Here we are well within the Isle of Thanet, whose name, as generally is the case, is of uncertain origin. "Thanatos," the "Isle of Death," suggested some commentator in the bygone years, but he did not bolster up his derivation by telling us in what way it was so deadly. Perhaps in the wrecks of its coast. In other respects, Thanet is the Isle of Good Health, of rude, hungry, boisterous health; and in summer the Isle of Cockneys. Does it not contain Ramsgate--"rollicking Ramsgate",--and Margate the merry, whose name--I am sorry--always reminds me of margarine? It was at Margate, upon Jarvis's Jetty, that "Mr. Simpkinson" met the "little vulgar boy" who did him so very brown, but I am not going to Margate to see the Jetty; which has been greatly altered since Jarvis caused it to rise out of the vasty deep. Margate is mentioned only that once in the _Ingoldsby Legends_ and Ramsgate not at all, and so I shall cut them out of my journey, and make across inland, over the high ridge at Acol, to Reculver. The road is flat, the surface good, and from Sandwich to Ebbsfleet is an enjoyable run. At Ebbsfleet there has been lately erected a tall granite cross to mark where St. Augustine landed and reintroduced Christianity in A.D. 597. Perhaps not everyone knows that he was sent against his will on this mission by the Pope, and that it was only grumbling he came. Not altogether so saintly as we might, not inquiring closely, suppose--a morose and masterful man. Through Minster lies our way--Minster-in-Thanet--reached by lanes of the charmingest, with overarching trees; very beautiful, and filled in summer with other things not so lovely: with such eye-sorrows and ear-torments as dusty brake-parties clamant with the latest comic songs and energetically performing upon cornets and concertinas; little vulgar boys, descendants, possibly, of Mr. Simpkinson's young friend, turning cart-wheels in the dust for casual pence. The brake-proprietors of Margate and Ramsgate, conscious that such tree-shaded spots are rare in Thanet, have taken these under their protection, and advertise "Twelve miles drives through the pretty lanes, 1/-." Minster is therefore a paradise of beanfeasters and the inferno of pilgrims, literary or other. [Illustration: THE SMUGGLER'S LEAP.]