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For previous to the coming of the Normans, when the English kings contented themselves with the sovereignty of Britain alone, and employed their whole military force in the subjugation of this people, they almost wholly extirpated them; as did king Offa, who by a long and extensive dyke separated the British from the English; Ethelfrid also, who demolished the noble city of Legions, and put to death the monks of the celebrated monastery at Banchor, who had been called in to promote the success of the Britons by their prayers; and lastly Harold, who himself on foot, with an army of light-armed infantry, and conforming to the customary diet of the country, so bravely penetrated through every part of Wales, that he scarcely left a man alive in it; and as a memorial of his signal victories many stones may be found in Wales bearing this inscription: "HIC VICTOR FUIT HAROLDUS" "HERE HAROLD CONQUERED."
As, at the end of the sixth century, Columban, an Irish monk of Banchor, had gone forth as a missionary, passing through France, Switzerland, and beyond the confines of the ancient Roman empire, so about a century later Boniface, an Englishman of Devonshire, repaired to Germany, under a recommendation from the pope and Charles Martel, and laboured among the Hessians and Saxons, cutting down their sacred oaks, overturning their altars, erecting churches, founding bishoprics, and gaining at last, from the hands of the savages, the crown of martyrdom.
The monastery of Banchor, in Flintshire, which contained above two thousand brethren, dispersed a numerous colony among the Barbarians of Ireland; and Iona, one of the Hebrides, which was planted by the Irish monks, diffused over the northern regions a doubtful ray of science and superstition. These unhappy exiles from social life were impelled by the dark and implacable genius of superstition.
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