He commenced his reign by a dishonourable concession, such as Athelstan would never have thought of, though it had cost him both his kingdom and his life in resisting it. He ended it by an act of cruelty, causing the eyes of the sons of Dunmail to be put out. Shortly after this, he fell in his own banqueting-hall, by the hand of a robber, in the midst of his nobles; while the wine-cup was circulating in celebration of the great Saxon feast held in memory of St. Augustine, he was struck dead by the dagger of Leof. At what place the deed was done, how the robber obtained admittance into the hall, whether angry words were exchanged between the assassin and the king, nothing certain is known--so much do the accounts vary in the old chronicles, although all admit the fact. Leof had been banished for six years; he suddenly appeared in the presence of the king; his object, beyond doubt, was to slay him. Could we but prove that the murderer belonged to the ancient Cymry, we should probably not be far in error in concluding that he came to revenge the tortures which had been inflicted on the British princes, who were blinded by the command of Edmund. Vengeance only could have induced an armed and banished robber to rush into the presence of the king, when he was feasting in the midst of his nobles, and there, on his own hearth, to deprive him of life. Strange that the scene of an event so well known, should be buried in obscurity. There must have been motives that impelled the murderer to perpetrate such a deed, which were unfavourable to the character of Edmund, or we should have met with something more than the mere entry of his violent death in the early chronicles. He was slain in his twenty-third year--in the dawn of manhood; but where he fell, or in what place he was buried, history has not left a single record that we can rely upon. Malmesbury says, "His death opened the door for fable all over England." How ominous his rising! how dark and sudden his setting! what splendour surrounded his noonday career; yet, withal, his life might be written in four brief sentences--"He perilled his kingdom in his youth--nobly redeemed the false step he had taken--committed an act of inhuman cruelty--was afterwards murdered, in the year 946." Edred succeeded Edmund, for the son of the latter was but a child when his father was slain. They were both sons of Edward the Elder by his second marriage, and, from the date of his death, must have been mere infants when he died. Both could claim the great Alfred as their grandfather.