Durham Cathedral, by Rev. William Green well. 63 



of the Northumbrian kings, Lindisfarne is very near to it, and 

 naturally would be under the protection of the king, who lived 

 there. Bamburgh, however, proved no great protection against 

 the Danes, who came over the sea, and landing on the coast, 

 then over-ran the country. The monks fearing lest they would 

 be deprived of the Saint's body and their other treasures, and of 

 their lives as well, fled from Lindisfarne, and wandered, not only 

 over a great part of the North of England, but over a consider- 

 able portion of the South of Scotland ; and many churches dedi- 

 cated to St. Cuthbert, in those parts, probably mark the spots 

 where the monks rested for awhile, with the body of the Saint. 

 After wandering from 875 to 883, they settled at Chester-le- 

 Street, which was given to them by Guthred, a Danish king, then 

 reigning in Northumbria, and who had become a Christian. 

 Chester-le-Street, unlike Lindisfarne, is inland, and stands upon 

 the site of a Roman station. It possesses no great natural 

 features for defence, but it is likely that some considerable re- 

 mains of the old Roman walls were standing, and served as a 

 protection against these Northern Rovers. There are a few re- 

 mains of the monk's sojourn at Chester-le-Street, in the shape of 

 portions of shafts of crosses, which are covered with thai peculiar 

 carving which I have already referred to as of Irish origin. 

 There the body rested, and from it the Bernician See was ruled, 

 until the removal of Bishop Ealdhun and the monks to Durham, 

 in 995. The difficulties of an adequate defence probably proved 

 to the monks that Ohester-le-Street was not a suitable place for 

 protection. The superior position of Durham was, no doubt, the 

 reason why it was selected for the site of the See. This then 

 was the commencement of the City of Durham. 



The site chosen for the final resting-place of the body of the 

 patron Saint of Durham, is a plateau, small in extent, but en- 

 closed by precipitous banks, and having the river running almost 

 entirely round it. So strong, indeed, is its position that in those 

 days it was, in fact, all but impregnable. 



In 999, Bishop Ealdhun completed the building of a stone 

 church, into which the body of St. Cuthbert was transferred 

 from a wooden building in which it had been at first placed. Of 

 that church I do not know that a single stone remains visible to 

 the eye, though there are, no doubt, thousands of stones belong- 

 ing to it enclosed within these walls. This building remained 



