=18. Æthelbert’s Reign.=[47]--In the year of our Lord’s incarnation 860, which was the twelfth of King Alfred’s life, <King> Æthelbald <died, and> was buried at Sherborne. His brother Æthelbert, as was right, added Kent, Surrey, and Sussex to his realm. In his days a great army of heathen came from the sea, and attacked and laid waste the city of Winchester. As they were returning laden with booty to their ships, Osric, Ealdorman of Hampshire, with his men, and Ealdorman Æthelwulf, with the men of Berkshire, faced them bravely. Battle was then joined in the town, and the heathen were slain on every side; and finding themselves unable to resist, they took to flight like women, and the Christians held the battle-field. =19. Æthelbert’s Death.=[48]--So Æthelbert governed his kingdom five years in peace and love and honor; and went the way of all flesh, to the great grief of his subjects. He rests interred in honorable wise at Sherborne, by the side of his brother. =20. The Danes in Kent.=[49]--In the year of our Lord’s incarnation 864 the heathen wintered in the isle of Thanet, and made a firm treaty with the men of Kent, who promised them money for observing their agreement. In the meantime, however, the heathen, after the manner of foxes, burst forth with all secrecy from their camp by night, and setting at naught their engagements, and spurning the promised money--which they knew was less than they could get by plunder--they ravaged all the eastern coast of Kent. =21. Æthelred’s Accession.=[50]--In the year of our Lord’s incarnation 866, which was the eighteenth of King Alfred’s life, Æthelred, brother of King Æthelbert, undertook the government of the West Saxon realm. The same year a great fleet of heathen came to Britain from the Danube,[51] and wintered in the kingdom of the East Saxons, which is called in Saxon East Anglia; and there they became in the main an army of cavalry. But, to speak in nautical phrase, I will no longer commit my vessel to wave and sail, or steer my roundabout course at a distance from land through so many calamities of wars and series of years, but rather return to that which first prompted me to this task: that is to say, I think it right briefly to insert in this place the little that has come to my knowledge about the character of my revered lord Alfred, King of the Anglo-Saxons, during the years of infancy and boyhood.