The house of the Mercian Penda produced yet another name closely connected with the story of the Cross in Cheshire. Werburga, a great-granddaughter of Penda, succeeded her mother as head of several great abbeys. She died at Trentham in Staffordshire towards the end of the seventh century, and two hundred years later, when the Danes (of whom you will read more in the next chapter) were harrying the land, her body was removed to Chester for safe keeping, and placed in the church of S. Peter and S. Paul which had been re-dedicated to S. Werburga and S. Oswald. For many centuries crowds of devout pilgrims made their way to Chester to offer prayers and gifts at S. Werburga's shrine. CHAPTER IX THE COMING OF THE NORTHMEN With the capture of Chester (Chap. VII) Ecberght's conquest of Mercia was complete. Northumbria, Kent, and East Anglia also submitted to him. But neither Ecberght nor the kings that came after him were to be allowed to enjoy the blessings of peace, for a new and terrible enemy now appeared on our shores. In the ninth century, the coasts of Britain were ravaged by the Northmen or Vikings, those Wild sea-wandering lords Who sailed in a snake-prowed galley with a terror of twenty swords. The word Vikings or 'wickings' means creek-men, from a Scandinavian word 'wick', 'a creek'. These Scandinavian and Danish sea-pirates left their homes in the bays and fiords of North-West Europe, and made raids upon Britain and the neighbouring lands more at first from greed of plunder than with any idea of conquest. Large numbers of Danes landed on our eastern coasts and ravaged the midlands. Under their leader Hasting or Hastein, they seized and occupied the city of Chester. We can imagine the hasty flight of the monks, for the abbeys and churches were always the first objects of attack by these heathen invaders. You will read elsewhere how King Alfred finally saved the greater part of England from the Danes and converted their leaders to Christianity. The little village of Plemstall (or Plegmundstall), near Chester, reminds us of Plegmund, a Saxon hermit, who took refuge here to escape the Danes. Plegmund had been a friend and tutor of King Alfred. When Alfred's work was done, and peace made with the Danes, he called Plegmund from his lonely retreat in the marshes of the Gowy to be Archbishop of Canterbury.