What says Alfred the king ?" I said.
"Alfred sees this as well as you, or as any one but our freemen," he answered; "but not yet can he make things go as he knows they should.

This is the end at which he ever aims, and I think he will teach his people how to fight in time.

I know this, that we shall have no peace until he does." "Your king can build a grand ship, but she is of no use without men in her day by day, till they know every plank of her." "Ay," said the Saxon; "but that will come in time.

It is hard to know how to manage all things." "Why," I said, "if the care of a ship is a man's business, for that he will care.

You cannot expect him to care for farm and ship at once, when the farm is his living, and the ship but a thing that calls him away from it." "What then ?" "Pay the shipman to mind the sea, that is all.