CHAP, xiv.] THE ENGLISH BREED OF CATTLE. 491 



it lay desolate for nearly three centuries until it was 

 rebuilt by .ZEthelflaed, the Lady of the Mercians. The 

 slaughter of the monks of Bangor may be taken as an 

 example of the fate of the British Christians, and the 

 sack of Chester illustrates the treatment of the British 

 towns and cities. The conflict between the two races 

 did not lose its deadly character until the English be- 

 came converts to Christianity. 



The British, as they were gradually pushed westward, 

 took refuge in Brittany and in Ireland, and under their 

 influence the north of Ireland became a great centre 

 from which Christianity 1 and civilisation spread not 

 merely over a large part of England and Scotland, but 

 over Scandinavia, Germany, and as far south as St. 

 Galle. To them we owe the illuminated missals, the 

 elaborate chalices, and the sculptured crosses in which 

 the late Celtic designs are blended with the Germanic, 

 introduced into Britain by the English, and into Ireland 

 by the Danes and Norse. 2 



The English Breed of Cattle. 



The English came over to Britain not as bodies of 

 fighting men, but with their wives and families and 

 household stuff; and the migration was so complete 

 that, according to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, the 

 Angleland which they forsook was left desolate for four 

 centuries afterwards. 3 They effected as great a revolu- 

 tion in farming in Britain as in the language and whole 

 political system, and with them appears, for the first 



1 See Cave-hunting, c. iii. 2 See pp. 443-4. 



3 Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, A.D. 449. The MS. A (Mon. Hist. Brit.} 

 from which the statement is taken ends in A.D. 975. 



