sink under
the weight of armour.

Then they tried to force some fenmen they caught to guide them to
us at Othery. Once the brave fenman led them to where they dared
not move till daylight came, while the blue fen lights flitted
round them like ghosts in the dark; and then the fen people swarmed
round them, and ended them with arrows and sling stones from a
distance. They tried no more night attacks on us after that. But
again they came in some force by daylight, and we had a strange
fight on a narrow strip of hard land in Sedgemoor, with all
advantage on our side. No Danes won back to the Polden Hills.

Then they dared not try the fens any more, and daily we kept their
sentries watching, and nightly we fell on outposts, until at last
they thought our force grew very great, and began to gather on
Edington hill, even as Alfred wished. And this saved many a village
and farm and town from plunder, for the fear of Alfred the king
began to grow among his foes.

Then the king made his next move; for, now that the way was open,
he sent to Odda at Exeter, bidding him move up to Taunton by some
northerly road, gathering what Devon men he could on the way. There
is hardly a stronger town in Wessex than the great fortress that
Ine the king made.

At this time I began to be full of thoughts about my ships. But
they could hardly be built as yet; and most of them were in
southern havens, whence, even were they ready, one could not bring
them round the stormy Land's End in early March. Yet the weather
was mild and open, and I began to think that at any time Hubba
might bring his Danes across the narrow Severn sea to join his
kinsmen at Edington. We heard, too, that Guthrum, the king of East
Anglia, was there now, and that he had summoned every warrior who
would leave the land he had won to come to him.

Men have blamed Guthrum for treachery in this; but seeing that the
peace was broken, and that he must needs fight for the peace at
least of his kingdom, I hold that this is not right. At all events,
Alfred blamed him not in the time to come. Nevertheless, I suppose
that in men's minds he always will be held answerable for what the
other chiefs wrought of ill, because he bore the name of king from
the first, and ruled East Anglia. No Saxon, who is used to hold his
king as over all, will understand how little power a host-king of
the north has.

Now all this while my good ship lay at Bridgwater, and with her
were fifty of my men