Silver, a white metal,[471] was probably named after Sil Vera, the Princess of the Silvery Moon and Silvery Stars. Silver Street is a common name for old roads in the south of England:[472] Aubrey Walk in Kensington, is at the summit of a Silver Street, and the prime Aubrey de Vere of this neighbourhood was, I suspect, the same ghost as originally walked Auber’s Ridge in Picardy, and the famous French Chemin des Dames. France is the land of the Franks,[473] and near Frankton in Shropshire at Ellesmere, i.e., the Elle, Fairy, or Holy mere, are the remains of a so-called Ladies Walk. This extraordinary Chemin des Dames, the relic evidently of some old-time ceremony, is described as a paved causeway running far into the mere, with which more than forty years ago old swimmers were well acquainted. It could be traced by bathers until they got out of their depth. How much farther it might run they of course knew not. Its existence seems to have been almost forgotten until, in 1879, some divers searching for the body of a drowned man came upon it on the bottom of the mere, and this led to old inhabitants mentioning their knowledge of it.[474]
England abounds in Silverhills, Silverhowes, Silverleys, Silvertowns, Silverdales, and Perryvales. By Silverdale at Sydenham is Jews Walk, and on Branch Hill at Hampstead is a fine prospect known as Judges Walk: here is Holly Bush Hill and Holly Mound, and opposite is Mount Vernon, to be connoted with Durovernon, the ancient name of Canterbury or Rodau’s Town.
Jews Walk, and the Grove at Upper Sydenham, are adjacent to Peak Hill, which, in all probability, was once upon a time Puck’s Hill, and the wooded heights of Sydenham were in all likelihood a caer sidi, or seat of fairyland.
My chair is prepared in Caer Sidi
The disease of old age afflicts none who is there.
. . . . . . . .
About its peaks are the streams of ocean
And above it is a fruitful fountain.
Sir John Morris-Jones points out that sidi is the Welsh equivalent of the Irish sid, “fairyland”[475] and he connects the word with seat. In view of this it is possible that St. Sidwell at Exeter was like the River Sid at Sidmouth, a caer sidi, or seat of the shee.
Sydenham, like the Phœnician Sidon, is probably connected with Poseidon, or Father Sidon, and Rhode the son of Poseidon may be connoted with Rhadamanthus, the supposed twin brother of Minos. Near Canterbury is Rhodesminnis, or Rhode Common,[476] and on this common Justice was doubtless once administered by the representatives of Rhadamanthus, who was praised by all men for his wisdom, piety, and equity. It is said that Rhode was driven to Crete by Minos, and was banished to an Asiatic island where he made his memory immortal by the wisdom of his laws: Rhode, whose name is rhoda, the rose or Eros, is further said to have instructed Hercules in virtue and wisdom, and according to Homer he dwells not in the underworld but in the Elysian Fields.