of the confederation.  When all was ready, they found that there were eight kings and twenty earls in the alliance, generally the relatives and comrades of Ragnar.  The two most prominent of these commanders were Guthrum and Hubba.  Hubba was one of Ragnar’s sons.  At length, toward the close of the summer, the formidable expedition set sail.  They approached the English coast, and landed without meeting with any resistance.  The Saxons seemed appalled and paralyzed at the greatness of the danger.  The several kingdoms of the Heptarchy, though they had been imperfectly united, some years before, under Egbert, were still more or less distinct, and each hoped that the one first invaded would be the only one which would suffer; and as these kingdoms were rivals, and often hostile to each other, no general league was formed against what soon proved to be the common enemy.  The Danes, accordingly, quietly encamped, and made calm and deliberate arrangements for spending the winter in their new quarters, as if they were at home.

During all this time, notwithstanding the coolness and deliberation with which these avengers of their murdered countryman acted, the fires of their resentment and revenge were slowly but steadily burning, and as soon as the spring opened, they put themselves in battle array, and marched into the dominions of Ella.  Ella did all that it was possible to do to meet and oppose them, but the spirit of retaliation and rage which his cruelties had evoked was too strong to be resisted.  His country was ravaged, his army was defeated, he was taken prisoner, and the dying terrors and agonies of Ragnar among the serpents were expiated by tenfold worse tortures which they inflicted upon Ella’s mutilated body, by a process too horrible to be described.

After thus successfully accomplishing the great object of their expedition, it was to have been hoped that they would leave the island and return to their Danish homes.  But they evinced no disposition to do this.  On the contrary, they commenced a course of ravage and conquest in all parts of England, which continued for several years.  The parts of the country which attempted to oppose them they destroyed by fire and sword.  They seized cities, garrisoned and occupied them, and settled in them as if to make them their permanent homes.  One kingdom after another was subdued.  The kingdom of Wessex seemed alone to remain, and that was the subject of contest.  Ethelred was the king.  The Danes advanced into his dominions to attack him.  In the battle that ensued, Ethelred was killed.  The successor to his throne was his brother Alfred, the subject of this history, who thus found himself suddenly and unexpectedly called upon to assume the responsibilities and powers of supreme command, in as dark and trying a crisis of national calamity and danger as can well be conceived.  The manner in which Alfred acted in the emergency, rescuing his country from her perils, and laying the foundations, as he did, of all the greatness and glory which has since accrued to her, has caused his memory to be held in the highest estimation among all nations, and has immortalized his name.