to the banqueting room, there was no object of secrecy that he did not minutely attend to both with eyes and ears. Remaining there several days, till he had satisfied his mind on everything which he wished to know, he returned to Athelney; and assembling his companions, pointed out the indolence of the enemy, and the easiness of their defeat." It is not sufficient ground for discrediting this story, that the same kind of thing has been told. of other military leaders from the time of Gideon downwards, for it is also true that the same kind of thing has been done in almost every long campaign. Alfred's scouting exploit is not more wonderful than some of Baden-Powell's scouting adventures in our own time, and just as BadenPowell earned from his enemies a soubriquet: "The wolf that never sleeps," so Alfred had the reputation of being "like a slippery serpent." 1

These stories preserve for us some of the outstanding excitements which relieved the weary weeks of waiting in the Somerset marshes. There is no doubt that when the time for action came, Alfred issued from his retreat a changed man. He is more cautious and self-restrained, though not a whit less courageous and spirited. He had made vows to God, as many men do in the time of their distress, and, as few do when the distress

1 William of Malmesbury, p. 117. Bohn.

is passed, he deliberately set himself to discharge them. It is, perhaps, this change in Alfred's temper and outlook which is adumbrated in the following passage from the life of St Neot, repeated by Asser with many pious reflections:

"But the Almighty not only granted to the same glorious king, victories over his enemies, but also permitted him to be harassed by them, to be sunk down by adversities, and depressed by the low estate of his followers, to the end that he might learn that there is one Lord of all things, to whom every knee doth bow, and in whose hand are the hearts of kings: who puts down the mighty from their seat, and exalteth the humble: who suffers his servants when they are elevated at the summit of prosperity to be touched by the rod of adversity, that, in their humility, they may not despair of God's mercy, and, in their prosperity, they may not boast of their honours, but may also know to whom they owe all the things which they possess.

"We may believe that this calamity was brought upon the king, because, in the beginning of his reign, when he was a youth and influenced by youthful feelings, he would not listen to the petitions which his subjects made to him for help in their necessities, or for relief from those who oppressed them; but he repulsed them from him, and paid no heed to their requests. This particular

gave much annoyance to the holy man St Neot, who was his relation, and who often foretold to him in the spirit of prophecy, that he would suffer great adversity on this account; but Alfred neither attended to the reproof of the man of God nor listened to his true prediction. Wherefore, seeing that a man's sins must be corrected either in this world or the next, the true and righteous Judge was willing that his sin should not go unpunished in this world, to the end that he might spare him. in the world to come."

The saint must have been a Job's comforter if he found his way to the king in the days of his trouble with exhortations of this kind. His ruleof-thumb method of interpreting God's Providence gives us some criterion of the value we are to attach to his attempts to measure the justice of Alfred's dealings with his people. We shall certainly be justified in refusing to condemn Alfred unheard on the sole and unsupported evidence of a good man who seems to have had a bias towards censoriousness. But though we may hesitate to believe the particular charge brought against Alfred, no doubt the saint was substantially correct in maintaining, as he seems to have done, that the king was a better man for the disasters and privations he had had to meet. Asser may be only reflecting what he had heard Alfred him

self say when he spoke of the Athelney days as having humbled his pride, and sobered his temper, and compelled him "to see life steadily and see it whole." The Hammer of Thor had done its work. It had had strong material to work upon, and now out of it had been hammered into shape a man whose every year of life after this time gave England more reason to think of him as England's Herdsman, England's Darling.

K

Chapter V

The Turn of the Tide

"The glory of conquering the consequences of defeat is greater than the glory of a bloodless victory."-Nettleship.

"And the Lord said unto Gideon, By the three hundred men that lapped will I save you and deliver the Midianites into thy hand."— Judges vii. 7.

"For the victory of battle standeth not in the multitude of an host, but strength cometh from heaven.”—Book of the Maccabees.

"Possunt quia posse videntur."

WHEN the tide has ebbed there is an interval of dead low water before it begins to flow again. Athelney marks low water in the fortunes of Wessex, but even at low water there were signs that the run of the tide was about to change.

The first good news which reached Alfred was of an important victory in Devonshire, and it must have come to him and his followers like the first breath of the spring which it heralded.

Asser's account of the event was evidently picked up on the spot, and is very spirited. "In the same winter the brother of Hingwar and Halfdene (ie. Hubba, of evil repute), with twenty-three ships, after