been before; and a tale, preserved by Florence, tells us that eight
tributary kings rowed Eadgar in his royal barge on the Dee, in token of
their complete subjection. Internally, Dunstan revived the declining
spirit of monasticism, which had died down during the long struggle with
the Danes, and attempted to reintroduce some tinge of southern
civilisation into the barbarised and half-paganised country in which he
lived. Wherever it was possible, he "drove out the priests, and set
monks," and he endeavoured to make the monasteries, which had
degenerated during the long war into mere landowning communities, regain
once more their old position as centres of culture and learning. During
his own time his efforts were successful, and even after his death the
movement which he had begun continued in this direction to make itself
felt, though in a feebler and less intelligent form.

[2] It is impossible to avoid noticing the increased
importance of semi-Celtic Britain under Dunstan's
administration. He was himself at first an abbot of the old
West Welsh monastery of Glastonbury: he promoted West
countrymen to the principal posts in the kingdom: and he had
Eadgar hallowed king at the ancient West Welsh royal city of
Bath, married to a Devonshire lady, and buried at
Glastonbury. Indeed, that monastery was under Dunstan what
Westminster was under the later kings. Florence uses the
strange expression that Eadgar was chosen "by the
Anglo-Britons:" and the meeting with the Welsh and Scotch
princes in the semi-Welsh town of Chester conveys a like
implication.

One act of Dunstan's policy, however, had far-reaching results, of a
kind which he himself could never have anticipated. He handed over all