CANTERBURY CATHEDRAL 201 



with wliicli he had surrounded the Queen ; liow that 

 paper preached homihes, and how all the others, nearly 

 without exception, gushed fulsome nonsense, it is not 

 the business of the present historian to set forth. 

 All he has to do is to remark that with this event closes 

 the history of Royal processions along the Dover Road. 

 The hilly road to Dover is not remarkable for sporting 

 events, but two may here be noted. On April 1st, 1903, 

 Mr. Walter de Creux-Hutchinson walked from Dover to 

 London Bridge in 14 hrs., 19 mins., 40 sees. ; and on 

 September 18th, 1909, A. G. Norman cycled from 

 London to Dover and back in 8 hrs., 8 mins. 



XXXVI 



The chief point of interest in Canterbury is, of course, 

 the Cathedral, the bourne to which countless pilgrims 

 came from all parts of the civilized world to gain the 

 goodwill and intercedence of that thrice sacred and 

 potent Saint Thomas whose peculiar sanctity over- 

 topped by far that of any other English martyr, and 

 whose shrine possessed scarce less efficacy than that of 

 the most renowned Continental resorts of the pious. 



But long before Becket's day the Metropolitan 

 Cathedral of Canterbury had arisen. The establishment 

 of the See dates from the time when Augustine landed 

 at Ebbsfleet, in the Isle of Thanet, in a.d. 596, and, 

 marching at the head of his forty Benedictine monks, 

 held a conference with Ethelbert, King of Kent, by 

 whose favour he was allowed to preach Christianity to 

 the Saxons. Thus was the Cross of Christ re-introduced 

 to these islands where it had flourished centuries before 

 among the Romans and the Romanized British. 



Saint Augustine, however, does not deserve quite 

 all the honour that has been paid him for his work. 

 He undertook his mission against his will and only 

 by the peremptory orders of Pope Gregory the First ; 



