22 THE GREAT LEVEL OF THE FENS. PART I. 



been found deep sunk in the bed of the river. The 

 first reclaimers of the Fen lands seem to have been the 

 religious recluses, who settled upon the islands over- 

 grown with reeds and rushes which rose up at intervals 

 amidst the Fen level, and where, amidst the waste, 

 they formed their solitary settlements. One of the first 

 of the Fen islands thus occupied was the Isle of Ely, or 

 Eely so called, it is said, because of the abundance and 

 goodness of the eels caught in the neighbourhood, and 

 in which rents were paid in early times. It stood solitary 

 amidst a waste of waters, and was literally an island. 

 Etheldreda, afterwards known as St. Audrey, the 

 daughter of the King of the East Angles, retired thither, 

 secluding herself from the world and devoting herself 

 to a recluse life. A nunnery was built, then a town, 

 and the place became famous in the religious world. 

 The pagan Danes, however, had no regard for Christian 

 shrines, and a fleet of their pirate ships, sailing across 

 the Fens, attacked the island and burnt the nunnery. 

 It was again rebuilt and a church sprang up, the fame 

 of which so spread abroad that Canute, the Danish king, 

 determined to visit it. It is related that as his ships 

 sailed towards the island his soul rejoiced greatly, and 

 on hearing the chanting of the monks in the quire 

 wafted across the waters, the king joined in the singing 

 and ceased not until he had come to land. Canute 

 more than once sailed across the Fens with his ships, 

 and the tradition survives that on one occasion, when 

 passing from Ramsey to Peterborough, the waves were 

 so boisterous on Whittlesea Mere (now a district of 

 fruitful cornfields), that he ordered a channel to be cut 

 through the body of the Fen westward of Whittlesea to 

 Peterborough, which to this day is called by the name of 

 the" King's Delph." 



The Fen islands were also the refuge of that loose and 

 lawless portion of the population, which even in civil I/AM 1 

 societies invariably hovers aboul Ilie nun-gin of the moor, 



