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them against the Picts and Scots. The chiefs of these Jutes 1 or Saxon pirates did not wait for a second invitation. Seizing their "rough-handled spears and bronze swords," they set sail for the shining chalk cliffs of Britain, 449 (?). They put an end to the ravages of the Picts and Scots. Then instead of going back to their own country, they took possession of the best lands of Kent and refused to give them up. (See map opposite.)

37. The Saxons and Angles conquer Britain. The success of the first band of sea robbers in Britain (§ 36) stimulated other bands to invade the island (477-541). They slaughtered multitudes of Britons and made slaves of many more. The conquerors named the parts of the country which they settled, from themselves. Each independent settlement was hostile to every other. Thus Sussex was the home of the South Saxons, Wessex of the West Saxons, Essex of the East Saxons. (See map opposite.) Finally, a band of Angles came from a little corner, south of the peninsula of Denmark, which still bears the name of Angeln. They took possession of all of eastern Britain not already appropriated. Eventually they came to control the greater part of the land, and from them, all the other tribes, when fused together, got the name of Angles or English ($50). (See map opposite.)

38. Resistance made by the Britons; King Arthur. Meanwhile the Britons had plucked up courage and made the best fight they could. They were naturally a brave people (§§ 2, 18). The fact that it took the Saxons more than a hundred years to get a firm grip on the island shows that fact. The legend of King Arthur's exploits also illustrates the valor of the race to which he belonged. According to tradition this British Prince, who had become a convert to Christianity (§ 25), met and checked the invaders in their insolent march of triumph. The battle, it is said, was fought at Mount Badon or Badbury in Dorsetshire. There, with his irresistible sword, Excalibur," and his stanch British spearmen, Arthur

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1 The Jutes, Saxons, and Angles appear to have belonged to the same Teutonic or German race. They inhabited the seacoast and vicinity, from the mouth of the Elbe, northward along the coast of Denmark or Jutland. These tribes which conquered England, and settled there, remained for a long time hostile to each other, but eventually, they united and came to be known as Anglo-Saxons or English. (See map opposite.)

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541-597]

COMING OF ST. AUGUSTINE

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compelled his foes to acknowledge that he was not a myth but a man1 able to break the heathen and uphold the Christ."

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39. The Saxons or English force the Britons to retreat. But though King Arthur may have checked the pagan Saxon invaders, he could not drive them out of the country. They had come to stay. On the other hand, many Britons were forced to take refuge among the hills of Wales. There they continued to abide. That ancient stock never lost its love of liberty. More than eleven centuries later their spirit helped to shape the destinies of the New World. Thomas Jefferson and several of the other signers of the Declaration of American Independence were either of Welsh birth or of direct Welsh descent.

40. Gregory and the English Slaves. The next period, of nearly eighty years, is a dreary record of constant battles and bloodshed. Out of this very barbarism a regenerating influence finally arose.

In their greed for gain, some of the English tribes did not hesitate to sell their own children into bondage. A number of these slaves, exposed in the market place in Rome, attracted the attention of a monk named Gregory.

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Struck with the beauty of their clear, ruddy complexions and fair hair, he inquired from what country they came. "They are Angles" (8 37), was the dealer's answer. No, not Angles, but angels," answered the monk; and he resolved that, when he could, he would send missionaries to convert a race of so much promise.2

41. Coming of Saint Augustine, 597. When Gregory (§ 40) became Pope he fulfilled his resolution, and sent Augustine with a band of forty monks to Britain. In 597 they landed on the very spot where the first Saxon war band had set foot on English soil nearly one hundred and fifty years before. Like Cæsar and his legions, Augustine and his monks brought with them the power of Rome. But this time that power did not come armed with the sword to force men to submit or die, but inspired with a persuasive voice to cheer them with new hope.

1 See "Arthur" in the "Dictionary of National British Biography"; and Professor Rowley in Low and Pulling's "Dictionary of English History," p. 434. See also Geoffrey of Monmouth's "History of the Britons" and Tennyson's " Idylls of the King."

2 Bede's "Ecclesiastical History."

42. Augustine converts the King of Kent and his People (597). The English at that time were wholly pagan, and had, in all probability, destroyed every vestige of the faith for which the British martyrs gave their lives (§ 25). But the King of Kent had married a French princess who was a devout Christian. Through the Queen's influence, the King was induced to receive Augustine. He was afraid, however, of some magical practice, so he insisted that their meeting should take place in the open air and on the island of Thanet. (See map facing p. 32.)

The historian Bede tells us that the monks, holding a tall silver cross and a picture of Christ in their hands, advanced and saluted the King. Augustine delivered his message, was well received, and invited to Canterbury, the capital of Kent. There the King became a convert to his preaching, and before the year had passed ten thousand of his subjects had received baptism; for to gain the King was to gain his tribe as well.

43. Augustine builds the First Monastery. At Canterbury Augustine became the first archbishop over the first cathedral. There, too, he established the first monastery in which to train missionaries to carry on the work which he had begun (§ 45). Part of the original monastery of St. Augustine is now used as a Church of England missionary college, and it continues to bear the name of the man who brought Christianity to that part of Britain. The example of the ruler of Kent was not without its effect on others.

44. Conversion of the North. The north of England, however, owed its conversion chiefly to the Irish monks of an earlier age. They had planted monasteries in Ireland and Scotland from which colonies went forth, one of which settled in Durham. Cuthbert, a Saxon monk of that monastery in the seventh century, traveled as a missionary throughout Northumbria, and was afterward recognized as the saint of the North. Through his influence that kingdom was induced to accept Christianity. Other missionaries went to other districts to carry the "good tidings of great joy."

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In one case an aged chief arose in an assembly of warriors and said: "O king, as a bird flies through this hall in the winter night, coming out of the darkness and vanishing into it again, even such

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