It is thus shown, by numerous and incontestable proofs, that the Danes held dominion in England for a short period, and that they also exercised, in conjunction with the Normans, so important and lasting an influence for centuries before and after the time of Canute the Great, at all events in that portion of England lying to the north of Watlinga Stræt, that even a great part of the population there may be safely assumed to be of Danish extraction. Nevertheless, the generally received opinion in England on this subject is expressed in the following passage in a brief History of Denmark lately published in London (“Edda, or the Tales of a Grandmother”), which states that after the suppression of the Danish power in England, “_Both nations [the Danes and English] separated soon after, and in a few years the Danish supremacy had vanished like a vision of the night; so little did it leave any traces in England, or produce any important political benefits to Denmark._” It would, however, have been extremely astonishing, nay, utterly inexplicable, if great effects had not manifested themselves in Denmark from the expeditions towards the west, and from the complete conquest of a country like England, which, in regard both to religious and political development, stood so far above Scandinavia. History, also, sufficiently shows of what great importance the conquest of England was, not only for Denmark, but for the whole Scandinavian North. The Christianity of Scandinavia arose, indeed, out of the smoking ruins of the English churches and convents. Scandinavian kings and warriors were frequently baptized during their Viking expeditions; and it was English priests who proclaimed the doctrines of Christianity on the plains of Denmark and in the rocky valleys of Sweden and Norway. Many of the first bishops in the North were of English extraction, and even the style of the ecclesiastical edifices attested the powerful influence of wealthy England. The more advanced cultivation of science and art in general which prevailed there, communicated itself in many directions to the countries of Scandinavia; where it certainly contributed, just as much as the great emigrations, to weaken heathenism, and thus, both in a religious and political point of view, to found a new and better order of things.