s. In spite of
the vigorous edicts of the Danes against arms a great proportion of
them bore weapons, which had been buried in the earth, or concealed in
hollow trees or other hiding-places until the time for action should
again arrive.

As they saw the king approaching at the head of his band, with the
Golden Dragon fluttering in the breeze, a great shout of joy arose from
the multitude, and they crowded round the monarch with shouts of
welcome at his reappearance among them, and with vows to die rather
than again to yield to the tyranny of the Northmen. The rest of the day
was spent in distributing the newly fashioned arms to those who needed
them, and in arranging the men in bands under their own thanes, or, in
their absence, such leaders as the king appointed.

Upon the following morning the army started, marching in a
north-easterly direction against the great camp of the Danes at
Chippenham. That night they rested at Okeley, and then marched on until
in the afternoon they came within sight of the Danes gathered at
Ethandune, a place supposed to be identical with Edington near Westbury.

As the time for Alfred's reappearance approached the agitation and
movement on the part of the people had attracted the attention of the
Danes, and the news of his summons to the Saxons to meet him at
Egbertesstan having come to their ears, they gathered hastily from all
parts under Guthorn their king, who was by far the most powerful viking
who had yet appeared in England, and who ruled East Anglia as well as
Wessex. Confident of victory the great Danish army beheld the approach
of the Saxons. Long accustomed to success, and superior in numbers,
they regarded with something like contempt the approach of their foes.

In the centre Alfred placed the trained phalanx which had accompanied
him from Athelney, in the centre of which waved the Golden Dragon, by
whose side he placed himself. Its command he left in the hands of
Edmund, he himself directing the general movements of the force. On his
right were the men of Somerset and Hants; on the left those of Wilts,
Dorset, and Devon.

His orders were that the advance was to be made with regularity; that
the whole line were to fight for a while on the defensive, resisting
the onslaught of the Danes until he gave the word for the central
phalanx to advance and burst through the lines of the enemy, and that
when these had been thrown into confusion by this attack the flanks
were to cha