he Picts,
were nevertheless obliged to give him marks of submission.[*] In all
these fortunate achievements, he was assisted by the activity and
prudence of his sister Ethelfleda, who was widow of Ethelbert, earl of
Mercia, and who after her husband's death, retained the government
of that province. This princess, who had been reduced to extremity in
childbed, refused afterwards all commerce with her husband; not from any
weak superstition, as was common in that age, but because she deemed all
domestic occupations unworthy of her masculine and ambitious spirit.[**]
She died before her brother; and Edward, during the remainder of his
reign, took upon himself the immediate government of Mercia, which
before had been intrusted to the authority of a governor.[***] The Saxon
Chronicle fixes the death of this prince in 925 his kingdom devolved to
Athelstan, his natural son.

[* Chron. Sax. p. 110. Hoveden, p. 421.]

[** W. Malms, lib. ii. cap. 5. M. West. p. 182.
Ingulph. p. 28. Higgen p. 261.]

[*** Chron. Sax. p. 110. Brompton, p. 831.]

ATHELSTAN.

{925.} The stain in this prince's birth was not, in those times, deemed
so considerable as to exclude him from the throne; and Athelstan, being
of an age, as well as of a capacity, fitted for government, obtained the
preference to Edward's younger children, who, though legitimate, were
of too tender years to rule a nation so much exposed both to foreign
invasion and to domestic convulsions. Some discontents, however,
prevailed on his accession; and Alfred, a nobleman of considerable
power, was thence encouraged to enter into a conspiracy against him.
This incident is related by historians, with circumstances which the
reader, according to the degree of credit he is disposed to give them,
may impute either to the invention of monks, who forged them, or to
their artifice, who found means of making them real. Alfred, it is said,
being seized upon strong suspicions, but without any certain proof,
firmly denied the conspiracy imputed to him; and, in order to justify
himself, he offered to swear to his innocence before the pope, whose
person, it was supposed, contained such superior sanctity, that no one
could presume to give a false oath in his presence, and yet hope to
escape the immediate vengeance of Heaven. The king accepted of the
condition, and Alfred was conducted to Rome, where, either conscious of
his innocence, or neglecting the superstition