The north-east became Saxonised at a very early period. This is clear from the place-names. There is no reason to doubt that St. Neot, the Saxon monk of Glastonbury, settled in that part of Cornwall which bears his name, in the ninth century, and after founding a college of priests died, and was buried there. There is no reason to doubt the substantial accuracy of Asser’s narrative—whether it be Asser’s or another’s—which states that Alfred the Great hunted in the neighbourhood of St. Neot, and was healed, or believed himself to have been healed, at the shrine of St. Guerir. Alfred’s possessions in Triconshire have been referred to. The community at St. Neot held two hides of land in the days of the Confessor, but the whole of it save one (Cornish) acre had been stolen by the Count of Mortain in 1086. Again, the canons of St. Stephen-by-Launceston appear to have suffered a diminution of their power and also of their revenue owing to Saxon settlement. At the time of the Survey their affairs were in a state of utter confusion. They were attempting to hold on to lands which had been theirs, and are styled theirs in Domesday Book, which Harold held before the Norman Conquest, and which the Count of Mortain was striving to re-annex. In North-East Cornwall the Celtic type of Christianity had given place to the Saxon. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [Illustration: CORNWALL DOMESDAY BOOK.] ------------------------------------------------------------------------