Note 59 — Front matter

The cruelty with which Roger Hoveden and the author of the life of St. Elphege charge the Danes, is owing to the above-mentioned reason. The Danes had no market for slaves in England; and they could neither give a share of their provisions to their captives, nor detach a body of men from the army, to keep in order such an immense number of slaves, whom they knew would undertake any thing which might restore them to liberty, and enable them to harrass their enemy. Under such circumstances, the Barbarians had no other alternative than to put their captives to death;—death was perhaps far preferable to a diseased life consumed in a horrid dungeon, which often has been the case. Vita Sancti Elphegi in Whartoni Anglia Sacra. Igitur ex omni numero, qui ad octo millia hominum prætendebatur, quatuor solummodo monasticæ professionis octingentos autem inferioris ordinis viros remansisse accepimus, quos primum beneficii gratia computatos, deinde verberibus acriter exaratos, aut pecuniaria redemptione dignos judicaverunt, aut servilibus mancipandos operibus secum abduxerunt. Roger Hoveden, fol. 247. b. Grex monachalis et turba virilis, sed et muliebris necnon infantilis decimatur, novem trucidantur decimus vitæ reservatur quatuor monachis et octingentis decimatorum summa perficitur.