*]

[** Dudo, ex edit. Duchesne, p. 70, 71. Gul.
Gemeticenia, lib. ii, cap. 2, 3.]

He lulled Rollo into security by an insidious peace and falling suddenly
upon him, murdered his brother and his bravest officers, and forced him
to fly for safety into Scandinavia. Here many of his ancient subjects,
induced partly by affection to their prince, partly by the oppressions
of the Danish monarch, ranged themselves under his standard, and offered
to follow him in every enterprise. Rollo, instead of attempting
to recover his paternal dominions, where he must expect a vigorous
resistance from the Danes, determined to pursue an easier but more
important undertaking, and to make rus fortune, in imitation of his
countrymen, by pillaging the richer and more southern coasts of Europe.
He collected a body of troops, which, like that of all those ravagers,
was composed of Norwegians, Swedes, Frisians, Danes, and adventurers
of all nations, who being accustomed to a roving, unsettled life, took
delight in nothing but war and plunder. His reputation brought him
associates from all quarters; and a vision, which he pretended to have
appeared to him in his sleep, and which, according to his interpretation
of it, prognosticated the greatest successes, proved also a powerful
incentive with those ignorant and superstitious people.[*]

[* Dudo, p. 71. Gul. Gemet. in epist. ad Gul.
Conq.]

The first attempt made by Rollo was on England, near the end of Alfred's
reign, when that great monarch, having settled Guthrum and his followers
in East Anglia, and others of those freebooters in Northumberland, and
having restored peace to his harassed country, had established the most
excellent military, as well as civil, institutions among the English.
The prudent Dane, finding that no advantages could be gained over such
a people, governed by such a prince, soon turned his enterprises against
France, which he found more exposed to his inroads;[**] and during the
reigns of Eudes, a usurper, and of Charles the Simple, a weak prince, he
committed the most destructive ravages, both on the inland and maritime
provinces of that kingdom. The French, having no means of defence
against a leader who united all the valor of his countrymen with
the policy of more civilized nations, were obliged to submit to the
expedient practised by Alfred, and to offer the invaders a settlement in
some of those provinces which they had depopulated by their a