was to put a stop on both sides to the lifting of cattle, and the carrying off of the peasantry as slaves. Both kings engaged to promote the Christian religion, and to punish apostasy. We are not well informed as to the progress the faith made among his subjects on Guthrun's conver-bound by it, continued to cross over from the sion; but it was probably rapid, though imperfect, and accompanied with a lingering affection for the divinities of the Scandinavian mythology. It was about this time, or very soon after Alfred's breaking up from his retreat at Athelney, and gaining the victory of Ethandune, that, moved by the love of humane letters which distinguished him all his life, he invited Asser, esteemed the most learned man then in the island, to his court or camp, in order that he might profit by his instructive conversation. The monk of St. David's, who was not a Saxon, but descended from a Welsh family, obeyed the summons, and, according to his own account, he was introduced to the king at Dene, in Wiltshire, by the thanes who had been sent to fetch him. A familiar intercourse followed a most courteous reception, and then the king invited the monk to live constantly about his person. The vows of Asser, and his attachment to his monastery, where he had been nurtured and instructed, interfered with this arrangement; but, after some delays, it was agreed he should pass half his time in his monastery, and the rest of the year at court. Returning, at length, to Alfred, he found him at a place called Leonaford. He remained eight months constantly with him, conversing and reading with him all such books as the king possessed. On the Christmas Eve following, Alfred, in token of his high regard, gave the monk an abbey in Wiltshire, supposed to be at Amesbury, and another abbey at Banwell, in Somersetshire, together with a rich silk pall, and as much incense as a strong man could carry on his shoulders, assuring him, at the same time, that he considered these as small things for a man of so much merit, and that hereafter he should have greater. Asser was subsequently promoted to the bishopric of Sherburn, and thenceforward remained constantly with the king, enjoying his entire confidence and affection, and sharing in all his joys and sorrows. This rare friendship between a sovereign and subject continued unbroken till death; and when the grave closed over the great Alfred, the honourable testimony was read in his will, that Asser was a person in whom he had full confidence. To this singular connection Alfred and his subjects were, no doubt, indebted for some improvements in the royal mind, which wrought good alike for the king and for the people; and we, at the distance of nearly 1000 years, owe to it an endearing record of that inonarch's personal character and habits. But some time had yet to pass ere Alfred could give himself up to quiet enjoyments, to law-making, and the intellectual improvement of his people. Though Guthrun kept his contract, hosts of marauding Danes, who were not VOL. I. Continent, and infest the shores and rivers of our island. In 879, the very year after Guthrun's treaty and baptism, a great army of pagans came from beyond the sea, and wintered at Fullanham, or Fulham, hard by the river Thames. From Fulham, this host proceeded to Ghent, in the Low Countries. At this period the Northmen alternated their attacks on England, and their attacks on Holland, Belgium, and East France, in a curious manner, the expedition beginning on one side of the British Channel and German Ocean, frequently ending on the other side. The rule of their conduct, however, seems to have been this-to persevere only against the weakest enemy. Thus, when they found France strong, they tried England; and when they found the force of England consolidated under Alfred, they turned off in the direction of France, or the neighbouring shores of the Continent. It is a melancholy fact, that England then benefited by the calamities of her neighbours. In the year 886, while the armies of the Northmen were fully employed in besieging or blockading the city of Paris, Alfred took that favourable opportunity to rebuild and fortify the city of London. Amongst other cities, we are told, it had been destroyed by fire, and the people killed; but he made it habitable again, and committed it to the care and custody of his son-in-law, Ethelred, Earl or Eolderman of the Mercians, to whom, before, he had given his daughter Ethelfleda. Each of the six years immediately preceding the rebuilding of London, he was engaged in hostilities; but he was generally fortunate by sea as well as by land, for he had increased his navy, and the care due to that truly national service. In the year 882 his fleet, still officered by Frieslanders, took four, and, three years after (in one fight), sixteen of the enemy's ships. In the latter year (885) he gained a decisive victory over a Danish host that had ascended the Medway, and were besieging Rochester, having built them a strong castle before the gates of that city. By suddenly falling on them, he took their tower with little loss, seized all the horses they had brought with them from France, recovered the greater part of their captives, and drove them to their ships, with which they returned to France in the utmost distress. Alfred was now allowed some breathing time, which he wisely employed in strengthening his kingdom, and bettering the condition of his people. Instead, however, of tracing these things 12 strictly in their chronological order, it will add | whole year, the Danes in either camp did little else than fortify their positions, and scour the country in foraging parties. Other piratical squadrons, however, kept hovering round our coasts, to distract attention and create alarm at many points at one and the same time. The been dead three years; and to complete the most critical position of Alfred, the Danes settled in the Danelagh, even from the Tweed to the Thames, violated their oaths, took up arms against him, and joined their marauding brethren under Hasting. It was in this campaign, or rather this succession of campaigns, which lasted altogether three years, that the military genius of the AngloSaxon monarch shone with its greatest lustre, and was brought into full play by the ability, the wonderful and eccentric rapidity, and the great resources of his opponent Hasting. To follow their operations the reader must place the map of England before him, for they ran over half of the island, and shifted the scene of war with almost as much rapidity as that with which the decorations of a theatre are changed. to the perspicuity of the narrative, if we follow at once the warlike events of his reign to their close. The siege of Paris, to which we have alluded, and which began in 886, employed the Danes or Northmen two whole years. Shortly after the heathens burst into the country now called Flan-honourable and trustworthy Guthrun had now ders, which was then a dependency of the Frankish or French kings, and were employed there for some time in a difficult and extensive warfare. A horrid famine ensued in those parts of the Continent, and made the hungry wolves look elsewhere for sustenance and prey. England had now revived, by a happy repose of seven years; her corn-fields had borne their plentiful crops; her pastures, no longer swept by the tempests of war, were well sprinkled with flocks and herds; and those good fatted beeves, which were always dear to the capacious stomachs of the Northmen, made the island a very land of promise to the imagination of the famished. It is true that of late years they had found those treasures were well defended, and that nothing was to be got under Alfred's present government without hard blows, and a desperate contest, at least doubtful in its issue. But hunger impelled them forward; they were a larger body than had ever made the attack at once; they were united under the cominand of a chief equal or superior in fame and military talent to any that had preceded him; | and therefore the Danes, in the year 893, once more turned the prows of their vessels toward England. It was indeed a formidable fleet. As the men of Kent gazed seaward from their cliffs and downs, they saw the horizon darkened by it; as the winds and waves wafted it forward, they counted 250 several ships; and every ship was full of warriors and horses brought from Flanders and France, for the immediate mounting of them as a rapid, predatory cavalry. The invaders landed near Romney Marsh, at the eastern termination of the great wood or weald of Anderida (already mentioned in connection with an invasion of the Saxons), and at the mouth of a river, now dry, called Limine. They towed their ships four miles up the river towards the weald, and there mastered a fortress the peasants of the country were raising in the fens. They then proceeded to Apuldre, or Appledore, at which point they made a strongly fortified camp, whence they ravaged the adjacent country for many miles. Nearly simultaneously with these movements, the famed Haesten or Hasting, the skilful commander-in-chief of the entire expedition, entered the Thames with another division of eighty ships, landed at and took Milton, near Sittingbourne, and there threw up prodigiously strong intrenchments. Their past reverses had made them extremely cautious; and for nearly a The first great difficulty Alfred had to encounter was in collecting and bringing up sufficient forces to one point, and then in keeping them in adequate number in the field; for the Saxon "fyrd," or levée en masse, were only bound by law to serve for a certain time (probably forty days), and it was indispensable to provide for the safety of the towns, almost everywhere threatened, and to leave men sufficient for the culti vation of the country. Alfred overcame this difficulty by dividing his army, or militia, into two bodies; of these he called one to the field, while the men composing the other were left at home. After a reasonable length of service those in the field returned to their homes, and those left at home took their places in the field. The spectacle of this large and permanent army, to which they had been wholly unaccustomed, struck Hasting and his confederates with astonishment and dismay. Nor did the position the English king took up with it give them much ground for comfort. Advancing into Kent, he threw himself between Hasting and the other division of the Danes: a forest on one side, and swamps and deep waters on the other, protected his flanks, and he made the front and rear of his position so strong that the Danes dared not look at them. He thus kept asunder the two armies of the Northmen, watching the motions of both, being always ready to attack either, should it quit its intrenchments; and so active were the patrols and troops he threw out in small bodies, and so good the spirit of the villagers and townfolk, cheered by the presence and wise disposi tions of the sovereign, that in a short time not a single foraging party could issue from the Danish camp without almost certain destruction. Worn out in body and spirit, the Northmen resolved to break up from their camps, and, to deceive the king as to their intentions, they sent submissive messages and hostages, and promised to leave the kingdom. Hasting took to his shipping, and actually made sail, as if to leave the well-defended island; but while the eyes of the Saxons were fixed on his departure, the other division, in Alfred's rear, rushed suddenly from their intrenchments into the interior of the country, in order to seek a ford across the Thames, by which they hoped to be enabled to get into Essex, where the rebel Danes that had been ruled by Guthrun would give them a friendly reception, and where they knew they should meet Hasting and his division, who, instead of putting to sea, merely crossed the Thames, and took up a strong position at Benfleet, on the Essex coast. Alfred had not ships to pursue those who moved by water; but those who marched by land he followed up closely, and brought them to action on the right bank of the Thames, near Farnham, in Surrey. The Danes were thoroughly defeated. Those who escaped the sword and drowning marched along the left bank of the Thames, through Middlesex, into Essex; but being hotly pursued by Alfred, they were driven right through Essex, and across the river Coln, when they found a strong place of refuge in the Isle of Mersey. Here, however, they were closely blockaded, and soon obliged to sue for peace, promising hostages, as usual, and an immediate departure from England. Alfred would have had this enemy in his hand through sheer starvation, but the genius of Hasting, and the defection of the Northmen of the Danelagh, called him to a distant part of the island. Two fleets, one of 100 sail, the second of forty, and both in good part manned by the Danes who had been so long, and for the last fifteen years so peacefully settled in England, set sail to attack | down all the western coast, from Cape Wrath to in two points, and make a formidable diversion. the Bristol Channel, and, ascending that arm of The first of these, which had probably been the sea, beleaguered a fortified town to the north equipped in Norfolk' and Suffolk, doubled the of the Severn. Though Alfred had established North Foreland, ran down the southern coast as friendly relations with the people of the west of far as Devonshire, and laid siege to Exeter: the England, who seem on many occasions to have smaller fleet, which had been fitted out in North- served him with as much ardour as his Saxon umbria, and probably sailed from the mouth of subjects, he still felt that Devonshire was a vulthe Tyne, took the passage round Scotland, ran nerable part. Leaving, therefore, a portion of his That Norfolk was now peopled by the Normans, under the name of Danes, may be inferred from its having the same reputation for producing litigants and lawyers that Normandy has in France, although Camden, oddly enough, attributes this to the goodness of the soil, which he admits to be very various. "The soil," says he, "is different, according to the several quarters; in some places it is fat, luscious, and moist; in others poor, lean, and sandy; and in others, clayey and chalky. But (to follow the directions of Varro) the goodness of the soil may be gathered from hence, that the inhabitants are of a bright, clear complexion; not to mention their sharpness of wit, and singular sagacity in the study of our common law, so that it is at present, and always has been reputed, the most fruitful nursery of law. yers. But even among the common people you may meet with many who, as one expresses it, if no quarrel offers, are able to 66 And," pick one out of the quirks and niceties of the law." adds Bishop Gibson, "for the preventing of the great and frequent contentions that might ensue thereupon, and the inconveniences of too many attorneys, a special statute was made, as long since as the time of King Henry VI., to restrain the number of attorneys in Norfolk, Suffolk, and Norwich." Thus Norfolk and Normandy add their testimony to the force of the expression of a man's "being too far north to be cheated." army on the confines of Essex, he mounted all the rest on horses, and flew to Exeter. Victory followed him to the west; he obliged the Danes to raise the siege of Exeter; he beat them back to their ships with great loss, and soon after the minor expedition was driven from the Severn. The blockade of the Danes in the Isle of Mersey does not appear to have been well conducted during his absence, and yet that interval was not devoid of great successes: for, in the meantime, Ethelred, Eolderman of the Mercians, and Alfred's son-in-law, with the citizens of London and others, went down to the fortified post at Benfleet, in Essex, laid siege to it, broke into it, and despoiled it of great quantities of gold, silver, horses, and garments; taking away captive also the wife of Hasting and his two sons, who were brought to London, and presented to the king on his return. Some of his followers urged him to put these captives to death-others to detain them in prison as a check upon Hasting; but Alfred, with a generosity which was never properly appreciated by the savage Dane, caused them immediately to be restored to his enemy, and sent many presents of value with them. By this time the untiring Hasting had thrown up another formidable intrenchment at South Showbury, in Essex, when he was soon joined by numbers from Norfolk and Suffolk, from Northumbria, from all parts of the Danelagh, and by fresh adventurers from beyond sea. Thus reinforced, he sailed boldly up the Thames, and thence spread the mass of his forces into the heart of the kingdom, while the rest returned with their vessels and the spoil they had so far made to the intrenched camp at South Showbury. From the Thames, Hasting marched to the Severn, and fortified himself at Buttington. But here he was surrounded by the Saxons and the men of North Wales, who now cordially acted with them; and in brief time Alfred, with Ethelred and two other eoldermen, cut off all his supplies, and blockaded him in his camp. After some weeks, when the Danes had eaten up nearly all their horses, and famine was staring them in the face, Hasting rushed from his intrenchments. Avoid ing the Welsh forces, he concentrated his attack upon the Saxons, who formed the blockade to the east of his position. The conflict was terrific; several hundreds (some of the chroniclers say thousands) of the Danes were slain in their attempt to break through Alfred's lines; many were thrown into the Severn and drowned; but the rest, headed by Hasting, effected their escape, and, marching across the island, reached their intrenchment and their ships on the Essex coast. Alfred lost many of his nobles, and must have been otherwise much crippled, for he did not molest Hasting, who could have had hardly any horse in any part of his retreat. Most of the Saxons who fought at Buttington were raw levies, and hastily got together. When Hasting next showed front it was in the neighbourhood of North Wales, between the rivers Dee and Mersey. During the winter that followed his dis asters on the Severn, he had been again reinforcel by the men of the Danelagh, and at early spring he set forth with his usual rapidity, and marched through the midland counties. Alfred was not far behind him, but could not overtake him until he had seized Chester, which was then almost | uninhabited, and secured himself there. This town had been very strongly fortified by the Romans, and many of the works of those conquerors still remaining,' no doubt gave strength to Hasting's position, which was deemed too formidable for attack. But the Saxon troops pressed him on the land side, and a squadron of Alfred's ships, which had put to sea, ascended the Mersey and the river Wirall, and prevented his receiving succour in that direction. Dreading that Chester might become a second Buttington, the Danes burst away into North Wales. After ravaging part of that country, they would have gone off in the direction of the Severn and the Avon, but they were met and turned by a formidable royal army, upon which they retraced their steps, and finally marched off to the north-east. They traversed Northumbria, Lincolnshire, Norfolk, Suffolk-nearly the whole length of the Danelaghwhere they were among friends and allies, and by that circuitous route at length regained their fortified post at South Showbury, in Essex, where they wintered and recruited their strength as usual. Early next spring the persevering Hasting sailed to the mouth of the Lea, ascended that river with his ships, and at or near Ware, about twenty miles above London, erected a new fortress on the Lea. On the approach of summer, the burgesses of London, with many of their neighbours, attacked the stronghold on the Lea, but were repulsed with great loss. As London was now more closely pressed than ever, Alfred found it necessary to encamp his army round about the city until the citizens got in their harvest. He then pushed a strong reconnoissance to the Lea, which (far deeper and broader than now) was covered by their ships, and afterwards surveyed, at great personal risk, the new fortified camp of the Danes. His active ingenious mind forthwith conceived a plan, which he confidently hoped would end in their inevitable destruction. Bringing up his army, he raised two 1 Some noble arched gateways, built by the Romans, were standing almost entire until a recent period, when they were laid low by a barbarous decree of the Chester corporation. 2 Some topographers contend that this fortified camp was not at Ware, but at Hertford. fortresses, one on either side the Lea, somewhat below the Danish station, and then he dug three deep channels from the Lea to the Thames, in order to lower the level of the tributary streain. So much water was thus drawn off, that "where a ship," says an old writer, "might sail in time afore passed, then a little boat might scarcely row;"-and the whole fleet of Hasting was left aground, and rendered useless. But yet again did that remarkable chieftain break through the toils spread for him, to renew the war in a distant part of the island. Abandoning the ships where they were, and putting, as they had been accustomed to do, their wives, their children, and their booty under the protection of their friends in the Danelagh, the followers of Hasting broke from their intrenchments by night, and hardly rested till they had traversed the whole of that wide tract of country which separates the Lea from the Severn. Marching for some distance along the left bank of the Severn, they took post close on the river at Quatbridge, which is supposed to be Quatford, near Bridgenorth, in Shropshire. When Alfred came up with them there, he found them already strongly fortified. On our first introducing the Northmen, we mentioned their skill in choosing and strengthening military positions; and the course of our narrative will have made their skill and speed in these matters evident, especially in the campaigns they performed under Hasting, who had many of the qualities that constitute a great general. Alfred was compelled to respect the intrenchments at Quatbridge, and to leave the Danes there undisturbed during the winter. In the meantime the citizens of London seized Hasting's fleet, grounded in the Lea. Some ships they burned and destroyed, but others they were enabled to get afloat and conduct to London, where they were received with exceeding great joy. For full three years this Scandinavian Hannibal had maintained a war in the country of the enemy; but now, watched on every side, worn out by constant losses, and probably in good part forsaken as an unlucky leader, both by his brethren settled in the Danelagh and by those on the Continent, his spirit began to break, and he prepared to take a reluctant and indignant farewell of England. In the following spring of 897, by which time dissensions had broken out among their leaders, the Danes tumultuously abandoned their camp at Quatbridge, and utterly disbanded their army soon after, fleeing in small and separate parties, in various directions. Some sought shelter among their brethren of the Danelagh, either in Northumbria, or Norfolk and Suffolk; some built vessels, and sailed for the Scheldt and the mouth of the Rhine; while others, adhering to Hasting in his evil fortune, waited until he was ready to pass into France. A small fleet, bearing his drooping raven, was hastily equipped on our eastern coast, and the humbled chieftain, according to Asser, crossed the Channel “sine lucro et sine honore," without profit or honour. It appears that he ascended the Seine, and soon after obtained a settlement on the banks of that river (probably in Normandy) from the weak King of the French. A few desultory attacks made by sea, and by the men of the Danelagh, almost immediately after Hasting's departure, only tended to show the naval superiority Alfred was attaining, and to improve the Anglo-Saxons in maritime tactics. A squadron of Northumbrian pirates cruised off the southern coasts, with their old objects in view. It was met and defeated on several occasions by the improved ships of the king. Alfred, who had some mechanical skill himself, had caused vessels to be built, far exceeding those of his enemies in length of keel, height of board, swiftness, and steadiness; some of these carried sixty oars or sweepers, to be used, as in the Roman galleys, when the wind failed; and others carried even more than sixty. They differed in the form of the hull, and probably in their rigging, from the other vessels used in the North Sea. Hitherto the Danish and Friesland builds seem to have been considered as the best models; but these ships, which were found peculiarly well adapted to the service for which he intended them, were constructed after a plan of Alfred's own invention. At the end of his reign they considerably exceeded the number of 100 sail; they were divided into squadrons, and stationed at different ports round the island, while some of them were kept constantly cruising between England and the main. Although he abandoned their system of ship-building, Alfred retained many Frieslanders in his service, for they were more expert seamen than his subjects, who still required instruction. After an obstinate engagement near the Isle of Wight, two Danish ships, which had been much injured in the fight, were cast ashore and taken. When the crews were carried to the king at Winchester, he ordered them all to be hanged. This severity, so much at variance with Alfred's usual humanity, has caused some regret and confusion to historians. One writer says that the Danes do not seem to have violated the law of nations, as such law was then understood, and that, therefore, Alfred's execution of them was inexcusable. Another writer is of opinion that Alfred always, and properly, drew a distinction between pirates and warriors. This line would be most difficult to draw, when all were robbers and pirates alike; but the real rule of Alfred's conduct seems to have been this--to distinguish between such Danes as attacked him |