Three sons by his first wife yet remained to Ethelred. One of them, Edmund, called "Ironsides," on account of his strength and prowess, had already commanded the armies during the lifetime of his father; he was proclaimed king. But the country was divided: the Danes established throughout the kingdom were powerful and numerous; treason crept even into the most intimate councils of the new king. Twice he delivered London when besieged; he fought five pitched battles, and repulsed on several occasions the Danes, driving them northwards. {71} At length he proposed to Canute that they should decide their pretensions to the crown by the fate of arms in a single combat. Unlike the majority of his race, Canute was not tall, and he was quite unfitted to sustain a struggle against the gigantic stature of Edmund. "Let us rather divide the kingdom, as our ancestors did before us," he said. The two armies received this proposition with acclamation. The North of England was allotted to Canute, and Edmund contented himself with the South, with a nominal right of sovereignty over the whole kingdom. One month afterwards, the Saxon king was dead, and Canute, convoking the "wittenagemot" of the South, protested that the treaty contained no stipulation in favor of Edmund's heirs. The chiefs declared themselves of the same opinion; the Dane was proclaimed King of all England, and the children of Ironsides were placed in his hands. Canute had proclaimed an amnesty; but on seizing power, he immediately proscribed all the partisans of Edmund whom he did not put to death. "Whoever brings me the head of an enemy shall be dearer to me than a brother," said he. Many heads were brought to him. The wittenagemot which had until then excluded from the throne all the Danish princes, voted the same sentence against the Saxon princes. Canute, however, had not assassinated the children of Edmund; he sent them to his ally, the king of Sweden; no doubt, with sinister intentions; but the innocence and beauty of his victims touched the heart of the proud Scandinavian: he could not keep them by his side, and he therefore sent them to the court of the king of Hungary, St. Stephen, who received them kindly and brought them up carefully. One of them, Edmund, died early; the second, Edward, subsequently married Agatha, daughter of the emperor of Germany, and we shall see his children reappear in history. {72}