Af-ter ma-ny bat-tles gain-ed on both sides, and find-ing him-self in the great-est dis-tress, be-ing left to fate by his sub-jects, he thought it prudent to re-tire. He now laid a-side all marks of a king, and, cloth-ing him-self as a pea-sant, took shel-ter, for a time, in the house of a poor shepherd. He soon af-ter went over to the Isle of Ath-el-ney; where he built a fort, to pro-tect him-self, his house-hold, and the few faith-ful ser-vants that he had with him.

When he had been a-bout a year in this retreat, up-on news be-ing brought him that some of his peo-ple had rout-ed an ar-my of the Danes, kill-ed their chief, and ta-ken their ma-gic standard, he sent forth an e-dict, call-ing up-on his no-bles to come to him, and u-nite in one more ef-fort to ex-pel the com-mon foe.

Al-fred, in or-der to make a sur-vey of the ex-act num-ber of the Danes, and the state in which their ar-my was, dress-ed him-self as a harp-er, and went in-to their camp. Up-on his re-turn, he gave or-ders to his no-bles to re-pair to their homes, to mus-ter as strong-ly as they could, and meet him on a cer-tain day at Selwood, in Wilt-shire.

This af-fair was done in so se-cret a man-ner, and so quick-ly, that, in a short time, the King, at the head of a large ar-my, came near the Danes

be-fore they had a-ny know-ledge of his de-sign. Al-fred, see-ing the sur-prise in-to which he had thrown them, press-ed them so close-ly on all sides, as to cause them at length to sus-tain a com-plete de-feat. He then grant-ed them terms of peace; which were in-deed bet-ter than they could ex-pect. He a-greed to give up the whole king-dom of the East An-gles to such as would em-brace the Chris-tian faith; in case they would com-pel the rest of their par-ty to quit the is-land, and, as much as was in their pow-er, pre-vent the land-ing of any more troops from a fo-reign country. This trea-ty was a-greed to; and when Guthram, the Dan-ish cap-tain, with thir-ty of his men, came to sub-mit to the of-fice of bap-tism, Al-fred be-came spon-sor for the chief at the font. A year or two af-ter this, a great num-ber of Danes land-ed in Kent, and laid siege to Roches-ter; but the King com-ing to the re-lief of that ci-ty, they were soon glad to de-camp. Alfred had now great suc-cess, by means of his na-vy; which he had been at great pains in form-ing. Hav-ing made the sea-coasts se-cure, he be-gan to de-fend the rest of the king-dom with cas-tles and wall-ed towns; and, lay-ing siege to the city of Lon-don, he soon got it from the Danes. After some years' res-pite, Al-fred was a-gain call-ed in-to the field, for a bo-dy of Danes

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there-with un-chaste un-lock tor-ment un-clasp un-loose tra-duce un-close un-man trans-act un-couth un-mask

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