudius, that the Roman general Aulus Plautius set out at the head of four legions to re-conquer Britain. While the campaign was still in progress the emperor himself arrived; but his sojourn was only sixteen days in duration, and to him belongs none of the credit for the conquest. It was against Caratacus and Togodumnus, sons of the late king Cunobelinus, that Aulus Plautius directed his march. Their capital was Camulodunum, the modern Colchester. Many of the neighbouring tribes espoused the Roman cause; and in four years' time Aulus was able to return to Rome, having completed the task of conquering south-eastern England from Kent to Norfolk.