Almost the first incident which his biographer recounts is the pretty story of how his mother sought to encourage her sons to learn to read. Showing the lads a beautifully-illuminated volume of English verse, and reading aloud some of its contents, she promised the volume to the first of them who could read it for himself. Fired by the desire to possess the volume, and also to learn something more of its wondrous pages, Alfred sought out a tutor, and ere long was able to claim it as his own. The love of letters, thus early demonstrated, grew with the years. In his later and more peaceful days he surrounded himself with scholars, and loved their company and converse better than aught else. Asser, the Welsh monk, who was his devoted friend, tells us that as “Alfred advanced through the years of infancy and youth, he appeared more comely in person than his brothers, and his countenance, speech, and manners were more pleasing than theirs. His noble birth and noble nature implanted in him from his cradle a love of wisdom above all things.” In his twentieth year Alfred married a noble Mercian lady named Mercill. Meanwhile, the Danes, growing bolder and bolder, had become a grievous peril to the land. In the year of Alfred’s marriage they marched on York, and capturing it, pushed into Mercia and wintered at Nottingham. In the twenty-second year of Alfred’s life they triumphed over Edmund, King of the East Angles. Him they dragged forth and bound to a tree. Then with fiendish glee they shot arrows into his limbs, and at length, unable to break his proud and confident spirit, they struck off his devoted head. They parted his realm amongst themselves, and placed their chief, Guthrum, on his throne. Next year King Ethelred and Alfred were overcome by the Danes at Reading. Roused by grief and shame at the loss of this battle, the English mustered in force and advanced against their foes at Ashdown. While Ethelred remained in his tent at prayer, Alfred led his men to the fight, and “with the rush of a wild boar,” charged up the slopes on which the Danes had stationed themselves. Long and fierce was the fray, but at nightfall victory rested with the English. Their joy was short-lived; a fortnight later the Danes were again victorious, and soon another Viking army from across the sea joined them. In the same year died Ethelred of his wounds, and Alfred was crowned king of a realm which was little more than a name. A month later his small army was overcome, and black indeed was the outlook. “Let no one be surprised,” says Asser, “that the English had but a small number of men, for they had been all but worn out by eight battles in this self-same year; in the which there died one king, nine chieftains, and innumerable troops of soldiers.”