“But you are not to believe from this, that the Danish army ever got a hold on the kingdom of Wessex. I think that the following passage from Asser’s ‘Life of Alfred’ will explain a good deal to you. Referring to his sojourn in Athelney, Asser says:-- “‘We may believe that this misfortune was brought upon the aforesaid king, because in the beginning of his reign, when he was a youth, and influenced by youthful feelings, he would not listen to the petitions which his subjects made to him for help in their necessities; but he drove them from him and paid no heed to their requests. This particular gave much pain to the holy man, St. Neot, who was his kinsman; and often foretold to him in the spirit of prophecy that he would suffer great adversity on this account; but Alfred neither attended to the reproof of the man of God, nor listened to his true prophecy--wherefore seeing that a man’s sins must be corrected either in this world or the next, the true and righteous Judge willed that his sin should not go unpunished in this world, to the end that he might spare him in the world to come. From this cause, therefore, Alfred often fell into such great misery, that sometimes none of his subjects knew where he was, or what had become of him.’ “And Alfred learned his lesson well in the next few years, for you will find that in the year 886 A.D., ‘which was the thirty-eighth year since his birth, King Alfred, after the burning of cities and slaying of the people, honourably rebuilt the city of London and made it again habitable, and gave it into the custody of his son-in-law, Æthelred, Earl of Mercia; to which King Alfred, all the Angles and Saxons, who before had been dispersed every where, or were in captivity with the pagans, voluntarily turned and submitted themselves to his rule!’ “You see they had turned from his rule many of them because it was an unjust one in those early years of his reign. But they were never subdued by the Danes,--so that my statement which you quote, ‘that the battle of Ashdown saved England from one hundred years of Paganism,’ is not shaken. “I have directed my London bookseller to leave a copy of Asser’s ‘Life of Alfred the Great,’ for you, at Somerset House, directed to the care of my friend, the secretary of the Antiquaries’ Society; you will find it to be well worth a careful perusal. I shall be always glad to hear from you upon the subjects on which we have conversed, and heartily desiring that the veneration for all that is old may grow upon you, and that God may have you in his good keeping, I am faithfully yours, “----.”