to know
Edmund.

The English hero divided his army into three divisions: The right
wing, where he posted around his own person the chosen band whom he
had trained during the last few years of retirement; the left wing,
chiefly composed of the men of Wessex; the centre, the weakest and
newest recruits, whom he posted there with as deep a design as led
Hannibal to use the same strategy at Cannae.

The Danes advanced impetuously to the attack, led by Canute himself,
somewhat similarly divided, and Edmund at once advanced his forces to
meet them. One hundred yards apart, both armies paused, and glared
upon each other. There was no flinching. With teeth firmly set, lips
compressed, and the whole body thrown into the attitude of a tiger
about to spring, each warrior gazed upon the foe.

The Danes, clad in black armour, with their ponderous battle-axes, and
fierce visages, upon which no gentle ray of mercy had yet shone; the
English, their minds set upon avenging the outraged national honour,
the desolated homes, the slaughtered families: the Danes bent on
maintaining their cruel superiority; the English bent on reversing it
or dying: the Danes hitherto victorious on nearly every field; the
English turning upon their oppressors as men to whom the only thing
which could make life tolerable was victory.

Canute's voice was heard crying, "Now, warriors, behold the hounds ye
have so often chastised await your chastisement once more."

Edmund, on the other hand, "Victory, my men, or a warrior's grave! We
will not live to see England prostrate beneath the tyrant any longer."

Then came the rush: the crash of steel upon steel, the hideous melee,
where friend and foe seemed blent in one dense struggling mass; the
cries which pain sometimes extorted from the bravest; the shouts of
the excited combatants, until Edmund's centre gave way.

He had expected this, and desired nothing more. The Danes pressed on
deeply into the core of the hostile army, when they found their
progress stopped by some of the bravest warriors who formed the rear,
and at that moment the wings curved round upon them.

"Come, my men!" shouted Edmund; and with Alfgar by his side, followed
by the whole of the English cavalry, burst upon the rear of the Danes.
He and his cleft their way in--hewed it through living masses of
flesh; trampled writhing bodies under foot; their very horses seemed
to laugh at the spear and sword, until before him Edmund saw Canute