controversies as arose between men of different hundreds. Formerly, the alderman possessed both the civil and military authority; but Alfred, sensible that this conjunction of powers rendered the nobility dangerous and independent, appointed also a sheriff in each county, who enjoyed a coördinate authority with the former in the judicial function.* His office also impowered him to guard the rights of the crown in the county, and to levy the fines imposed, which in that age formed no contemptible part of the public revenue. There lay an appeal, in default of justice, from all these courts, to the king himself in council; and as the people, sensible of the equity and great talents of Alfred, placed their chief confidence in him, he was soon overwhelmed with appeals from all parts of England. He was indefatigable in the despatch of these causes; † but finding that his time must be entirely engrossed by this branch of duty, he resolved to obviate the inconvenience, by correcting the ignorance or corruption of the inferior magistrates, from which it arose. He took care to have his nobility instructed in letters and the laws; § he chose the earls and sheriffs from among the men most celebrated for probity and knowledge; he punished severely all malversation in office ; || and he removed all the earls whom he found unequal to the trust; allowing only some of the more elderly to serve by a deputy, till their death should make room for more worthy successors. The better to guide the magistrates in the administration of justice, Alfred framed a body of laws, which, though now lost, served long as the basis of English jurisprudence, and is generally deemed the origin of what is denominated the COMMON LAW. He appointed regular meetings of the states of England twice a year, in London,** a city which he himself had repaired and beautified, and which he thus rendered the capital of the kingdom. The similarity of these institutions to the customs of the ancient Germans, to the practice of the other northern conquerors, and to the Saxon laws during the Heptarchy, prevents us from regarding Alfred as the sole author of this plan of government, and leads us rather to think, that, like a wise man, he contented himself with reforming, extend ing, and executing the institutions which he found previously established. But, on the whole, such success - attended his legislation, that every thing bore suddenly a new face in England. Robberies and iniquities of all kinds were repressed by * and so exact the punishment or reformation of the criminals; was the general police, that Alfred, it is said, hung up, by way ́of bravado, golden bracelets near the highways, and no man dared to touch them. Yet, amidst these rigors of justice, this great prince preserved the most sacred regard to the liberty of his people; and it is a memorable sentiment preserved in his will, that it was just the English should forever remain as free as their own thoughts.‡ As good morals and knowledge are almost inseparable, in every age, though not in every individual, the care of Alfred for the encouragement of learning among his subjects was another useful branch of his legislation, and tended to reclaim the English from their former dissolute and ferocious manners; but the king was guided, in this pursuit, less by political views than by his natural bent and propensity towards letters. When he came to the throne, he found the nation sunk into the grossest ignorance and barbarism, proceeding from the continued disorders in the government, and from the ravages of the Danes. The monasteries were destroyed, the monks butchered or dispersed, their libraries burnt; and thus the only seats of erudition in those ages were totally subverted. Alfred himself complains, that on his accession he knew not one person, south of the Thames, who could so much as interpret the Latin service, and very few in the northern parts who had reached even that pitch of erudition. But this prince invited over the most celebrated scholars.from all parts of Europe; he established schools every where for the instruction of his people; he founded, at least repaired, the University of Oxford, and endowed it with many privileges, revenues, and immunities; he enjoined by law all freeholders possessed of two hides § of land, or more, to send their children to school, for their instruction; he gave preferment both in church and state to such only as had made some proficiency in knowledge; and by all these expedients he had the satis *Ingulph. p. 27. + W. Malms. lib. ii. cap. 4. Asser. p. 24. A hide contained land sufficient to employ one plough. See H. Hunting, lib. vi. in A. D. 1008. Annal. Waverl. in A. D. 1083. Gervase of Tilbury says, it commonly contained about one hundred acres. faction, before his death, to see a great change in the face of affairs; and in a work of his, which is still extant, he congratulates himself on the progress which learning, under his patronage, had already made in England. But the most effectual expedient, employed by Alfred for the encouragement of learning, was his own example, and the constant assiduity with which, notwithstanding the multiplicity and urgency of his affairs, he employed himself in the pursuits of knowledge. He usually divided his time into three equal portions: one was employed in sleep, and the refection of his body by diet and exercise; another, in the despatch of business; a third, in study and devotion; and that he might more exactly measure the hours, he made use of burning tapers of equal length, which he fixed in lanterns,* an expedient suited to that rude age, when the geometry of dialling, and the mechanism of clocks and watches, were totally unknown. And by such a regular distribution of his time, though he often labored under great bodily infirmities,† this martial hero, who fought in person fifty-six battles by sea and land,‡ was able, during a life of no extraordinary length, to acquire more knowledge, and even to compose more books, than most studious men, though blessed with the greatest leisure and application, have, in more fortunate ages, made the object of their uninterrupted industry. Sensible that the people, at all times, especially when their understandings are obstructed by ignorance and bad education, are not much susceptible of speculative instruction, Alfred endeavored to convey his morality by apologues, parables, stories, apothegms, couched in poetry; and besides propagating among his subjects former compositions of that kind, which he found in the Saxon tongue, he exercised his genius in inventing works of a like nature, as well as in translating from the Greek the elegant Fables of Æsop. He also gave Saxon translations of Orosius's and Bede's histories; and of Boethius concerning the consolation of philosophy. And he deemed it nowise derogatory from his other great characters of sovereign, legislator, warrior, and politician, thus to lead the way to his people in the pursuits of literature. Meanwhile, this prince was not negligent in encouraging * Asser. p. 20. W. Malms. lib. ii. cap. 4. † Asser. p. 4, 12, 13, 17. Asser. p. 13. W. Ingulph. p. 870. Spelman, p. 124. the vulgar and mechanical arts, which have a more sensible, though not a closer connection with the interests of society. He invited, from all quarters, industrious foreigners to re-people his country, which had been desolated by the ravages of the Danes.* He introduced and encouraged manufactures of all kinds, and no inventor or improver of any ingenious art did he suffer to go unrewarded. He prompted men of activity to betake themselves to navigation, to push commerce into the most remote countries, and to acquire riches by propagating industry among their fellow-citizens. He set apart a seventh portion of his own revenue for maintaining a number of workmen, whom he constantly employed in rebuilding the ruined cities, castles, palaces, and monasteries. Even the elegances of life were brought to him from the Mediterranean and the Indies; and his subjects, by seeing those productions of the peaceful arts, were taught to respect the virtues of justice and industry, from which alone they could arise. Both living and dead, Alfred was regarded by foreigners, no less than by his own subjects, as the greatest prince, after Charlemagne, that had appeared in Europe during several ages, and as one of the wisest and best that had ever adorned the annals of any nation. Alfred had, by his wife Ethelswitha, daughter of a Mercian earl, three sons and three daughters. The eldest son, Edmund, died without issue, in his father's lifetime. The third, Ethelward, inherited his father's passion for letters, and lived a private life. The second, Edward, succeeded to his power, and passes by the appellation of Edward the Elder, being the first of that name who sat on the English throne. EDWARD THE ELDER. [901.] This prince, who equalled his father in military talents, though inferior to him in knowledge and erudition,|| found, immediately on his accession, a specimen of that turbulent life to which all princes, and even all individuals, were exposed, in an age when men, less restrained by law or justice, and less occupied by industry, had no aliment for their inquietude but wars, insurrections, convulsions, rapine, and depredation. * Asser. p. 13. Flor. Wigorn. p. 588. Asser. p. 20. W. Malms. lib. ii. cap. 4. W. Malms. lib. ii. cap. 4. W. Malms. lib. ii. cap. 5. Hoveden, p. 421. † Asser. p. 20. Ethelwald, his cousin-german, son of King Ethelbert, the elder brother of Alfred, insisted on his preferable title; and arming his partisans, took possession of Winburne, where he seemed determined to defend himself to the last extremity, and to await the issue of his pretensions.† But when the king approached the town with a great army, Ethelwald, having the prospect of certain destruction, made his escape, and fled first into Normandy, thence into Northumberland, where he hoped that the people, who had been recently subdued by Alfred, and who were impatient of peace, would, on the intelligence of that great prince's death, seize the first pretence or opportunity of rebellion. The event did not disappoint his expectations: the Northumbrians declared for him, and Ethelwald, having thus connected his interests with the Danish tribes, went beyond sea, and collecting a body of these freebooters, he excited the hopes of all those who had been accustomed to subsist by rapine and violence. The East Anglian Danes joined his party; the Five-burgers, who were seated in the heart of Mercia, began to put themselves in motion; and the English found that they were again menaced with those convulsions from which the valor and policy of Alfred had so lately rescued them. The rebels, headed by Ethelwald, made an incursion into the counties of Glocester, Oxford, and Wilts; and having exercised their ravages in these places, they retired with their booty, before the king, who had assembled an army, was able to approach them. Edward, however, who was determined that his preparations should not be fruitless, conducted his forces into East Anglia, and retaliated the injuries which the inhabitants had committed, by spreading the like devastation among them. Satiated with revenge, and loaded with booty, he gave orders to retire; but the authority of those ancient kings, which was feeble in peace, was not much better established in the field; and the Kentish men, greedy of more spoil, ventured, contrary to repeated orders, to stay behind him, and to take up their quarters in Bury. This disobedience proved, in the issue, fortunate to Edward. The Danes assaulted the Kentish men, but met with so vigorous a resistance, that, though they gained the field of battle, they bought that advantage by the loss of their bravest leaders Chron. Sax. p. 99, 100. + Chron. Sax. p. 100. Chron. Sax. p. 100. Chron. Sax. p. 100. H. Hunting. lib. v. p. 352. |