However this may be, and whatever view we may take of the comparative influence of Alfred’s energetic action and Ethelred’s religious faith in the defeat of the Danes at this great battle, it is certain that the results of it were very momentous to all concerned.  Ethelred received a wound, either in this battle or in some of the smaller contests and collisions which followed it, under the effects of which he pined and lingered for some months, and then died.  Alfred, by his decision and courage on the day of the battle, and by the ardor and resolution with which he pressed all the subsequent operations during the period of Ethelred’s decline, made himself still more conspicuous in the eyes of his countrymen than he had ever been before.  In looking forward to Ethelred’s approaching death, the people, accordingly, began to turn their eyes to Alfred as his successor.  There were children of some of his older brothers living at that time, and they, according to all received principles of hereditary right, would naturally succeed to the throne; but the nation seems to have thought that the crisis was too serious, and the dangers which threatened their country were too imminent, to justify putting any child upon the throne.  The accession of one of those children would have been the signal for a terrible and protracted struggle among powerful relatives and friends for the regency during the minority of the youthful sovereign, and this, while the Danes remained in their strong-hold at Reading, in daily expectation of new re-enforcements from beyond the sea, would have plunged the country in hopeless ruin.  They turned their eyes toward Alfred, therefore, as the sovereign to whom they were to bow so soon as Ethelred should cease to breathe.

In the mean time, the Danes, far from being subdued by the adverse turn of fortune which had befallen them, strengthened themselves in their fortress, made desperate sallies from their intrenchments, attacked their foes on every possible occasion, and kept the country in continual alarm.  They at length so far recruited their strength, and intimidated and discouraged their foes, whose king and nominal leader, Ethelred, was now less able than ever to resist them, as to take the field again.  They fought more pitched battles; and, though the Saxon chroniclers who narrate these events are very reluctant to admit that the Saxons were really vanquished in these struggles, they allow that the Danes kept the ground which they successively took post upon, and the discouraged and disheartened inhabitants of the country were forced to retire.

In the mean time, too, new parties of Danes were continually arriving on the coast, and spreading themselves in marauding and plundering excursions over the country.  The Danes at Reading were re-enforced by these bands, which made the conflict between them and Ethelred’s forces more unequal still.  Alfred did his utmost to resist the tide of ill fortune, with the limited and doubtful authority which he held; but all was in vain.  Ethelred, worn down, probably, with the anxiety and depression which the situation of his kingdom brought upon him, lingered for a time, and then died, and Alfred was by general consent called to the throne.  This was in the year 871.