For three years,there was a war with these Danes;and there was a famine in the country,too,and a plague,both upon human creatures and beasts.But KING ALFRED,whose mighty heart never failed him,built large ships nevertheless,with which to pursue the pirates on the sea;and he encouraged his soldiers,by his brave example,to fight valiantly against them on the shore.At last,he drove them all away;and then there was repose in England.
As great and good in peace,as he was great and good in war,KING
ALFRED never rested from his labours to improve his people.He loved to talk with clever men,and with travellers from foreign countries,and to write down what they told him,for his people to read.He had studied Latin after learning to read English,and now another of his labours was,to translate Latin books into the English-Saxon tongue,that his people might be interested,and improved by their contents.He made just laws,that they might live more happily and freely;he turned away all partial judges,that no wrong might be done them;he was so careful of their property,and punished robbers so severely,that it was a common thing to say that under the great KING ALFRED,garlands of golden chains and jewels might have hung across the streets,and no man would have touched one.He founded schools;he patiently heard causes himself in his Court of Justice;the great desires of his heart were,to do right to all his subjects,and to leave England better,wiser,happier in all ways,than he found it.His industry in these efforts was quite astonishing.Every day he divided into certain portions,and in each portion devoted himself to a certain pursuit.That he might divide his time exactly,he had wax torches or candles made,which were all of the same size,were notched across at regular distances,and were always kept burning.Thus,as the candles burnt down,he divided the day into notches,almost as accurately as we now divide it into hours upon the clock.But when the candles were first invented,it was found that the wind and draughts of air,blowing into the palace through the doors and windows,and through the chinks in the walls,caused them to gutter and burn unequally.To prevent this,the King had them put into cases formed of wood and white horn.And these were the first lanthorns ever made in England.
All this time,he was afflicted with a terrible unknown disease,which caused him violent and frequent pain that nothing could relieve.He bore it,as he had borne all the troubles of his life,like a brave good man,until he was fifty-three years old;and then,having reigned thirty years,he died.He died in the year nine hundred and one;but,long ago as that is,his fame,and the love and gratitude with which his subjects regarded him,are freshly remembered to the present hour.
In the next reign,which was the reign of EDWARD,surnamed THE ELDER,who was chosen in council to succeed,a nephew of KING ALFRED troubled the country by trying to obtain the throne.The Danes in the East of England took part with this usurper (perhaps because they had honoured his uncle so much,and honoured him for his uncle's sake),and there was hard fighting;but,the King,with the assistance of his sister,gained the day,and reigned in peace for four and twenty years.He gradually extended his power over the whole of England,and so the Seven Kingdoms were united into one.