[* Asser, p. 6. Chron. Sax. p. 79.]
The Mercians, in this extremity, applied to Ethered for succor; and that
prince, with his brother Alfred, conducting a great army to Nottingham,
obliged the enemy to dislodge, and to retreat into Northumberland.
{870.} Their restless disposition, and their avidity for plunder,
allowed them not to remain long in those quarters; they broke into East
Anglia, defeated and took prisoner Edmund, the king of that country,
whom they afterwards murdered in cool blood; and, committing the most
barbarous ravages on the people, particularly on the monasteries, they
gave the East Angles cause to regret the temporary relief which they had
obtained, by assisting the common enemy.
The next station of the Danes was at Reading; whence they infested
the neighboring country by their incursions. The Mercians, desirous of
shaking off their dependence on Ethered, refused to join him with
their forces; and that prince, attended by Alfred, was obliged to march
against the enemy with the West Saxons alone, his hereditary subjects.
The Danes, being defeated in an action, shut themselves up in their
garrison; but quickly making thence an irruption, they routed the West
Saxons, and obliged them to raise the siege.
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