co March 25. i 882 | 
at large. While the Andredsweald, which lay in an im- 
penetrable mass along its western border, extended south- 
ward behind the swamps of Romney Marsh to the coast 
of the Channel, a morass that stretched from the hills of 
Dulwich to the banks of the Thames blocked the narrow 
strip of open country between the northern edge of the 
Weald and the river. The mcre tempting waterway along 
the Thames itself was barred by the walls, if not by the 
fortified bridge, of London. The strength of these 
barriers is proved by the long pause which took place in 
the advance of the Jutes, for a century was to pass before 
(rig any effort to penetrate further into the island ” 
ig. 1). 
Again the advance of the East Saxons was hindered by 
obstacles quite as formidable as the Andredsweald in South 
Britain. “ As the South Saxons were prisoned within their 
narrow strip of coast by the reaches of the Andredsweald, 
so the East Saxons found themselves as effectually barred 
from any advance into the island by a chain of dense wood- 
lands, the Waltham Chace of later ages, whose scanty 
NATURE 
417 
relics have left hardly more then the names of Epping 
and Hainault Forests. These woodlands, which stretched 
at this time in a dense belt on either side the Roding 
along the western border of the district that the invaders 
had won from the Thames to the open downs above 
Saffron Walden, and were backed to the west by the 
marshy valley of the Lea, whose waters widened into an 
estuary as it reached the Thames, seem to have been 
wholly uninhabited, for no trace remains in their area of 
military stations or of the country houses or burial-places 
of the provincials. How impassable in fact these fast- 
nesses had been found by the Romans is clear from the 
fact that even their road-makers never attempted to pene- 
trate them. The lower portion of the Ermine Street, the 
road to the north, which in later days struck direct through 
this district from London to Huntingdon, did not exist in 
Roman times, and the British provincial was forced to 
make a circuit either by Leicester or Colchester on his 
way to Lincoln and York.”’ 
Further north again the progress of the Angles 
EARLY LONDON. 
MighgateZ 
2 a % 
ee 
Hyder Yih 
WN Hare X res i 
{Local names around of later date.) 
Moor 
Livids ryt ® 5 
Mo 
k ee... 
UNDE NT. Bree” Stepney 
YRYG, 
————_ . yi 
Ss Pilham—sff 
WIBBA’ i 
Wimbledon 2 
Jambermell 
amber Pe 
Fic. 3. 
in what was known afterwards as East Anglia, and 
further north still in modern Lincolnshire, was natu- 
rally influenced by the widespread marsh, the remains 
of which are still to be seen in the Fen country. 
have seen what barriers held back the Jute of Kent 
and the Saxon on either side of him; but barriers as 
impassable held back the Engle of the eastern Gwent, 
for the forest-line which began on the Thames reached 
on along their western frontier to the Wash, and the 
Wash stretched to the northward from Newmarket to the | 
sea. The fens which occupied this huge break in the 
eastern coast of Britain covered in the sixth century a far 
larger space than now; for while they stretched north- 
ward up the Witham almost as far as Lincoln, and south- 
wards up the Cam as far as Cambridge, they reached 
inland to Huntingdon and Stamford, and the road 
between those places skirted their bounds to the west. 
So vast a reach of tangled marsh offered few temptations 
to an invader; and we shall see grounds at a later time 
for believing that the Gyrwas, as the Engle freebooters 
“We | 
who found a home in its islands called themselves, were 
for a long time too weak to break through the line of 
towns that guarded its inner border” (Fig. 2). 
One of the most interesting passages, with its accom- 
panying map, in Mr. Green’s book, is that in which he 
describes the probable founding of London, the nature of 
the ground in which it stood, and the surrounding wild 
country, all now covered and its features obliterated by 
many square miles of bricks and mortar. Mr. Green 
shows how it was that what was destined to be the 
greatest city in the world came to be planted where it 
is, and how its future progress was determined by the 
physical conditions of its site. 
“The commercial greatness of London has made men 
forget its military importance, but from the first moment 
of its history till late into the middle ages London was 
one of the strongest of our fortresses. Its site, indeed, 
must have been dictated, like that of most early cities, by 
the advantages which it presented as well for defence as 
for trade. It stood at the one point by which either 
