THE ISLE CF RUIM. 237 



the county contains throughout an almost balanced 

 mixture of Celtic and Teutonic elements. 



However, the century and a half that succeeded the 

 English colonization of south-eastern Britain were, no 

 doubt, a time of great retrogression towards barbarism, 

 as everywhere else in Romanised Europe. The villas 

 that must have covered the gentle slopes towards the 

 Wantsum fell into decay ; the fortresses were destroyed ; 

 the roads ran wild ; and the sea and river began slowly 

 to slit up the central part of the great navigable back- 

 water. A hundred and fifty years after Hengest and 

 Iloi'sa, if those excellent gentlemen ever really existed, 

 another famous landing took place in Thanet. Augustine 

 aud his companions disembarked at Ebb's Fleet, and held 

 close by (on the hill behind Prospect House) their first 

 interview with JEthelberht. But though this epoch- 

 making event hai)pened to occur in Thanet, it has no 

 special connection with the history of the island, any 

 further than as' a component of England generally. And 

 indeed, even through the garbled version of Bede, it is 

 plain enough to see that British Christendom was not 

 yet wholly wiped out in eastern Britain. The conver- 

 sion of Kent was essentially a conversion of the king and 

 nobles to the Roman communion ; it brouglit back once more 

 the part of Britain most in connection with the continent 

 into the broad fold of continental Christendom. It is 

 quite clear, in fact, that Rutupioe and Duroveruum, 

 Richborough and Canterbury, had never ceased to hold 

 close intercourse with the opposite shore, whose cliffs 

 still shine so distinctly from the hills about Ramsgate. 

 For iEthelberht himself was married to a Christian 



