second year of his age, the nineteenth of his reign over Mercia and Northumbria, the sixteenth of his rule over all England, in the third year of the indiction, and on the eighth day before the ides of July, it being the fifth day of the week, leaving his son Edward heir to his kingdom and his virtues. His body was carried to Glastonbury, and there interred with royal honors. He, during his lifetime, had collected together three thousand six hundred ships ; and it was his custom every year, after the solemnities of Easter were concluded, to collect twelve hundred of these on the eastern, twelve hundred on the western, and twelve hundred on the southern coast of the island, and to row to the western side with the eastern fleet, and then sending that back, to row to the north with the western one ; and again sending that back, to row to the east with the northern one ; and in this manner it had been his usage every summer to sail around the whole island, manfully acting thus for the defence of his kingdom against foreigners, and for the exercise of himself and his people in military affairs. But in the winter and spring it was his practice to pass along the interior of his kingdom throughout all the provinces of the English, and to see how his legal enactments, and his decrees and statutes, had been observed by the men in power. He was also accustomed to use every possible precaution that the poor might not receive detriment by oppression from the rich. Thus, in one respect, his object was military strength, in the other, justice ; and in both he consulted the welfare of the people and of the realm. By reason of this he was held in fear by his enemies on every side, while he was endeared to those who were subjected to him ; at his departure the whole kingdom was in a state of perturbation, and after a period of gladness, because the country flourished in peace in his days, tribulation began to arise in every quarter. For Elpher, the duke of the Mercians, and many chief men in the kingdom, blinded by great bribes, expelled the abbats and monks from the monasteries in which king Edgar the Peaceful had placed them, and introduced there secular clergy with their wives; but the madness of this rash man was resisted by Ethelwin, the duke of East Anglia, a friend of God, and his brother Elfwold, and earl Brithnoth, who, hold- 76 ANNALS OF B0GEB. DE HOVEDEN. A.D. 975.