OBJECTS OF INTEREST. 61
whither it had been transported for safety in the
stormy times before the Conquest, Greensted lying
on the ancient road from London to Suffolk. The
incident is thus referred to in an old chronicle of
the Abbey of St. Edmund :—" His body was like-
wise entertained at Aungre [Ongar], where a
wooden chapel erected to his memory remains to
the present day." Edmund, who was more of a
saint than a soldier, but had the courage to say to
his conquerors, the Danes, who offered him his
life if he embraced the religion of Odin and gave
up half his kingdom, " You may destroy this frail
body, but know the freedom of mind shall never
bow before you," was bound to a tree and shot
with arrows. It is related that, when the church
was under repair in 1848, and the ancient timber
lay on the ground, the old oak-tree near Eye, in
Suffolk, to which tradition had always attached the
scene of the martyrdom, fell to the ground, and,
being cut up, an arrow-head was found embedded
more than a foot in depth in the solid timber, and
that the annual rings of growth showed that more
than a thousand years had elapsed since it struck
there.
It is a very pretty walk or drive of five miles
from Greensted to Epping by Toot Hill and
Ongar Park Wood.
Old Chingford Church, which stands in a
dismantled condition about a mile to the south of
the present church on Chingford Green, is devoid
of antiquarian interest, but is remarkable for its
fine position, commanding a striking view over the
valley of the Lea into Hertfordshire and Middle-
sex, and for the extraordinary trees of ivy, of great
age and girth, which hide and protect the moulder-