ALFRED.

1C3

stipulation with them, and engaged them, by c h a i\presents of money, to remove to Lindesey in II.Lincolnshire; a country which they had alreadyreduced to ruin and desolation. Finding thereforeno objed in that place , either for their rapineor violence, they suddenly turned back uponJUercia, in a quarter where they expected tofind it without defence, and fixing their stationat Repton in Derbyshire , they laid the wholecountry desolate with tire and sword. Burrhed,despairing of success against an enemy, whommo force could resist, and no treaties bind,abandoned his kingdom, and flying to Rome,took shelter in a cloyster He was brother-in-law to Alfred , and the last who bore the title:of king in JMcrcia.

The West-Saxons were now the only remain-ing power in England; and though supported bythe vigour and abilities of Alfred, they wereunable to sustain the efforts of those ravagers,who from all quarters invaded them. A newswarm of Danes came over this year under threeprinces, Guthrum, Oscitel, and Amund; andhaving first joined their countrymen at Repton,they soon found the necessity of separating, morder to provide for their subsistence. Part ofthem, under the command of Haldene , theirchieftain , marched into Northumberland ,

'* Aster. p. 8- Chron. Sax. p, 82. Ethehvard, lib. 4.cap. 4.

30 Chron Sax. p. 8?.

H 4