rocess is more exactly recorded, less legendary, and
more consecutively told because it was (to all contemporary watchers)
the capital event of the time, and to all posterity the one thing that
explained men to themselves.

We know also that, not so much the nucleus of the conversion as the
secure vantage from which it marched outward, was the triangle of
Kent. We can believe that the civilisation of Kent was something quite
separate from the rest of the south-eastern portion of England, and
that the many customary survivals which are, to this day, native to
the county are remaining proofs of its unique character among the
petty kingdoms during the mythical period between the withdrawal of
the Romans and the arrival of St. Augustine.

The early hold of civilisation upon Kent is explicable. But when the
influence of Rome begins to spread again over England you have
distances covered which are astounding; there occur sporadic incidents
of the highest importance in spots where they would be the least
expected. Among the very first of these is the first baptism of a
West-Saxon King.

It was certainly at Dorchester that this baptism took place and the
choice of the site, little as we know of the village or city, has
filled every historian with conjecture. Up to the very landing of St.
Augustine we are still dependent upon what is half legendary and very
meagre record. The chief point indeed as regards this part of the
country is the tradition of a battle fought against the British at
Bedford by the West Saxons and the occupation of "four towns." This
success was put down by tradition to the year 571, but everything was
still so dark that even this success is a legend.

Within the lifetime of a man you have the baptism of Cynegil, the king
of the West Saxons, at Dorchester, and that baptism takes place less
than forty years after the complete submission of Kent.

The Chronicle, in mentioning this date, is no longer upon legendary
ground: it is dealing with an event which was kept on record by
civilised men who understood the art of writing, who could speak
Latin, who could bear their records to Rome, and, what is more, the
fact and the date are confirmed by the Venerable Bede.

It is imagined by some authorities that the fulness of the story and
its apparent accuracy depend upon access to some early ecclesiastical
record preserved at Dorchester and now lost. At any rate, Dorchester,
whether because it had been, up till