the district between the Tyne and Tees, for example, to the state of a
savage and solitary forest. The wolves, which Roman authorities describe
as nonexistent in England, again peopled those dreary wastes; and from
the soft civilisation of Rome the inhabitants of the land fell back to
the barbarous manners and customs of the shepherds and hunters of the
German forests. Nor did the independent Britons, who had taken refuge
finally in Wales, or Devon and Cornwall, fare much better. Separated by
their foes from the rest of mankind, they returned to that state of
barbarism from which they had emerged, and became a scandal at last to
the growing civilisation of their English foes.

Under these circumstances the Saxons or English (the Saxons founded the
kingdoms of Wessex and Essex; the Jutes, Kent; the Angles all the
others. The predominance of the latter caused the term English to become
the general appellation.) cared little to inhabit the cities they
conquered; they left them to utter desolation, as in the case described
in the text, until a period came when, as in the case of the first
English assaults upon Exeter and the west country, they no longer
destroyed, but appropriated, while they spared the conquered.

xxv Seaton in Devonshire.

xxvi Elgiva or Aelgifu, signifies fairy gift.

Xxvii

The gate of hell stands open night and day;
Smooth the descent, and easy is the way:
But to return, and view the upper skies--
In this the toil, in this the labour lies.--Dryden.