And even the traitor Edric, having had the assurance to reproach him
with his services, was condemned to be executed, and his body to be
thrown into the Thames; a suitable reward for his multiplied acts of
perfidy and rebellion.
Canute also found himself obliged, in the beginning of his reign,
to load the people with heavy taxes, in order to reward his Danish
followers: he exacted from them at one time the sum of seventy-two
thousand pounds; besides eleven thousand pounds which he levied on
London alone. He was probably willing, from political motives, to mulct
severely that city, on account of the affection which it had borne to
Edmond, and the resistance which it had made to the Danish power in two
obstinate sieges.[*] But these rigors were imputed to necessity,
and Canute, like a wise prince, was determined that the English, now
deprived of all their dangerous leaders, should be reconciled to the
Danish yoke, by the justice and impartiality of his administration. He
sent back to Denmark as many of his followers as he could safely spare;
he restored the Saxon customs in a general assembly of the states; he
made no distinction between Danes and English in the distribution of
justice; and he took care, by a strict execution of law, to protect
the lives and properties of all his people.
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