him and his descendants. Against these invaders the forces of the Angles made a stand, but fortune no longer flattered the king with her customary favours, but deserted him in the contest: for, when, during the greater part of the day, he had almost secured the victory, he lost the battle as the sun declined; however, by the favour of darkness, he escaped the disgrace of being conquered. In the next action, with a small force, he totally routed an immense multitude. At length, after a reign of thirty-seven years and seven months, he departed this life, and was buried at Winchester; leaving an ample field of glory for his son, and declaring, that he must be happy, if he was careful not to destroy, by the indolence natural to his race, a kingdom that himself had consolidated with such consummate industry.
CHAP. II.
Of king Ethelwulf. [a.d. 839—858.]
In the year of our Lord's incarnation 837,[1] Ethelwulf, whom some call Athulf, the son of Egbert, came to the throne, and reigned twenty years and five months. Mild by nature he infinitely preferred a life of tranquillity to dominion over many provinces; and, finally, content with liis paternal kingdom, he bestowed all the rest, which his father had subjugated, on his son Ethelstan; of whom it is not known when, or in what manner, he died. He assisted Burhred, king of the Mercians, with an army against the Britons, and highly exalted him by giving him his daughter in marriage. He frequently overcame the piratical Danes, who were traversing the whole island and infesting the coast with sudden descents, both personally and by his generals; although, according to the chance of war, he himself experienced great and repeated calamities; London and almost the whole of Kent being laid waste. Yet these disasters were ever checked by the alacrity of the king's advisers, who suffered not the enemy to trespass with impunity, but fully avenged themselves on them by the efiect of their united counsels. For he possessed at that time, two most excellent prelates,
- ↑ Malmesbury, in following the Saxon Chronicle, is two years earlier than the Northern Chronicles.
