In all this, however, we begin to catch the first faintly-resounding note of modern Thanet. The intelligent reader will no doubt have observed, with his usual acuteness, that up to date we have heard practically nothing of Ramsgate, Margate, and Broadstairs, which now form the real centres of population in the nominal island. Its relations have all been with Rutupiae, Sandwich, Canterbury, and the mainland. But the silting up of the Wantsum turned the new Thanet seaward, by the chalky cliffs; and the gaps or gates in that natural sea-wall now began to be of comparative importance as fishing stations and small havens. Ebb's Fleet was no longer the port of Ruim. The centre of gravity of the island shifts at this point, accordingly, from Minster to Ramsgate. The change is well marked by certain interesting ecclesiastical facts. Neither Ramsgate nor Broadstairs had originally churches of their own. The first formed part of the parish of St. Lawrence, which was itself a mere chapelry of Minster till late in the thirteenth century. The old village lies half a mile inland, and Ramsgate itself was throughout the middle ages nothing more than a mere gap and cove where the fishermen of St. Lawrence kept their boats. The first church in the town proper was not erected till 1791. Similarly, Broadstairs formed part of the parish of St. Peter's, the village of which lies back at about the same distance from the sea as St. Lawrence; and St Peter's, too, was at first a chapelry of Minster. The cliffs were then nothing; the inward slope was everything.