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remained the same. We can hardly hope to add to these facts by any new discovery. The Essays were most valuable, not in adding to a record already familiar, but in showing what that record proved and meant. In the following pages I

have referred to this book on several occasions. If I have not always acknowledged with gratitude the source of certain paragraphs due to this book, I hope that this general acknowledgment will prove sufficient.

The Introduction to the book consists of an address which I was invited to deliver before the people of Winchester, as preparatory to the first steps towards the celebration. I wish it had been more worthy of the subject. My audience was representative; not only were the scholars and divines of Winchester present, with the notables of the city, but also a large number of working people who filled up the hall. It was with the most lively satisfaction that I found the subject one that would hold and interest this part of the assemblage. If the subject could interest the folk of Winchester, why should it not interest also the larger company of the working class over the whole of the Anglo-Saxon world? I desire to stand before a larger audience in a wider theatre. I desire to fill that theatre with the people to whom at present Alfred is but a name, if even that. I should like, if it were possible, to see before me, in imagination, tier beyond tier, stretching far away in the distance, circle beyond circle, millions of white faces intent upon the story of the English king. If they will listen, my voice will reach to the farthest circle; if they are interested, they will listen. Let me see their faces light up as if touched by sunshine when the in

terest of the subject fills them; let me see the changes as of passing rain and sunshine on an April day on the faces of this vast audience. Wherever they live, in whatever climate, under whatever name, they own their liberty, which they enjoy unconsciously, as they enjoy the free air of heaven-their peace, order, security, self-government, all of which they accept as if these things came by nature with the harvest and the fruits of the season in due course-to the great and wise King Alfred, whose history every man and woman of the English-speaking race ought to learn, and every boy and girl to know.

I would rather write a book for the people than anything else that the world can offer. He who reaches the heart of the people becomes and continues an abiding force. Truly, his work lives after him—his good work. Think of the influence, for two hundred years and more, of the “Pilgrim's Progress"! What could man desire better than for all these years to be a champion of religious liberty and the sturdy individualism which has done so much for the national character and the national history? It is a great ambition-there can be none greater; the glories that a State can offer the honour, the distinction, the wealth are insignificant before such an achievement. Let me be permitted to entertain the ambition, even though it is not destined to be fulfilled.

In the name, then, of everything that is dear to us and profitable to us; in the name of godliness, patience, resolution, frankness, wisdom, and self-sacrifice, let us endeavour to make Alfred better known to his great-grandchildren. We are all his great-grandchildren. Our ancestors of a

thousand years ago numbered all the people of Wessex, Kent, and Sussex, and among them the royal line of Cerdic, with Alfred as the common great-grandfather. W. B.

II. THE AUTHORITIES.

It may be asked at the outset, how we know all these things about Alfred. The sources of our information are many, but the things they tell us are few. First and foremost, there is the "Life of Alfred," by Asser, formerly Bishop of Sherborne. This document, about which there has been much discussion, was the work of a Welsh scholar and ecclesiastic, who was invited by Alfred to join him at his Court to read aloud to him and to advise him in matters literary. Asser's work appears to have been mutilated and altered, or added to in many places, but the greater part was always, undoubtedly, as we have it at the present day. There are many "undesigned coincidences" which prove the genuineness of the work. Thus, Asser was a descendant of the old British race, so goes out of his way to inform his readers of the British names of certain places. He tells us that the island of Thanet was called Ruim; that the village of Snotingaham is called by them Tigguocobane; that Wilton is situated. near the ancient Guilon; and that Thornscetan is Durngueis. It is not likely that a forged document would take the trouble to invent these details. Moreover, there is little, except in one or two passages, evidently interpolated and easily detected, which contains legend or tradition. The "Life" is a contemporary document left un

finished some five or six years before the king's death; the autobiographical parts bear every possible mark of truth; while, scattered here and there, are passages of irrepressible personal admiration and affection.

Thus Asser says―

"Alfred would avail himself of every opportunity to procure coadjutors in his good designs, to aid him in his strivings after wisdom, that he might attain to what he aimed at; and, like a prudent bird, which, rising in summer with the early morning from her beloved nest, steers her rapid flight through the uncertain tracks of ether, and descends on the manifold and varied flowers of grasses, herbs, and shrubs, essaying that which pleases most, that she may bear it to her home, so did he direct his eyes afar, and seek without that which he had not within, namely, in his own kingdom."

And again—

"Thus, like a most productive bee, he flew here and there, asking questions as he went, until he had eagerly and unceasingly collected many various flowers of Divine Scriptures, with which he quickly stored the cells of his mind."

These passages are hardly such as a writer at second hand, or the writer of a forged biography would set down. They have a spontaneous and personal air. From the beginning to the end, indeed, of the document the loyalty of Asser is conspicuous. It is no mere lip-worship that he offers; his love for Alfred is based upon years of the closest personal relations, in which the king's character, his greatness, his disinterested labours, his modesty, his wisdom, his many noble qualities, have become gradually revealed to his private secretary. We could not have chosen a better

biographer, though we might wish for more details, a continuation to the end, and a more carefully arranged Life.

Apart from these points, it is very strong testimony to the truth of this document that it is quoted copiously by the earlier chroniclers, especially Florence of Worcester, who died in 1118, and wrote somewhere about 1100, or two hundred years after Asser. Of course, a great deal may happen in two hundred years. At the same time, the period 900 A.D. to 1100 A.D. can hardly be called one of great literary activity, nor was it a period in which, for no apparent motive, a forged document such as the "Life of King Alfred" was likely to be produced.

Had a pretended Life of Alfred been foisted upon the world, it would have been stuffed with fable, legend, and the attribution of works with which the king had no concern. Alfred speedily became the subject of song and of tradition. the so-called "Proverbs of King Alfred," there occurs a song

ALFRED.

"Englene Herd [England's Shepherd]
Englene Darling.

In Enkelonde he was king:

Alfred he was in Enkelonde a king

Wel swythe strong,

He was king and cleric

Full well he loved God's work:

He was wise in his word,

And war [wary] in his work.

He was the wisest man

That was in England."

In

There is, next in importance to Asser's "Life," the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. This document was

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