rms.[***]

[** Gul Gemet lib. ii. cap 6.]

[*** Dudo, p. 82.]

The reason why the Danes, for many years, pursued measures so different
from those which had been embraced by the Goths, Vandals, Franks,
Burgundians, Lombards, and other northern conquerors, was the great
difference in the method of attack which was practised by these
several nations, and to which the nature of their respective situations
necessarily confined them. The latter tribes, living in an inland
country, made incursions by land upon the Roman empire; and when they
entered far into the frontiers, they were obliged to carry along
with them their wives and families, whom they had no hopes of soon
revisiting, and who could not otherwise participate of their plunder.
This circumstance quickly made them think of forcing a settlement in
the provinces which they had overrun: and these barbarians, spreading
themselves over the country, found an interest in protecting the
property and industry of the people whom they had subdued. But the Danes
and Norwegians, invited by their maritime situation, and obliged to
maintain themselves in their uncultivated country by fishing, had
acquired some experience of navigation; and, in their military
excursions, pursued the method practised against the Roman empire by the
more early Saxons. They made descents in small bodies from their ships,
or rather boats, and ravaging the coasts, returned with the booty to
their families, whom they could not conveniently carry along with them
in those hazardous enterprises. But when they increased their armaments,
made incursions into the inland countries, and found it safe to remain
longer in the midst of the enfeebled enemy, they had been accustomed to
crowd their vessels with their wives and children, and having no longer
any temptation to return to their own country, they willingly embraced
an opportunity of settling in the warm climates and cultivated fields of
the south.

Affairs were in this situation with Rollo and his followers, when
Charles proposed to relinquish to them part of the province formerly
called Neustria, and to purchase peace on these hard conditions. After
all the terms were fully settled, there appeared only one circumstance
shocking to the haughty Dane: he was required to do homage to Charles
for this province, and to put himself in that humiliating posture
imposed on vassals by the rites of the feudal law. He long refused to
submit to this indi