The various groups of tumuli in the eastern parts of Kent are well known to our English antiquaries; and it is a fact pretty generally established, that they are referable to a period extending from the time of the abandonment of this Island by the Romans (and perhaps earlier) down to the establishment of Christianity, when it became the practice to inter the dead in some consecrated place, within the precincts of the church. To this period belong the numerous barrows on Barham Downs, near Canterbury; and the excavations recently made by Lord Albert Conyngham in the group on Breach Downs, adjacent to the village of Barham, prove that they also are of the same age.