Page:Early Man in Britain and His Place in the Tertiary Period.djvu/518

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The invasion of Gaul by the Goths was swiftly followed by that of Britain by the English, and the destruction of the Roman empire by that of the province of Britain. In the long and deadly warfare which followed the landing of the three keels in the Isle of Thanet, in the year 449, the tide of conquest flowed steadily to the west, and the borders of England were enlarged until they extended to the western shores. The Roman civilisation was destroyed, the cities were burnt, their inhabitants driven away, until in the seventh century after Christ the Roman provincials were only represented by the Welsh of Cornwall, Wales, and Cumbria (Strathclyde). Christianity was replaced by the worship of Thor and Odin. The character of this conquest is eloquently described by Gildas, by the metaphor that the flame kindled in the east raged over nearly all the land till it flared red over the western ocean. In 607 Æthelfrith advanced from the line of the Upper Trent on Chester, and the Northumbrian and British armies confronted each other. A body of monks from the monastery of Bangor having come out to pray for victory over their enemies, Æthelfrith asked who they were, and on being told said, "If they fight against us with their prayers they are as truly our enemies as if they were armed," and began the battle by putting them to the sword. Bæda, who tells the story, says that eight hundred of them were killed. The British were routed, and Chester so ruthlessly destroyed, that