THE PRESIDENT'S ADDRESS. 
65 
the whole process would be precisely analogous to that which we 
see now in many of our colonial dependencies, where beyond the 
established English or Colonial rule there is an extended native 
area, into which the more audacious or more enterprising settlers 
gradually intrude, until at length from their increasing numbers 
the demand arises for complete organisation. 
" It was thus perhaps that they [the Saxons] advanced from 
the western border or from the southern coast as far as Exeter," 1 
which by the time of Cynewulf s invasion, may have been far 
more Saxon than Keltic, may even have attained a kind of in- 
dependence, and so have remained with its mixed population until 
the time of iEftelstan, Avhen the county at large was cleared of the 
British race. Those who retained the true British spirit would be 
more likely to cross the Tamar, and throw in their lot with their 
still independent countrymen, than to remain subjugated ; and it is 
abundantly clear in many ways that Exeter occupied an exceptional 
position. For example, it was so thoroughly Saxonised long before 
the earliest date that we can assign to Saxon domination in Devon, 
that it possessed towards the close of the seventh century a Saxon 
school, in which Winfred of Crediton, the famous Boniface, 
apostle of Germany, himself of Saxon as of Devonshire birth, was 
trained. 
Thus there are far fewer difficulties in the way of accepting a 
conquest under Cynewulf or Ecgberht than under iE^Selstan. So 
also is it certain that there was a complete expulsion of the Keltic 
race, and that whatever Keltic blood we now have in Devon, must 
date before the Saxon Conquest, or have been acquired, mainly 
from Cornwall, since. 2 
1 Mr. King cites as possible relics of such incursions the curious group of 
"Sewers" in the Kingsbridge promontory — the dwellings of " sea- ware " = 
" sea people " ; and the district around Polperro defended against the land by 
the so-called "giant's hedge "—the great earthwork from Lenin to Looe — the 
glossary and dialect of which are markedly Teutonic, while the place-names 
arc Keltic. To this date also we may possibly assign the traces of the 
Scandinavian along the valleys of the Dart and the Teign, collected by Mr. 
Spence Bate, though some identifications seem doubtful. Vide Trans. Devon. 
Assoc. vol. v. pp. 548-557. 
2 Mr. Kerslake ("Vestiges of the Supremacy of Mercia in the South of 
England in the Eighth Century ") interprets the A . S. Chronicle entry of 743— 
"Now vESelbald, King of the Mercians, and Cuthred, King of the West 
Saxons, fought with the Welch," to mean the Dumnonian or Cornish 
