The remains of the
once flourishing town of Seaton, on the Durham coast, can be
discovered amid the sands at low tide. The modern village has sunk
inland, and cannot now boast of an ancient chapel dedicated to St.
Thomas of Canterbury, which has been devoured by the waves.
Skegness, on the Lincolnshire coast, was a large and important town;
it boasted of a castle with strong fortifications and a church with a
lofty spire; it now lies deep beneath the devouring sea, which no
guarding walls could conquer. Far out at sea, beneath the waves, lies
old Cromer Church, and when storms rage its bells are said to chime.
The churchyard wherein was written the pathetic ballad "The Garden of
Sleep" is gradually disappearing, and "the graves of the fair women
that sleep by the cliffs by the sea" have been outraged, and their
bodies scattered and devoured by the pitiless waves.
One of the greatest prizes of the sea is the ancient city of Dunwich,
which dates back to the Roman era. The Domesday Survey shows that it
was then a considerable town having 236 burgesses. It was girt with
strong walls; it possessed an episcopal palace, the seat of the East
Anglian bishopric; it had (so Stow asserts) fifty-two churches, a
monastery, brazen gates, a town hall, hospitals, and the dignity of
possessing a mint.
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