The probably never by unlettered people. In most 

 Mf lk y parts of England for centuries, and it is said 

 ay ' in many parts still, the common designation is 

 'The Way of Saint James.' This has a 

 singular correspondence in the name popular 

 among the French peasants, ' the Road of Saint 

 Jacques of Compostella.' Originally a like 

 designation was common in Spain, though for 

 a thousand years the popular epithet runs El 

 Camino de Santiago, after the Warrior- Saint 

 of the Iberian peoples. I am told that 'the 

 Way of Saint James' is common in certain 

 counties of England, but I have never heard 

 it, nor do I wholly recall the reason of this 

 particular nomenclature. In some form the 

 road - idea continually recurs. How many 

 readers of these notes will know that the 

 familiar ' Watling Street ' that ancient 

 thoroughfare from Chester through the heart 

 of London to Dover was also applied to this 

 Galaxy that perchance they may look at 

 to-night from quiet country-side, or village, or 

 distant towns, or by the turbulent seas of our 

 unquiet coasts, or by still waters wherein 

 the reflection lies and scintillates like a 

 phantom phosphorescence. Watling Street 

 does not sound a poetic equivalent for the 

 Milky Way, but it has a finer and more 

 ancient derivation than 'the Way of Saint 

 226 



