of the provinces; they spoke nearly the same language;
they differed little in their manners and laws; domestic dissensions
in Denmark prevented, for some years, any powerful invasion from
thence, which might awaken past animosities; and as the Norman
Conquest, which ensued soon after, reduced both nations to equal
subjection, there is no further mention in history of any difference
between them. The joy, however, of their present deliverance made
such impression on the minds of the English, that they instituted an
annual festival for celebrating that great event; and it was observed
in some counties even to the time of Spellman [z].
[FN [z] Spellm. Glossary, in verbo HOCDAY.]

The popularity which Edward enjoyed on his accession was not destroyed
by the first act of his administration, his resuming all the grants of
his immediate predecessors; an attempt which is commonly attended with
the most dangerous consequences. The poverty of the crown convinced
the nation that this act of violence was become absolutely necessary;
and as the loss fell chiefly on the Danes, who had obtained large
grants from the late kings, their countrymen, on account of their
services in subduing the kingdom, the English were rather pleased to
see them reduced to their primitive poverty. The king's severity also
towards his mother, the queen-dowager, though exposed to some more
censure, met not with very general disapprobation. He had hitherto
lived on indifferent terms with the princess; he accused her of
neglecting him and his brother during their adverse fortune [a]; he
remarked that as the superior qualities of Canute, and his better
treatment of her, had made her entirely indifferent to the memory of
Ethelred, she also gave the preference to her children of the second
bed, and always regarded Hardicanute as her favourite. The same
reasons had probably made her unpopular in England; and though her
benefactions to the monks obtained her the favour of that order, the
nation was not, in general, displeased to see her stripped by Edward
of immense treasure which she had amassed. He confined her, during
the remainder of her life, in a monastery at Winchester, but carried
his rigour against her no farther. The stories of his accusing her of
a participation in her son Alfred's murder, and of a criminal
correspondence with the Bishop of Winchester, and also of her
justifying herself by treading barefoot, without receiving any hurt,
over ni