a treat, was watching their movements, and at the acutest brain in all Wessex was ponag over the scanty items of information so "Jarted, and preparing slowly but very effecy for action. By the spring of 878, Alfred his followers had constructed unobserved z fortifications on an eminence near the sad, naturally protected by the marshes amid ich it was situated; and suddenly the royal tard, the golden dragon of Wessex, was there red, and Saxons and Danes alike knew that the King was alive again." The revulsion of Ang was amazing. The courage of the people Prved almost as if by miraculous influence. They all joyfully hastened to him," we read, and courage began to return to the fainthearted." Its nobles of Somerset hastened to the King with forces as they could collect; and soon from parts of the country came armed men to Parthen the Saxon army. A few preliminary

Yssful skirmishes with the Danes gave conface; and then Alfred, at the head of a large ime, moved from the fortress to a place known as Ebertes-stan (now Buxton-Deveril, near the Frat of Selwood, in Wiltshire. Here he was and by many from Somersetshire, Wiltshire, Hampshire; and thence he marched towards ⚫ppenham, the stronghold of the Danes, who received with alarm the intelligence of the pearance of Alfred at the head of a large y. At Ethandune (near Westbury), the ner met. Alfred kept his army in close order, mitting the phalanx formation he had previously

d to be so effective. The Danes fought aly, but their fierce onslaughts were red; and, after a fierce fight, they were -fated, and those who escaped slaughter, flod afusion towards Chippenham. The conquerSaxons were in no mood for mercy. Alfred had d his heart for the work he had to perform. e prisoners were killed, the fortress was toeged, and, after fourteen days, the Danes in -ppenham surrendered, and Alfred was once Ere lord of Wessex.

THE DANES ACCEPT CHRISTIANITY. An unexpected incident now occurred. Guththe Danish leader, the most powerful and as of his race then in England, not only Izally submitted to Alfred, but offered to adopt Christian religion. Alfred joyfully acceded the proposition, and shortly afterwards Guth, with thirty of his chief followers, was mnly baptised, Alfred himself being his scr, and giving him the name of Athelstan. ere was, however, a political treaty to be

arranged. Alfred, satisfied with recovering the independence of his own kingdom, did not attempt to interfere with the Danes in other parts of the island. It was agreed by Alfred and the Saxon Witanagemote on the one hand, and Guthrum and the nobles of East Anglia on the other, that a definite boundary should be fixed, dividing England into two parts, from the mouth of the Thames, along the river Lea to its source, and then along the course of the Ouse till the Roman Watling Street, the broad road leading to Chester, was reached. North and east of this line was to be the Danelagh, or Danes' land; south and west Alfred was King of the Saxon people.

ALFRED A LAWGIVER.

To consolidate the kingdom which he had so bravely re-created was the next work of Alfred. He reconstructed fortifications, and built many new fortresses; organised an army, in which one-half of the able-bodied natives of his king. dom were always ready for service, and established a regular and well-provided naval force, the fleet being composed of far larger and better equipped ships than had ever been seen on British waters. He established a code of laws, not, as some have asserted, first introduced by him in their entirety, but collected from the laws made in the times of the earlier kings, but in the late troubled times allowed to fall into disuse. To these laws he made additions, and, what was of more importance, established means by which they could be enforced. Although judges nominally existed, they had allowed their functions to devolve on servants and inferior officers, who were for the most part grossly inefficient and corrupt. It has been stated the King caused more than forty of them to be hanged for misconduct. He limited the power possessed by the nobles of summary jurisdiction, and put a restraint upon their exercise. It has often been stated that he originated trial by jury, but that institution existed long before his time. There is no doubt, however, that he adopted means by which juries were made more independent and efficient. He rebuilt London, which had been almost destroyed by the ravages of the Danes, and he appointed a governor, armed with power to preserve order and encourage trade.

ENCOURAGEMENT OF LEARNING.

Alfred clearly saw that the education of the people was an important element in the wellbeing of a State. He studied hard himself, and he encouraged others to study, appointing

teachers to instruct men of position, in order that they might be better able to discharge their duties. He invited to his court scholars of eminence, and endeavoured by all the means in his power to raise the standard of education among the clergy. It has been often asserted, but on very slight authority, that he established the schools which afterwards developed into the University of Oxford; but it is beyond question that he gave a wonderful impulse to learning, and that his own writings contributed greatly to its promotion. He was nearly forty years old when he began to study Latin; but such progress did he make that he was soon able to translate many works into the Anglo-Saxon language. Among the translations by him which are still in existence are Pope Gregory's “Pastorale," a directory and manual for bishops and other clericals, to which the King himself contributed a very remarkable preface; the great treatise by Boethius, "De Consolatione Philosophiæ;" and the "General History" of Orosius, one of the earliest attempts to write a history of the king. doms of the world and their geographical positions; a free translation of Bede's "Ecclesiastical History;" and a selection from the works of St. Augustine. Other works are mentioned by his biographers, but no copies of them are known to be in existence.

When it is recollected that these literary studies and achievements were carried out amid the pressure of arduous duties of statesmanship, and by a man who almost incessantly suffered intense physical pain, we cannot but wonder at and admire his firmness of will and incessant mental activity. He was expert in mechanical science, and designed buildings. His zeal for the Church was great, and he sent embassies to Christian Churches in foreign lands, even to the Nestorian Christians in remote India.

ANOTHER INVASION AND DEFEAT OF THE
DANES.

In 894, sixteen years after the treaty by which England was divided between the Saxons and the Danes, there was a new invasion by the Northmen. An attempt had been made in 883, when a band landed in Kent, and besieged Rochester, but were driven away by the King's soldiers. About 894, one of the most renowned of the sea-kings, Hasting (whose name is still preserved in the well-known attractive place of resort on the south coast), made another attempt, with about three hundred vessels. He divided his force into two bodies. One landed in Kent, near Romney; Hasting himself led the other

up the Thames and Swale, and disembarkel near Sittingbourne. Alfred. at the head of a power ful force, followed his line of march, and at last overtook him and utterly routed him at Faraham, pursuing the fugitives with great slaughter. While so engaged the news reached him tat descents were being made on the sentbern, especially the Devonshire. coasts. By rapi marches, Alfred reached Exeter, then besieged by the Danes, and defeated them. Hasting esi quitted the Thames, and his ships had reac* -I the Severn, where Alfred gained another victory. The Danes retreated into Northumbria and Es Anglia, and again made their way to the Thames, and sailed up the little river Lea. Alfrelflowed, and, by diverting the water of the streaza, compelled them to abandon their ships. Defcure! in every encounter by the energy and ability oỂ Alfred, the Danes retreated, and Wessex was at peace, except from a few desultory attack ty Danish pirates, easily captured by the large stips and bold seamen of the Saxon fleet.

DEATH OF ALFRED.

On the 28th of October 901 (or 900, the remed is rather uncertain), Alfred the Great diei, ani was buried in the monastery at Winchester, which he had founded. In 1642, the Parliam.rtary troops broke open the tomb and scatt res the ashes of the dead, the great Alfred's an ag others. He was happy in his domestic relations, and left behind him three sons and two daugh ters, each of whom exhibited marked ability and energy of character. Asser, the father's freal and biographer, says of the sons (the elder of whom, Edward. succeeded to the throne) "They had the love of all about them, arl showed affability and gentleness to all, ba natives and foreigners, and were in comple subjection to their father. Nor amongst those other studies which pertain to their life, an are fit for noble youths, were they suffered to pass their time idly and unprofitably, without learning the liberal arts: for they have carefully learni the Psalms and Saxon books, especially the Sa poems, and are continually in the habit of making use of both." The girls of the real family were trained, we are informel, all kinds of womanly work." His admirable wife, Elswitha, survived him six years, and died at the court of her son. She was amply provel for by her loving husband, the Great Alfre as we name him, Alfred the truth-teller,' 29 he was reverently designated by an author of the Norman time.

66

G. R. E.

meant simply the ruin of the German Empire; and a century and a half was inadequate to heal the wounds inflicted between the years 1618, when the war broke out, and 1648, when the utter exhaustion of all parties brought about the Peace of Westphalia. The features of the contest were horrible; and all the armies appear to have become alike demoralised, and hardened into ferocious cruelty by the length of the struggle. Nine hundred thousand men perishing within two years in Saxony alone; all the torments that the rapacity and lawlessness of a brutal soldiery could inflict, practised year after year upon the wretched inhabitants of towns and villages; fanaticism and bigotry in their worst forms, using oppression as their weapon, and hounding on the superstitious and the ignorant to tear cach other; whole districts once covered with thriving towns and hamlets silent and abandoned to solitude and desolation, plague and famine following in the track of warfare to complete its work, such are the features of the heaviest calamity that ever befell the great German nation, spreading sorrow and devastation throughout the length and breadth of the land, from the shores of the Baltic to the Lower Danube, and from the borders of France to the confines of Poland. No part of the vast empire was spared; for the torrent of war swept over all, though some districts suffered more than others, Saxony and Bohemia being the chief victims.

THE CHRISTIAN SOLDIER.

Amid all this desolation and havoc and wrong, there stands forth, in bright contrast to the selfish, sordid, and blood-thirsty crew around him, one gracious, heroic figure. It is Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden, "The Lion of the North, and the Bulwark of the Protestant Faith," the one great leader among the many whose names are rendered famous during the struggle, who stood forth for a good cause, and fought like a Christian soldier. He alone seems to have entered upon the strife from higher motives,-to secure to his Protestant brethren in Germany the blessings of religious toleration and freedom of worship; he alone preserved his fame unspotted amid all the intrigues of ambition and statecraft by which the main question of the struggle was at length obscured and superseded; and to him posterity has with one voice accorded the honours of a Christian hero, even his enemies being unable to withhold from so much greatness and virtue their tribute of posthumous praise. In various points a close analogy may be drawn between the part played by Gustavus Adolphus in

the Thirty Years' War, and that of John Hampden in the great struggle that was being waged in England for religious and political freedom. To both men were common the lofty enthusiasm that led them to face dangers and to conquer difficulties, forbidding them to look back when once they had put their hands to the plough. Euth were distinguished by great personal valour, and a regardlessness of danger that brought fatal consequences; both were men of strong religions convictions that took the puritan form; and in both cases their career was violently cut short at the time when their services were most needed.

THE ANCESTORS OF GUSTAVUS ADOLPHUS; THE HOUSE OF VASA.

Gustavus Adolphus, the great King of Sweden. belonged to an illustrious house. It is seldom indeed in history that distinguished men follow one another in three generations. Yet this was the case here. Gustavus Vasa, the grandfather of Gustavus Adolphus, laid the foundation of the greatness of Sweden; his father, Charles IX carried forward the work on its founder's plan: and Gustavus Adolphus himself gave an extens a to the work, of which his predecessors had never dreamed, and which rendered it of paramount importance in the history of Europe. The firs three Vasas all played an important part in history.

The way in which the family attained the regal power was this:-In Sweden during the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, the gover ment was an elective monarchy, the nobles fre quently quarrelling for the possession of the throne. The power of the feudal nobility and clergy increased in every generation, and even bishops and archbishops kept soldiers, and sent forth men to fight for them. In time, the barons acquired the power of petty kings in their separate districts, and grievously oppressed their peasants with taxes and feudal labour. The power of the Church was still greater; and at one time a third of the Swedish soil was held by ecclesiastics. Continual feuds with Denmark and Norway increased the confusion of affairs; until at length, in the year 1397, an attempt was made to put an end to the misrule by the Treaty of Calmar.

By this treaty it was settled that the three countries, Sweden, Norway, and Denmark, should be under one single government; the succession to the throne to be vested in the reigning house of Denmark; but each of the three countries to remain in possession of its own laws and privi

The arrangement did not produce the ared effect, and, indeed, brought little advanexcept to the clergy, whose already over. power it greatly increased. The royal was little more than a shadow in Sweden, * power being in the hands of the governor or ral deputy, who held his dignity for life. e men out of the Sture family distinguished melves in this office,-Sten Sture, Swante e, and Sten Sture the younger.

IMISTIAN II. AND GUSTAVUS VASA; SWEDEN A SEPARATE MONARCHY.

A very different king from the powerless tates elevated by the union of Calmar came the throne in 1513, in the person of Christian Astute and cunning as the French Louis XI., at like that monarch, utterly ruthless in his ty, he determined to secure unlimited sway, bly took up the fight against the aristoc47, the great commercial predominance of the and the clergy. In Sweden his task was -red easy for him by the feud between the s of Sture and Trolle, who had contended a chief office of the State. Gustavus Trolle, he failed to win the governorship, sucin securing the archbishopric of Upsala, cond office in the kingdom. He became adliest enemy of the Stures, and gave all istance in his power to Christian, in his of absolute rule. It was partly through assistance that Christian was enabled to ** terror in Sweden by the atrocious massacre ockholm in the year 1520, when ninety-four the most influential members of the upper es were put to death within three days. In ark and Norway similar measures were to destroy the power of the aristocracy, weaken the commercial interest. bat the event was contrary to the tyrant's and expectations. He had raised up terest against him,-the aristocracy, the ata, and the merchants. In Jutland the ty rose in revolt and drove him away. In n the blood-stained edifice of his power fell arler. Gustavus Vasa, a relative of the family, had been treacherously conveyed mark as a hostage, in defiance of plighted r. to the contrary, by Christian II., who invely discerned an enemy in the energetic telligent young noble. Gustavus Vasa **ed to escape to Sweden, on board a mership, and presently roused the brave faithful Dalecarlian peasants of the North

t. Victorious against the troops of the shop of Upsala, he was presently pro

claimed governor of the kingdom and leader of the army, at the Diet of Wadstena. In 1523, the decree of another Diet raised him to the dignity of King of Sweden, and he made a triumphal entry into the capital. The next year a peace between Denmark and Sweden was brought about; and in 1544, the Diet of Westeras declared the crown of Sweden to be hereditary in the Vasa family. The name Vasa, it may be observed, had a warlike origin. The word designates the fascines, or faggots, which are thrown into the ditches across which a storming party has to advance to the attack of a town. The family with the warlike name, and a policy no less warlike, established their rule in Sweden under great and manifold difficulties and dangers. Gustavus, while he bequeathed the crown to his eldest son, Eric XIV., unfortunately weakened the royal power by giving the principalities of Finland, East Gothland, and Sudermanland, to his other sons, John, Magnus, and Charles. Eric, a wild and passionate king, increased the territory of the country, but at last went mad, after having, in his frenzied jealousy, put to death various members of the royal family, and menaced the highest nobles with a similar fate. Deposed by his brothers, he was cast into prison, where poison, administered in consequence of a decree of the Council, put an end to his miserable life. His next brother, John, succeeded him,—a weak-minded and vacillating prince, who at one time, persuaded by his queen, a princess of Polish birth, abjured the Protestant faith; and though he afterwards adopted it again, never regained the confidence of his subjects that he had forfeited by this ill-advised step. His son and successor, Sigismund, was a Catholic and King of Poland. To prevent danger to the Protestant faith in Sweden from this circumstance, it was decreed at the Council of Upsala, that the Evangelical Lutheran religion should be the only one acknowledged and tolerated in Sweden; and as Sigismund had returned to Poland, his uncle, Charles of Sudermanland, the son of Gustavus Vasa, was chosen as governor of the kingdom. Sigismund was highly indignant at this arrange. ment, which he tried to upset by force of arms, but was unsuccessful; and after he had refused a demand made by the Diet at Stangebro, under Charles's influence, that he should renounce the Roman faith and either come to Sweden to rule his hereditary dominions in person, or send his son within five months, that the heir might be instructed in the national religion, the crown was given to Charles IX, the son of Gustavus Vasa, and the defender of the Protestant faith.