, he was not reduced to
absolute despair, but continued for a long time the almost hopeless
struggle. There is a certain desperation to which men are often
aroused in the last extremity, which surpasses courage, and is even
sometimes a very effectual substitute for strength; and Alfred might,
perhaps, have succeeded, after all, in saving his affairs from utter
ruin, had not a new circumstance intervened, which seemed at once to
extinguish all remaining hope and to seal his doom.

This circumstance was the arrival of a new band of Danes, who were, it
seems, more numerous, more ferocious, and more insatiable than any
who had come before them. The other kingdoms of the Saxons had been
already pretty effectually plundered. Alfred's kingdom of Wessex was
now, therefore, the most inviting field, and, after various excursions
of conquest and plunder in other parts of the island, they came like
an inundation over Alfred's frontiers, and all hope of resisting them
seems to have been immediately abandoned. The Saxon armies were broken
up. Alfred had lost, it appears, all influence and control over both
leaders and men. The chieftains and nobles fled. Some left the country
altogether; others hid themselves in the best retreats and fastnesses
that they could find. Alfred himself was obliged to follow the general
example. A few attendants, either more faithful than the rest, or else
more distrustful of their own resources, and inclined, accordingly, to
seek their own personal safety by adhering closely to their sovereign,
followed him. These, however, one after another, gradually forsook
him, and, finally, the fallen and deserted monarch was left alone.

In fact, it was a relief to him at last to be left alone; for they who
remained around him became in the end a burden instead of affording
him protection. They were too few to fight, and too many to be easily
concealed. Alfred withdrew himself from them, thinking that, under the
circumstances in which he was now placed, he was justified in seeking
his own personal safety alone. He had a wife, whom he married when he
was about twenty years old; but she was not with him now, though she
afterward joined him. She was in some other place of retreat. She
could, in fact, be much more easily concealed than her husband; for
the Danes, though they would undoubtedly have valued her very highly
as a captive, would not search for her with the eager and persevering
vigilance with which it was to