are, The old Danmonii dwelt: so hard again at hand, The Durotriges sat on the Dorsetian sand: And where from sea to sea the Belgae forth were Jet, [Somerset, Even from Southampton's shore, through Wilt and The Atrebates in Bark unto the bank of Thames, Betwixt the Celtic sleeve and the Sabrinian streams) The Saxons there set down one kingdom: which install'd, [call'd, And being west, they it their western kingdom So eastward where by Thames the Trinobants were set, [debt, To Trinovant their town, for that their name in That London now we term, the Saxons did possess, And their east kingdom call'd, as Essex' doth express; [Fear; The greatest part thereof, and still their name doth Though Middlesex therein, and part of Hartford were ; From Coln upon the west, upon the east to Stour*, Where mighty Thames himself doth into Neptune pour. [lean, As to our farthest rise, where forth those fore-lands Which bear their chalky brows into the German main, The Angles, which arose out of the Saxon race, Allured with delights and fitness of that place, Where the Iceni liv'd did set their kingdom down, From where the wallowing seas those queachy washes drown That Ely do inisle, to martyr'd Edmond's ditch, Till those Norfolcian shores vast Neptune doth enrich: Which (farthest to the east of this divided isle) Th' East-Angles' kingdom, then, those English did instile. [mouth, "And Sussex seemeth still, as with an open Those Saxons' rule to show, that of the utmost south The name to them assum'd, who rigorously expell'd Cornavii more remote, and where the Coritani, [plain, From Severn to the ditch that cuts New-market And from the banks of Thames to Humber, which contain For a more plain division of the English king doms see to the XI. song. ? So call'd, of the East-Saxons. So many goodly shires of Mersey, Mercia height) Their mightier empire, there, the middle English pight. [nct end: Which farthest though it raught, yet there it did But Offa, king thereof, it after did extend Beyond the bank of Dee; and by a ditch he cut Through Wales from north to south, into wide Mercia put [there, Well near the half thereof, and from three peoples To whom three special parts divided justly were (The Ordovices, now which North-Wales people be, From Cheshire which of old divided was by Dee: And from our Marchers now, that were Demetæ then; (men) dom made: And those Silures call'd, by us the South-Wales Beyond the Severn, much the English Offa took, To shut the Britons up within a little nook. From whence, by Mersey's banks, the rest a king[sway'd; Where in the Britons' rule (before) the Brigants The powerful English there establish'd were to stand: [Northumberland; Which, north from Humber set, they term'd Two kingdoms which had been with several thrones enstall'd: Bernitia hight the one; Diera th' other call'd. The first from Humber stretch'd unto the bank of Tine: Which river and the Frith the other did confine. Diera beareth through the spacious Yorkish bounds, From Durham down along to the Lancastrian sounds 10, With Mersey and clear Tine continuing to their fall, To England-ward within the Picts' renowned wall, And did the greater part of Cumberland" contain: With whom the Britons' name for ever shall re Who there amongst the rocks and mountains lived This said, the aged street sagg'd sadly on alone: As Coln come on along, and chane'd to cast her eye * A river upon the confines of Suffolk and Essex. meal of England. ear What barley is there found, whose fair and bearded stay. When presently the hill that maketh her a vale, With things he had in hand did interrupt her tale, With Hampstead being fall'n and High-gate at debate; [state, As one before them both that would advance his From either for his height to bear away the praise, Besides that he alone rich Peryvale surveys. But Hampstead pleads, himself in simples to have skill, And therefore by desert to be the noblest hill; As one, that on his worth and knowledge doth rely In learned physic's use, and skilful surgery; And challengeth, from them, the worthiest place her own, [known. Since that old Watling once, o'er him to pass was Then High-gate boasts his way, which men do most frequent; [scent; His long-continued fame, his high and great deAppointed for a gate of London to have been, When first the mighty Brute that city did begin. And that he is the hill, next Endfield which hath place, A forest for her pride, though titled but a chase. Her purlieus, and her parks, her circuit full as large, [charge. As some (perhaps) whose state requires a greater Whose holts that view the east, do wistly stand to look Upon the winding course of Lee's delightful brook. Where Mimer coming in, invites her sister Bean, Amongst the chalky banks t' increase their mistress' train; Whom by the dainty hand obsequiously they lead (By Hartford gliding on, through many a pleasant mead. And coming in her course to cross the common fare, For kindness she doth kiss that hospitable Ware.) Yet scarcely comfort Lee (alas!) so woe begun, Complaining in her course, thus to herself alone; "How should my beauty now give Waltham such delight, Or I, poor silly brook, take pleasure in her sight? for true) Dare loudly lie for Coln, that sometimes ships did | But I, distressed Lee, whose course doth plainly tell, That what of Coln is said, of me none could refell, Whom Alfred 15 but too wise (poor river!) I may say, (When he the cruel Danes did cunningly betray, Which Hartford then besieg'd, whose navy there abode, And on my spacious breast before the castle rode) By 'vantage of my soil, he did divide my stream; That they might ne'er return to Neptune's wat❜ry' realm. And since, distressed Lee, I have been left forlorn, A by-word to each brook, and to the world a scorn." When Sturt, a nymph of her's, (whose faith she oft had prov'd, And whom, of all her train, Lee most entirely lov'd) Lest so excessive grief her mistress might invade, Thus (by fair gentle speech) to patience doth persuade : [fore, "Though you be not so great to others as beYet not a jot for that dislike yourself the more. Your case is not alone, nor is (at all) so strange; Sith every thing on Earth subjects itself to change. Where rivers sometime ran, is firm and certain ground: [are found. And where before were hills, now standing lakes And that which most you urge, your beauty to despoil, Doth recompense your bank with quantity of soil, Beset with ranks of swans; that, in their wonted pride, [side. Do prune their snowy plumes upon your pleasant And Waltham wooes you still, and smiles with wonted cheer: [dear." And Thames as at the first, so still doth hold you To much-beloved Lee, this scarcely Sturt had [broke: But goodly London's sight their farther purpose When Thames his either banks adorn'd with buildings fair, spoke, The city to salute doth bid the Muse prepare; Whose turrets, fanes, and spires, when wistly she beholds, Her wonder at the site thus strangely she unfolds: "At thy great builder's wit, who's he but wonder may? Nay, of his wisdom thus ensuing times shall say: 'O more than mortal man, that did this town begin! Whose knowledge found the plot, so fit to set it in. What god, or heavenly power, was harbour'd in [be blest? From whom with such success thy labours should Built on a rising bank, within a vale to stand, And for thy healthful soil, chose gravel mix'd with sand. [casts, thy breast, And where fair Thames his course into a crescent (That, forced by his tides, as still by her he hastes, He might his surging waves into her bosom send) Because too far in length his town should not ex[reach, tend.' "And to the north and south, upon an equal Two hills their even banks do somewhat seem to stretch, ་ Those two extremer winds from hurting it to let ; And only level lies upon the rise and set. Of all this goodly isle, where breathes most cheerful air, [fair; And every way thereto the ways most smooth and 15 Sce to the 12th song, As in the fittest place by man that could be thought, Nor any haven lies to which is more resort, Ere idle gentry up in such abundance sprung, The public wealth so dry, and only is the cause Before the costly coach, and silken stock came in ; Sith every thing therein consisteth in extremes; Here of this present song she briefly makes an end. 16 Tobacco. ILLUSTRATIONS. In wandering passage the Muse returns from the wedding, somewhat into the land, and first to Hartford; whence, after matter of description, to London. Thou saw'st when Ver'lam once her head aloft did bear. For, under Nero, the Britons, intolerably loaden with weight of the Roman government, and espe pecially the Iceus, (now Norfolk and Suffolk men) provoked by that cruel servitude, into which not themselves only, but the wife also and posterity of their king Prasutagus were, even beyond right of victory, constrained, at length breathing for liberty, (and in a farther continuance of war, having for their general R. Boudicea, Bunduica, or as the difference of her name is) rebelled against their foreign conqueror, and in martial opposition committing a slaughter of no less than 80,000, (as Dio hath, although Tacitus miss 10,000 of this number) ransacked and spoiled Maldon, (then Camalodunum) and also this Verulam, near St. Alban's) which were the two chief towns of the isle (a); the first a colony, (whereof the 8th song) (a) Suet. lib. 6. cap. 39. this a municipal city (b), called expressly, in a catalogue at the end of Nennius, Caer-Municip. Out of Agellius 1 thus note to you its nature: Municipes sunt cives Romani ex municipiis suo jure & legibus suis atentes, muneris tantum cum pop. Rom. honorarii participes, a quo munere capessendo appellati videntur; nullis aliis ne cessitatibus neque ulla pop. Rom. lege astricti, quùm nunquam pop. Rom. eorum fundus factus esset. It differed from a colony, most of all in that a colony was a progeny of the city, and this of such as were received into state-favour and friendship by the Roman. Per-onating the genius of Ver'lam, that ever-famous Spenser (c) sung: I was that city, which the garland wore Of Britain's pride, delivered unto me As under the Romans, so in the Saxon times afterward, it endured a second ruin; and, out of its corruption, after the abbey erected by king Offa, was generated that of St. Alban's; whither, in later times (d), most of the stone-works, and whatsoever fit for building, was by the abbots translated. So that, -Now remains no memory, Nor any little monument to see, By which the traveller that fares that way, "This once was she," may warned be to say (e). The name hath been thought, from the river there running called Ver, and Humphrey Lhuid (f) makes it, as if it were Uer-lhan, i. e. a church upon Ver. Thou saw'st great burden'd ships through these thy vallies pass. Lay not here unlikelihoods to the author's charge; he tells you more judiciously towards the end of the song. But the cause why some have thought so is, for that, Gildas (g), speaking of St. Alban's martyrdom, and bis miraculons passing through the river at Verlancestre, calls it iter ignotum trans Thamesis fluvii alveum: sa by collection they guessed that Thames had then his full course this way, being thereto farther moved by anchors and such like here digged up. This conjecture hath been followed by that noble Muse (h) thus in the person of Verlam: And where the crystal Thamis wont to slide (b) Municipium Tacit. Annal. 14. (g) In Epist. de Excid. Britan. There also where the winged ships were seĉn, But, for this matter of the Thames, those two relics of their name. of the statute (as I have seen in a fair MS. ex- about the course and limits of them; whereupon (4) Original. fol. 97. b. Charta de Foresta ad (u) V. Camden Roman. That of so great descent, and of so large a dower, And striving to prefer their son, the best they may, His breast adorn'd with swans, oft wash'd with silver part of the name seems to this day left in the middle of the city) to this place, and thence in a crooked line through Shropshire by Wrekin hill into Cerdigan (y); but others (*) say from Verlam to Chester; and where all is referred to Belin by Geffrey ap Arthur, and Polychronicon, another (a) tells you that the sons of (I know not what) king Wethle made, and denominated it. The Fosse is derived, by one consent out of Cornwall into Devonshire, through Somerset, over Coteswold by Tewkesbury, along near Coventry, to Leicester, through Lincoln to Berwick, and thence to Caithness, the utmost of Scotland. Of restitution of the other you may be desperate; Rickeneld I have told you of; in Henry of Huntingdon no such name is found, but with the first two, Ickenild and Erming-street. Ickenild, saith be, goes from east to west: Erming-street, from south to north: another tells me, that Erming-street begins at St. Dewy's, and conveys itself to Southampton; which the author hath attributed to Ichning, begun upon the word's community with Icens) in the eastern parts. It is not in my power to reconcile all these, or elect the best; I only add, that Ermingstreet, which, being of English idiom, seems to have had its name from Inmunrull in that signifi-Yet cation, whereby it interprets (b) an universal pillar worshipped for Mercury, president of ways, is like enough (if Huntingdon be in the right, making it from south to north) to have left its part in Stanstreet, in Surrey, where a way made with stones and gravel, in a soil on both sides very different, continues near a mile; and thence towards the eastern shore, in Sussex, are some places seeming as other relics of it. But I here determine nothing. (y) Polychron. lib. 1. cap. de Plat. reg. (*) Henric. Huntingd. hist. 1. (a) Roger. Hoveden, part 1. fol. 248. (6) Adam. Bremens. hist. Eccles. cap. 5. and see to the 3d song. POLY-OLBION. THE SEVENTEENTH SONG. THE ARGUMENT. To Medway, Thames a suitor goes; As still his goodly train yet every hour increas'd, And from the Surrian shores clear Wey came down [greet, to meet His greatness, whom the Thames so graciously doth That with the fern-crown'd flood' he minion-like doth play: is not this the brook, enticeth him to stay. But as they thus, in pomp, came sporting on the shoal, [Mole 'Gainst Hampton-court he meets the soft and gentle Whose eyes so pierc'd his breast, that seeming to foreslow The way which he so long intended was to go, And that he in her sight transparent might appear, sped [spent, (For greatly they had hop'd, his time had so been That he ere this had won the goodly heir of Ar length it came to pass, that Isis and her ThameT' fame; content Coming by Fernham, so called of fern there * Isis. growing. A very woody vale in Surry. |