ions, 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 [g].
[FN [f] Dudo, ex edit. Duchesne, p. 70, 71. Gul. Gemeticencis, lib.
2. cap. 2, 3. [g] Dudo, p.71. Gul. Gem. 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 Gothrum 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 [h]; and during the reigns of Eudes, an 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 valour 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
arms [i].
[FN [h] Gul. Gemet. lib. 2. cap. 6. [i] 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
barbari