cxii Journal of Proceedings.
of instances were known, including one at Woodchester. They could not
examine the whole of this villa, because the church had been built in it,
and why 1 He thought advantage was taken of the Roman villa as a
quarry for brick and stone to build the church. The tesselated pavement
here was not figured, but was simply laid in patterns. Some had
supposed that this villa was the dwelling of the Count of the Saxon
shore, but he did not think that the Count would have been unwise
enough to have put his villa in a situation so convenient of access to the
Danes, whom he was trying to keep off. During the invasion of
the Danes, Mersea was frequently occupied by them. After the
great defeat at Farnham they retreated to this place and to Bright-
lingsea, and King Alfred, or his lieutenants, attacked them and
drove them off. Next year the Danes came again to Mersea, and from
thence sailed to London, making that well-known expedition of theirs
up the river Lea.*
Dr. Laver had traced a Roman Road from Colchester to Mersea, not
quite following the track of the modern road. There was every probability
that the Stroud or Causeway was the remain; of a Roman road, and it
had been found, like many other Roman roads, of great use ever since.
Near where they were standing there was probably a ferry to the large
station of Othona, the site of which had been unknown until
lately, but which was out yonder by Bradwell Church. If people
had paid the slightest attention to Bede they would have guessed where
Othona was, because in his ' Ecclesiastical History' he accurately
described its situation. The fact that the station was now submerged
proved that the whole of the coast had been sinking. It was not to be
supposed that a clever people like the Romans would have built on a
place which was liable to be inundated by the sea ; but now the whole of
Othona was under water at spring-tide, which was, he thought, a clear
proof of the sinking of the shore. In Bede's time he described the place
as being unhealthy, and gave that as a reason why the early missionaries
went there, it being their habit to minister to the outcasts, rather than
in the principal places in the country. A few years ago, in making exca-
vations, the remains of a town were discovered at Bradwell, and a large
number of Roman relics were disinterred, clearly proving that there was
the long-lost Othona.† It would have been difficult to get from
* In answer to a question by Mr. Spurrell, Dr. Laver gave Stowes' 'Annals' as his
authority for these statements ; the passages being these :—
" The same yeere (892) also King Alfred fought against the
Fernham. Normans at Fernham, in Kent, where he slewe them, wounded their
King, and chased the remnant through the Thames into Eastsex,
whereby many of them were drowned. They which escaped fled to
an Island called Breklesey situate in a stream of the Riuer Colne."
Isle of Mersea " In the yeere, 895, the Pagans wintered at a little Isle called Mersig,
Ley a river that in the East part of Essex, situate in the sea, and the same yeere they
bare ships unto sayled by the River of Thames, after by the Riuer of Ligea, and
Ware. Asserius. twentie miles from London began to build a Fortress."
† See 'Essex Naturalist,' vol. ii., pp. 251-2, for some account of Othona, and the
relics unearthed during explorations.