To puff and look important and to say:—
‘Though we know we should defeat you, we have not the time to meet you,
We will therefore pay you cash to go away.’
But we’ve proved it again and again,
That if once you have paid him the Dane-geld
You never get rid of the Dane.
For fear they should succumb and go astray,
So when you are requested to pay up or be molested,
You will find it better policy to say:—
No matter how trifling the cost,
For the end of that game is oppression and shame,
And the nation that plays it is lost!’
And Canute ruled England righteously. He turned Christian, he rebuilt the abbeys and churches which his ancestors had burned, he kept a strong little army of English or Danish soldiers about his person, and he kept order and peace. His sons, however, were good for nothing; King Edward the Confessor, 1042–1066.and in 1042 Edward, the younger son of Ethelred, was recalled from ‘Normandy’, whither he had been sent to be out of Canute’s way, and ruled Eneland as king till 1066.
Dangers from abroad.Now, as we approach the end of the Saxon period of our history, let us take a look at our foreign neighbours.
Those who will be important to us are four in number.
1. Denmark and Norway; except in the reign of Canute, these were always hostile.
Scotland.2. Scotland, once Pict-land, the district north of the Forth and Clyde. Celtic ‘Scots’ from Ireland had con-
