this title is
derived) in the real life of the state.

In addition to this, political and social changes had been long
modifying the structure of society in a way tending to degrade the
general condition. As the lesser Kingdoms were merged into one large
one, the wider dominion of the king removed him further from the
people; every succeeding reign raising him higher, depressing them
lower, until the old English freedom was lost.

The "folk-moot" and "Witenagemot"* were heard of no more. The life of
the early English State had been in its "folk-moot," and hence rested
upon the individual English freeman, who knew no superior but {30} God,
and the law. Now, he had sunk into the mere "villein," bound to follow
his lord to the field, to give him his personal service, and to look to
him alone for justice. With the decline of the freeman (or of popular
government) came Anglo-Saxon degeneracy, which made him an easy prey to
the Danes.

*Witenagemot--a Council composed of "Witan" or "Wise Men."

The Northmen were a perpetual menace and scourge to England and
Scotland. There never could be any feeling of permanent security while
that hostile flood was always ready to press in through an unguarded
spot on the coast. The sea wolves and robbers from Norway came
devouring, pillaging, and ravaging, and then away again to their own
homes or lairs. Their boast was that they "scorned to earn by sweat
what they might win by blood." But the Northmen from Denmark were of a
different sort. They were looking for permanent conquest, and had
dreams of Empire, and, in fact, had had more or less of a grasp upon
English soil for centuries before Alfred; and one of his greatest
achievements was driving these {31} hated invaders out of England. In
1013, under the leadership of Sweyn, they once more poured in upon the
land, and after a brief but fierce struggle a degenerate England was
gathered into the iron hand of the Dane.

Canute, the son of Sweyn, continued the successes of his father,
conquering in Scotland Duncan (slain later by Macbeth), and proceeded
to realize his dream of a great Scandinavian empire, which should
include Denmark, Sweden, Norway, and England. He was one of those
monumental men who mark the periods in the pages of History, and yet
child enough to command the tides to cease, and when disobeyed, was so
humiliated, it is said, he never again placed a crown upon his head,
acknowledging the presence of a K