He upreared God's glory and loved God's law and bettered the public peace more than the kings who were before him within man's memory. God also him helped that kings and earls gladly to him bowed and were submissive to all that he willed. In Edgar's reign we first hear of the division of the shire into 'hundreds' for the trial and punishment of evildoers. Why this name was chosen is not quite clear, but the Hundred probably denoted a collection of a hundred homesteads or hamlets. The Hundred had its 'moot' or assembly of freemen, held near some sacred spot or conspicuous landmark. In Cheshire some of them, Bucklow for instance, took their names from the ancient 'lows' or burial-places. Early in the eleventh century fresh invasions of Danes took place, and in 1016 Cnut Dane became King of England. Cheshire formed a portion of a great earldom, embracing the whole of Mercia and governed by Earl Leofric. Cnut, who during his reign visited Rome and had there learnt much about church building, was a generous friend to the churches, rebuilding those that had suffered in the wars and erecting many new ones. The church of S. Olave or Olaf, in the south-eastern part of the city of Chester, probably owes its foundation to him, for the name shows that there was a Danish settlement in the city. The city itself was governed at this time, like other Danish cities, by twelve 'lagmen' or lawmen who presided over its law-courts. Leofric, not to be outdone by his master Cnut, almost entirely rebuilt the church of S. Werburga in 1057, and if we may judge from the memorials of his work which he has left in other cities of his earldom, much of the new church was probably built of stone. It is doubtful whether he lived to see the completion of his work. In any case, before many years had passed, the church was again enlarged on a still grander scale and by a greater race of church builders than any that had gone before them. CHAPTER X THE NORMANS COME TO CHESHIRE In the early months of the year A.D. 1070 the Saxons of Cheshire fled before the approach of an army of discontented and almost mutinous troops who had cut their way through the deep snowdrifts of the Pennine Hills. But neither the severity of the weather nor the hardships of the march seemed to have any effect upon the stern and indomitable Norman warrior at their head, who, like the Vikings whose blood flowed in his veins, set an example of energy and endurance to his half-starved fainting followers. William the Conqueror, Duke of Normandy, had landed in England three and a half years previously, and defeated the English King Harold at the battle of Senlac. But the real 'conquest' was yet to come; and after swift visits to the west and north of England William crossed the hills that lay between York and Cheshire and made a dash upon Chester, the one great city of free England that had not yet bowed to the might of the Norman invader.