PREFACE. 



No historical records are complete without the usual 

 chapter on Manners and Customs ; and the true scholar 

 never feels himself well in possession of the I'equisite 

 knowledge of the past age, till he has so learnt its 

 time honoured tale, as to apprehend in a human and 

 practical sense those feelings which made its super- 

 stitions plausible, its heathenism social, its public 

 institutions tend, in the end, to the general welfare. 



The Saxons have not been more fortunate than others 

 in their appreciation by us, self satisfied moderns. They 

 have been, and still .are, I believe, commonly regarded 

 as mangy dogs, whose success against the Keltic race 

 in this country was owing chiefly to their starved 

 condition and ravening hunger. The children protest 

 that, positively, as they know from their most reUable 

 handbooks, these roving savages stuffed their bellies 

 mth acorns, and the enlightened literati and dilettanti 

 begrudge them any feeling of respect for their queens 

 and ladies, or any arts such as befit our " Albion's 

 " glorious isle " under an Encflish kino-. 



The work now published for the first time, and 

 from a unique manuscript, will, if duly studied, afford 

 a large store of information to a very difierent effect, 

 and show us that the inhabitants of this land in 

 Saxon times were able to extract a very fair sliaie 

 of comfortable food, and healing medicines, and savoury 

 drinks directly or indirectly from it. Many readers 



