province into the two portions known to us to-day as Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire; for the former, when we get information about it in the eleventh century, shews no signs of Danish colonisation and was regarded as subject to Mercian law, whereas the latter was then peopled to a considerable extent by sochemanni and was held to be a portion of the Danelaw.
The followers of Halfdene and Guthrum when once settled proved fairly peaceable neighbours to Wessex and her Mercian ally, and in the next two decades only gave trouble on one or two occasions when roused by the appearance of fresh fleets from abroad. This furnished Alfred with a much needed opportunity for re-organising his realm, and it is his great glory that he not only took up the task with patient doggedness, but shewed himself if possible even more capable as a reformer in peace than as a leader in war. It is impossible for want of space to follow his reforms in detail, but a few of the more noteworthy developments due to his constructive statesmanship may be glanced at. First we may take his military reforms. These comprised the improvement of his naval force by the enlistment of Frisians, and the division of the fyrd, or national levy, into two parts, the one to be available as a relief to the other at convenient intervals, so that the peasant soldiers might have proper opportunities of attending to the needs of their farms and therefore less excuse for deserting in the middle of a campaign. But more important than either of these was the gradual creation in all parts of his kingdom of fortified strongholds, defended by earthworks and palisades of timber, in imitation of the Danish "boroughs," and the subdivision of the ancient West Saxon shires into smaller districts of varying size, each charged with the upkeep of one or more forts. The evidence for this is found in the many references to the "men of the boroughs" that begin to appear in the chronicle as the reign proceeds and even in the land-books, such as the Worcester charter[1], which sets forth how Aethelred, with Alfred's consent, "worked" a borough at Worcester for the protection of the bishop and monks and granted them the right to take a scot (burh-wealles-scaeting) for its maintenance. This, of course, is a Mercian instance, but a list[2] of the boroughs of Wessex and of the hidages assessed on their appendant districts has also chanced to be preserved, which cannot be of a date much after Alfred's death, and this mentions some twenty-five strongholds scattered up and down his kingdom. Of these, the more important along the south coast were Hastings, Lewes, Chichester, Porchester, Southampton, Wareham, Bridport and Exeter; and along the north frontier, Barnstaple, Watchet, Axbridge, Bath, Malmesbury, Cricklade, Wallingford and Southwark (Suthringa geweore). It seems also likely that the scheme of hidage recorded in this document
