portion of Wessex was allotted to him, probably such as had been held by his father Ethelwulph, when the subjects rebelled on account of his step-mother Judith. Slightly as we have passed by this frail fair lady, Alfred was greatly indebted to her; she first tempted him to read when he was only twelve years of age; but for her he might, like his brothers, have remained in ignorance. She first pointed out the path which guided him to the literature of Rome; he had trod the streets of the "eternal city," and his wise laws tell us the use he made of his learning. We are compelled to drag the great king bit by bit before our readers, lest we should startle them by his too sudden appearance; for he seems to rise above the age in which he lived with an unnatural majesty--there is no relief near to where he stands, no neighbouring summit which he might descend that would seem to lessen his giant form in its shadow;--bold and bare and giant-like his god-imaged figure heaves up, and with its mighty shadow eclipses the very sunset which, though ever sinking, leaves not in gloom the bright form that makes the "darkness visible" by which it is surrounded. CHAPTER XX. RAVAGES OF THE DANES--DEATH OF ETHELRED. "We look in vain for those old ruins now, For the green grass waves o'er that ample floor, And where the altar stood rank nettles grow; None mourned its fall more than the neighbouring poor, They passed its ruins sighing, day by day, And missed the beadsman in his hood of gray, Who never bade the hungry turn away."--THE OLD ABBEY.