He built an supported a powerful navy;[*] and that
he might retain the seamen in the practice of their duty, and always
present a formidable armament to his enemies, he stationed three
squadrons off the coast, and ordered them to make, from time to time,
the circuit of his dominions.[**] [3] The foreign Danes dared not to
approach a country which appeared in such a posture of defence: the
domestic Danes saw inevitable destruction to be the consequence of
their tumults and insurrections: the neighboring sovereigns, the king of
Scotland, the princes of Wales, of the Isle of Man, of the Orkneys, and
even of Ireland,[***] were reduced to pay submission to so formidable
a monarch. He carried his superiority to a great height, and might have
excited a universal combination against him, had not his power been so
well established, as to deprive his enemies of hopes of shaking it It is
said, that residing once at Chester, and having purposed to go by water
to the abbey of St. John the Baptist, he obliged eight of his tributary
princes to row him in a barge upon the Dee.[****] The English historians
are fond of mentioning the name of Kenneth III.
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