Hastings took his vessels into this river, and, following its turnings for some miles, he conducted them at last to a place where he found more solid ground to land upon.  But this ground, though solid, was almost as wild and solitary as the morass.  It was a forest of vast extent, which showed no signs of human occupancy, except that the peasants who lived in the surrounding regions had come down to the lowest point accessible, and were building a rude fortification there.  Hastings attacked them and drove them away.  Then, advancing a little further, until he found an advantageous position, he built a strong fortress himself and established his army within its lines.

His next measure was to land another force near the mouth of the Thames, and bring them into the country, until he found a strong position where he could intrench and fortify the second division as he had done the first.  These two positions were but a short distance from each other.  He made them the combined center of his operations, going from them in all directions in plundering excursions.  Alfred soon raised an army and advanced to attack him; and these operations were the commencement of a long and tedious war.

A detailed description of the events of this war, the marches and countermarches, the battles and sieges, the various success, first of one party and then of the other, given historically in the order of time, would be as tedious to read as the war itself was to endure.  Alfred was very cautious in all his operations, preferring rather to trust to the plan of wearing out the enemy by cutting off their resources and hemming them constantly in, than to incur the risk of great decisive battles.  In fact, watchfulness, caution, and delay are generally the policy of the invaded when a powerful force has succeeded in establishing itself among them; while, on the other hand, the hope of invaders lies ordinarily in prompt and decided action.  Alfred was well aware of this, and made all his arrangements with a view to cutting off Hastings’s supplies, shutting him up into as narrow a compass as possible, heading him off in all his predatory excursions, intercepting all detachments, and thus reducing him at length to the necessity of surrender.

At one time, soon after the war began, Hastings, true to the character of his nation for treachery and stratagem, pretended that he was ready to surrender, and opened a negotiation for this purpose.  He agreed to leave the kingdom if Alfred would allow him to depart peaceably, and also, which was a point of great importance in Alfred’s estimation, to have his two sons baptized.  While, however, these negotiations were going on between the two camps, Alfred suddenly found that the main body of Hastings’s army had stolen away in the rear, and were marching off by stealth to another part of the country.  The negotiations were, of course, immediately abandoned, and Alfred set off with all his forces in full pursuit.  All hopes of peace were given up, and the usual series of sieges, maneuverings, battles, and retreats was resumed again.