THE ICKNIELD WAY 5 



These evergreen woods are extremely beautiful, and 

 are interspersed occasionally with fine beech trees ; 

 the woods reach down to the two Kimbles, and 

 the village of Ellesborough, or Ethelburga. I 

 showed him that important British road — the 

 ' Icknield Way,' the ' Via Iceni ' of the Romans — 

 the road to the Iceni of Boadicea, that great queen 

 of a noble race, who was struck down, and, it is 

 said, killed at the battle with the Roman legions 

 near St. Albans. This road commences at Devizes 

 in Wiltshire, continuing its route to the Thames, 

 which it crosses at Wallingford, or Watlingford, 

 to the litde town of Watlington, then to Princes 

 Risborough — once the residence of the Black Prince 

 — along the foot of the Chiltern range to Dun- 

 stable, where it crosses or joins the main Roman 

 road to the north — the ' Watling Street ' of these 

 pioneers of civilisation still bearing the same 

 name in the City of London — and on by Tow- 

 cester to Chester. The Icknield Way con- 

 tinues across the kingdom to St. Albans — the 

 ' Verulamium ' of the Romans, whose glorious 

 Norman Abbey, now a cathedral, is largely 

 built of Roman bricks from that warlike station. 

 To our rear, amongst the dense mass of beech trees, 

 lies Hughenden, which is about seven miles distant, 

 the residence of the great political chief, the late 

 Benjamin Disraeli, Earl of Beaconsfield, K.G., from 

 whose residence, he once told me, while I was 

 visiting him, that Simon de Montfort went to 

 compel King John to sign Magna Charta at 



