10 SIXTH ANNUAL MEETING. 
“It was during this period that Christianity was intro- 
duced into this Island, and the first Christian Church in 
Britain built at Glastonbury. The history of this vener- 
able and magnificent establishment, the burial-place of the 
British hero, King Arthur, the refuge of the historian 
Gildas, the residence of St. Patrick, the cradle of St. 
Dunstan, patronized and enriched by Ina, Canute, Alfred, 
and later kings; whose mitred Abbot is said to have been 
able to bring 15,000 fishting men into the field ; the scene 
of the brutal murder of the high spirited and conscientious 
Abbot Whiting, is too well known to Archsologists to 
require that I should now do more than point out its 
situation. 
“In the year 557, Ceawlin, the great West-Saxon Con- 
queror, over-ran the eastern part of the county. Kenewalch, 
in the year 680, defeated the Bretwallas at Pen, and drove 
them to this side of the Parret; and in the year 702, Ina 
founded the Uastle of Taunton, to strengthen his western 
frontier against the subjecets of Geraint, Prince of Corn- 
wall, whose dominions still extended as far eastward as 
Blackdown and Exmoor. 
“There at the juncetion of the Thone and Parret, is 
Athelney, described by Asser, as an island on the borders 
of Britain, where the indomitable Alfred lay hid while the 
Danish pirates ravaged the country far and wide; and 
farther to the east is Aller, where, after his defeat, the 
heathen Guthrum was baptized ; and again, nearer the 
ridge of Mendip, is Wedmore, the royal residence of his 
immortal conqueror, where a deposit of the coins of Can- 
ute the Dane was recently discovered, some of which are 
in our Museum in Taunton. 
“The distriet before us, indeed, appears to have been a 
favorite one with the West Saxon monarchs. South 
