The History of London

was early in the fifth cent

ater we find the Ea

xcept once when, after a defeat of the British by the Saxons at Crayford in the year 457, we read that the fugitives

ee the author's book L

within the old walls. Canterbury, Silchester, Porchester, Colchester-all were taken, their people massacred, the walls left standing, the streets left desolate. For the English-the Saxons-loved not city walls. Therefore

country, the Romans sent an expedition north to drive back these savages. Already the Saxons, the Jutes and the Angles were sending piratical expeditions to harry the coast and even to make settlements. The arm of the Roman was growing weak, it could not stretch out so far: the fleets of the Romans, under the officer called the 'Co

t by the citizens but by the Roman soldiers who entered the City in time. The citizens were mostly merchants: they were Christians in name and in form of worship, they were superstitious, they were luxurious, they were unwarlike. Many of them were not Britons at all, but foreigners settled in the City for trade. Moreover, for it is not true that the whole British people had grown unfit for war, a revolt of the Roman legions in the year 407 drew a large

have suffered most severely long before the Romans went away. We are, therefore, in the year 410, facing a situation full of menace. The Picts and Scots are overrunning the whole of the north, the Saxons are harrying the eas

ING SHIP, FROM A

niversity at

tions, an unwarlike population. When the curtain fall