The opinions of Elfric are scarcely less heterodox on other points. He not only enjoins the Clergy to read the Scriptures on Sundays and holidays, in the Saxon language, but appeals to them as the final rule of Faith and conduct; and, in prosecution of his plan, undertook a translation, of which the Pentateuch, and the books of Joshua and of Judges, are still preserved. When the disorganization of the country, owing to the incursions of the Danes, and the utter incapacity of Ethelred for its government, is recollected, the character and occupations of Ælfric appear altogether extraordinary. They prove, indeed, that the convulsions of the period had not the effect, in the decay of learning, which has been ascribed to them, and induce a doubt, whether the imputed ignorance and incompetency of the Anglo-Saxon Clergy had any other foundation than the rancour of the opposite party. The period, however, is not yet arrived to enter into this discussion: the Primate had indeed implanted those doctrines which were, ultimately, to be eradicated only by the extermination of those who had been educated in their belief; but he died before the controversy had assumed a tone of acrimony, and difficulties of another kind impended over his immediate successors.

The fatal policy of purchasing the retreat of the northern invaders by the payment of 10,000l., is ascribed to Siric, and was not, perhaps, extraordinary in a feeble old man, who partook in the panic which spread even to the gates of Canterbury, when a fleet of ninety-three ships entered the Stour. It fell in, however, too well with the indolent habits of Ethelred, and was pursued until the means of satiating their yearly growing exorbitancy were exhausted. Siric scarcely survived the first exaction, and the See was vacant, when the following year brought down fresh invaders under the conduct of the Kings of Denmark and of Norway, who, failing in an attack upon London, retreated only with more exasperation, burning, plundering and slaughtering, as they coasted the shores of Kent and Sussex, until they were appeased by the undertaking to provision their fleet as it lay in winter quarters at Southampton, and by the payment of 16,000l.

Elphege, who succeeded Ælfric at Canterbury, and nobly vindicated himself from the imputation of these ignominious measures by his subsequent martyrdom, seems to have improved this season of conciliation and repose to the best of all purposes. He then held the See of Winchester, and when Aulaff, the King of Norway, visited the court of Ethelred at Andover, converted him to Christianity and drew from him a promise, which also, says the Saxon Chronicle, he performed, never again to molest England. The good-faith of Aulaff, indeed, underwent no very long probation, as he was immediately after involved in a war with Denmark, and being defeated in a naval action, plunged into the sea and was drowned. But the spirit of adventure was as little likely to be broken by the death as to be appeased by the conversion of the Norwegian; others succeeded, and their demands rose to 20,000l., to 24,000l., to 30,000l., and to 40,000l. The counsels of Ethelred only tended to aggravate the horrors of the period. In the year 1002, he

is said to have given orders for a general massacre of the Danes throughout England, and their countrymen returned the following season, intent upon revenge as well as plunder: and when at length it became necessary to resort to arms, the fatal influence of the brothers Edric and Brihtric rendered the appeal hopeless.

The name of Elfric does not appear mixed up with these events, but Elphege, who was consecrated in 1006, is chiefly celebrated for the resistance he opposed to the exactions of the invaders, and the sufferings he underwent in consequence. Not, indeed, that the legend of so favourite a martyr is to be supposed deficient in its complement of miracles; but that it may reasonably be doubted whether they had any other foundation than the taste of his biographer for such decorations, and the recorded scruples of Lanfranc to admit him into the Romish martyrology without some such evidence of Romish sanctity. The rigid enforcement of Fasts, which is the most striking feature in the councils held during his Primacy, seems to confirm the account of his austerities.

Elphege was scarcely seated at Canterbury before the Danish fleet again entered the Stour, and Ethelred was at length induced to collect the force of the country; but " they lay out all their harvest only to their own harm," whilst the incursions of the enemy received no check; and the mighty naval armament which was assembled at Sandwich in the following years, was broken up by the divisions of its leaders before the fleet of Thurkill appeared upon the coast; and left the men of Kent no other means of escaping from his ravages than by submitting to his exactions. The rapid movements of the invaders do not seem, hitherto, to have allowed them to molest Canterbury, and it is not improbable that its inhabitants had pleaded their security from the violence, as an exemption from the tribute which was levied upon the country. It was plainly the premeditated object of the Danes in the autumn of 1011, when they made their way thither, immediately upon landing at Sandwich, and had invested the city before any force could be collected together to oppose them. The Primate did not forsake his post in this danger, and when after a siege of some days, the enemy had succeeded in setting fire to the city, and made good their entrance, in the midst of the confusion thus created, he rushed from his Cathedral in the vain hope of restraining the brutality of the conquerors, and was spared, on the instant, as if only to increase their triumph by making him the witness of the conflagration of his Church, and the slaughter of his Clergy and the inhabitants of every age and sex. About eight hundred persons only are said to have been spared in this tragedy, and only four of the members of his Church. The Abbey of St. Augustine, without the walls, escaped in comparative safety, but, there is too good reason to suppose, by no means immaculate. The Saxon Chronicle distinctly states, that the entrance of the Danes was effected " through the treachery of Elfmar, whose life the Archbishop had formerly saved;" a treason aggravated by ingratitude, which historians had some hesitation in imputing to the Abbot of St. Augustine's of that name, whom, it should seem from the

same document, they subsequently "suffered to go away." The miracles, however, which are related by the Chroniclers of St. Augustine's to account for the extraordinary exemption of their Abbey, involve their whole tale in the imputation of fiction, and imply a consciousness of truth to be concealed, which leaves no reason to doubt that the two passages relate to the same person. The expectation of ransom seems to have induced the Danes to spare the lives of Elphege, of the King's steward, and of the Abbess of Minster in Thanet, which last had been doomed to see the whole of her sisterhood burnt to death in the church to which they had fled; but Elfmar had already paid the ignominious price of his liberation.

The venerable Archbishop was compelled to accompany the fleet up the Thames; and continued a prisoner whilst it lay at Greenwich through the following winter. He was by no means, however, shut out from all opportunity of exercising his function, and if the patient endurance of his own misfortunes, and the dignified asperity with which he reproved his blood-stained captors had the effect of inflaming them only the more against him, and of aggravating the severity of his imprisonment, it seems also to have touched the hearts of some amongst them, and been the means, under Providence, of converting them to Christianity. A tribute of no less than 48,000l. was now demanded by them as the price of their departure, and by the pernicious influence of Edric, again acceded to. The winter, however, was passed, and the exertions of Edric and the council, even aided by the fears which the Danish position excited in London, failing to collect that sum, the marauders became impatient of the delay, and again appealed to the captive Primate. He had resolutely opposed the short-sighted policy, and in the true spirit of patriotism, exhorted his countrymen to disregard his personal danger, and now resisted the final demand of 3000l. for his own liberation.

Probably in the hope that his resolution would give way in the interval, they respited his death to the end of another week. That it was the deliberate purpose of Thurkill and the other leaders to put their threat into execution at that time is by no means manifest, for when he was brought forth into the market-place, a drunken rabble furiously rushed upon him, and he was sinking under their blows and the bones and skulls of oxen which were snatched up and cast upon him, when one, whom he is stated to have confirmed on the preceding day, rather in pity than in vengeance, (impiâ motus pietate) terminated his sufferings by the stroke of his axe.

The horror excited by the report of this barbarity probably wrought upon the citizens, for it should seem that the tribute was forthcoming on the following day. The body of the Primate, which had been exposed to every indignity, was restored for sepulture, and, when the invaders dispersed with their booty, Thurkill, together with forty-five of their ships, stipulated to enter into the service of Ethelred, and defend the land in case of further aggressions.

The memory of Elphege was deservedly held in the highest respect

by the Anglo-Saxons, nor did their Norman conquerors think fit to degrade his shrine from its place by the high altar of his cathedral and opposite to that of Dunstan. Beyond his patriotism, indeed, he had a claim upon their veneration which they were little apt to underrate, having, in the midst of the distractions of his country contrived to add the manors of Farningham (Parva) and Warehorne to the endowment of Christ-Church.

Ethelred appointed Lifing, Bishop of Wells, to the archi-episcopal See early in the following year (1013); but it was only to cast him like his predecessor into the hands of the Danes. Sweyne, who had joined in the expedition of Aulaff, twenty years before, again commanded in person. He found Thurkill, whose army lay at Greenwich, whilst his fleet commanded the Thames, still faithful to his compact with Ethelred; and had no inducement to linger in the neighbourhood of Canterbury, which had not yet recovered from the calamities of the last irruption. Sailing, therefore, from Sandwich, he made for the mouth of the Humber, and from thence overran all the midland parts of England. The despair of the people was now at its height, and casting off their allegiance to Ethelred, they submitted to the sceptre of the Dane, who advanced upon the metropolis through the heart of the land. Thurkill, it seems, for some time imparted confidence to the contemptible King, and when at length London opened its gates to Sweyne, received the Saxon princes on board his fleet and transported them to the shelter they sought in Normandy, whither also the affrighted Primate fled upon his enlargement. The death of Sweyne, however, before his government was well recognized, induced Ethelred to return, and Lifing took the opportunity of again covering-in his cathedral.

Knute, whose presence in Denmark was required upon his father's death, had contented himself with an act of vindictive barbarity upon the hostages in his power, and hastily quitted the shores of England. But Edric was still employed in rivetting the Danish yoke upon the necks of his countrymen, and a tribute of 21,000l. was again ordered to be paid to the army of Thurkill. These treacherous counsels were, however, vigorously opposed by several of the Anglo-Saxon nobles, at whose head the Ethling now first displayed the manliness of his character. Two of them immediately fell victims to the resentment of Edric, and Edmund escaping from the court of his father, waited for no authority to raise a power upon their estates; and by the time Knute returned the following year, was at the head of an army which had the immediate effect of chasing Edric from the court of Ethelred. The traitor went over with the fleet of Thurkill to the party of Knute; but the Ethling continued in force sufficient to maintain the struggle. The king forsook his army in despair; Uchtred withdrew his forces to defend his earldom of Northumberland; but the intrepid prince protracted the struggle, and on the death of Ethelred, in 1016, succeeded to a throne which he had shewn his competency to maintain. He was crowned by Lifing in London, but immediately afterwards appeared in arms in the west, which he recovered; again relieved the metropolis, and returned to establish his authority in Wessex; re-appeared to

chase the Danes across Kent to the Isle of Shepey, and when defeated at Assingdon, in Essex, rallied a fresh force in Gloucestershire to renew the struggle.

The short career of Edmund redeems the character of the AngloSaxon princes; in little more than a twelvemonth from his first appearance in arms he was no more. Edric is said to have boasted that in addition to his other treasons, he had opened the throne for the accession of Knute by the assassination of his intrepid competitor, and to have received his recompence from the ready axe of the Dane. Knute was now universally acknowledged, and Lifing again called to London to set the crown upon his head. The Primate, whom the Saxon Chronicle calls also Elfstan, and Parker, Electanus, died in 1019-20. His repair of his cathedral has been already mentioned. He is recorded also as a benefactor to his church in lands, but the only accessions to its endowment of any magnitude were the manors of Hollingbourne and Boughton (Malherbe), L. S. A. under the will of Athelstan, the elder brother of Edmund, who died in 1015.

Athelnoth, who succeeded, is related to have been destined to that station by the prophetic spirit of Dunstan, even in his childhood. But his career furnishes ample matter of interest without reverting to these customary embellishments. He had been Dean of Christ-Church, an office the name of which was sufficient to startle his monkish historians, and call forth again the tale of Danish profanation to account for an apparent breach of rule. As, however, he had been educated a monk of Glastonbury, it is reasonable to suppose that he was master of the essentials of the monkish discipline of Dunstan, how short soever it might fall of the refinements of Lanfranc. That he adorned his high station, they confess, in ascribing to him the surname of " the Good," and the rank of a saint, and is proved beyond a doubt by the salutary influence that he exerted over the character of Knute, which from exhibiting all the traits of the savage superstition in which he had been educated, became, before the close of his reign, worthy of the Christianity at least which was then professed. It is observable that the Saxon Chronicle says he was consecrated Bishop in 1020, and in 1022 went to Rome, and received the pall, and was consecrated Archbishop by Pope Benedict, as if the Papal sanction was not, among the AngloSaxons, considered necessary to the validity of his election to the See, but only to the exercise of his legantine power. He is represented to have consecrated the Bishops of St. David's and of Llandaff immediately after his return; an extension of his jurisdiction beyond that of his predecessors, and which, indeed, the first Norman primates failed to maintain.

The hasty repairs of his predecessor left much for Athelnoth to do to the fabric of his cathedral during his more tranquil primacy; neither was he careless of its endowment, having purchased or rather redeemed, from Syred de Chilleham the manor of Godmersham and restored it to his church. It should seem that the former donation of that manor by Beornulph, in 822, had not prevented its resumption